Reducing properties of Tin (II)
While growing the tin hedgehog from the previous experiment, let’s learn some other properties of tin (II) chloride. It is a strong reducing agent. Tin (II) ion interacts with the oxidizers like bromine water, potassium permanganate, potassium bromide. And also reduces iron (III) ion to a bivalent iron or silver (I) ione to metallic silver.
For this experiment I took iodine solution in alcohol (instead of bromine water), potassium permanganate, potassium bichromate and iron (III) chloride (with KSCN added for a better visual effect, you can find more information here).
Those solutions were dropped on a filter paper resulting in four colored spots. Tin (II) chloride solution was dropped in the middle of each spot which resulted in discoloration as you can see from the video:
In case of bichromate reduction, a light green color of chrome (III) can be observed. Manganese (II) salts have a light pink color in a solid state, but it’s hard to notice in a solution. On a side note - try to compare a manganese (II) salt solution with water under a good light and you may see the difference.
The chemistry behind the discoloration can be generally described as followed: