Reactions between Metals and Acids

This worksheet tests a student's ability to understand the reactions between Metals and Acids.

 

First off, when an acid reacts with a metal, the acid will react with the metal to produce the metal salt of that acid; at the same time it will produce hydrogen gas.

 

What does that look like?  The general path of these metal/acid reactions is:

 

Acid + Metal  Salt + Hydrogen

 

(NB: note that the word 'salt' here refers to a metal salt, i.e. a compound of the metal which has been formed through reaction with an acid, e.g. zinc chloride, potassium nitrate and iron sulfate are all metal salts).

 

 

Example:

Here are two examples of reactions of different metals with dilute acids:

 

Zinc + Sulfuric Acid  →  Zinc Sulfate + Hydrogen
Magnesium + Hydrochloric Acid  →  Magnesium Chloride + Hydrogen     On the surface these might not seem too clear: where did the 'sulfate' or 'chloride' come from?  It might help to use compound names for these acids - after all, they are all compounds of HYDROGEN in solution.  Try this:   HYDROCHLORIC ACID  =  HYDROGEN CHLORIDE SULFURIC ACID  =  HYDROGEN SULFATE NITRIC ACID  = HYDROGEN NITRATE   Now look back at those two word equations above - can you see where the zinc sulfate and the magnesium chloride have come from?   Let's check out one more:   Copper + Nitric Acid  →  Copper Nitrate + Hydrogen  could re-written as:   Copper + Hydrogen nitrate  →  Copper nitrate + Hydrogen   Now can you see what's going on?  In all of the above reactions, the metal has TAKEN THE PLACE OF the hydrogen in the acid and formed a metal salt.  It's a type of DISPLACEMENT reaction.   You might like to read through all this again, think about it, then test out some of the following questions.