Vanadium (new) - Periodic Table of Videos

(Piano music) Vanadium, element number 23,

the third of the so-called " transition metals, " so it lies between titanium and chromium

in the Periodic Table. I don't know a huge amount about the chemistry

of vanadium. I've never actually seen vanadium metal, so let's have a look at it.

It's in a really quite historic box. It's wire; it's not easy to open.

And you can see there's a coil of fairly black-ish coloured wire.

There are several things that interest me: first of all that you can make wire as thin as that,

and secondly, that it doesn't look very shiny, possibly it's got an oxide layer on the surface.

I've been given another sample: of vanadium powder, but vanadium powder can catch fire quite easily,

and so I don't really want to take it out because we might have a fire here on the table