The answer to why lubricant industries use graphite as raw material has various answers. But the best graphite mining companies depict that it is because of its high melting point.
Graphite is a naturally occurring allotrope of carbon. It chemically consists of carbon atoms. The lubricating properties of graphite lead to the biggest graphite producers having abundant production. Let’s find out why it is a major raw material in the lubricants industry?
Properties Of Graphite:
- It has a greyish black colour and the substance is opaque. It is lighter than diamond and is smooth and slippery to touch. Graphite has three major types: crystalline, amorphous, and flakes.
- Graphite is an excellent conductor of electricity and heat due to the presence of free electrons. It has a shiny black luster.
- Graphite is a crystalline solid that is very greasy to touch. It is fairly soft due to weak Van der Waal forces. Moreover, it is also non-inflammable.
- The lubricating properties have certain mechanisms of graphite. Due to the loosely bound property, the layers of graphite slide over each other, and thus it can act as a major lubricant between two moving surfaces.
Graphite As A Main Raw Material For Lubricant Industry:
- There are three allotropes of carbon namely graphite, diamond, and fullerene. Due to a difference in their structure, all three of them show different properties.
- Graphite occurs in natural form but can be made artificially by heating coke. The temperature must be between 3273K to 3300K in electric arc furnaces.
- In the graphite structure, all carbon atoms possess stable chemical bonds alongside the other three carbon atoms. These atoms make sheets that are later held by weak forces of attraction.
- Moreover, the two-dimensional sheet of benzene rings fuses together to make it a suitable lubricating material. Since there are only three electrons in each carbon atom that helps to make hexagonal rings, the fourth electron thus becomes free to move. It is also responsible for making graphite an excellent conductor of electricity and heat.
- Lastly, the carbon atoms in graphite have sp3 hybrids. They get the direction in a similar plane forming hexagonal rings. Additionally, the two successive layers are held together by weak attraction forces. One layer can easily slide over the other which makes graphite soft and greasy as a lubricating agent.
Conclusion:
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