Sodium copper dichloroisocyanurate

sodium copper dichloroisocyanurate is an exotic complex with the formula Na2[Cu(C3N3O3Cl2)4]. It exists as a purple powdery solid. If you own a fountain with copper in it, you my have come across this compound before. If you use sodium dichloroisocyanurate to treat your fountain water, it will slowly react with the copper generating some of this colourful complex. this will give the copper a light purple coating.

To make the complex I started with two beakers. In one I prepared a solution of copper sulphate and in the second, a solution of sodium dichloroisocyanurate. I combined the solutions slowly and as I did so a purple precipitate of sodium copper dichloroisocyanurate formed. I filtered the precipitate and dried it. Here's the slightly wet product:

CuSO4 + 4 Na(C3N3O3Cl2) ==> Na2[Cu(C3N3O3Cl2)4] + Na2SO4

I find using concentrated solutions of sodium dichloroisocyanurate and copper sulphate works best. If dilute solutions are used, the product takes a while to form and precipitate.