Ionized Metal and Corrosion

Name: Phillip
Status: other
Grade:
Location: OR

Question: Can ionizing a metal protect it from acids? Will a
positive or negative charge bind, repel, or tie up an acid's
corrosiveness on metal?
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Phillip,

When metals such as iron, aluminum, zinc, etc. react with an 
acid, the metal is said to be oxidized - the metal gives up at 
least one electron to the hydrogen ion of the acid. This results 
in the metal being ionized and the hydrogen ion becoming hydrogen 
gas (being reduced). Thus, saying that ionizing a metal protects it 
from acids is in some sense correct in that no further reactions 
with acids can occur. However, it is also incorrect because in 
another sense, the metal after having been ionized is already in 
a form as though it already reacted with the acid in the first place. 
Thus the ionic form being a product of the metal-acid reaction is not 
a protection from the reaction itself because the ionic form is the 
product of the reaction.

Greg (Roberto Gregorius)
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