Barium Carbide, BaC₂

Barium Carbide, BaC₂, was first obtained in an impure form by reducing barium carbonate with magnesium in the presence of carbon, or by heating a mixture of barium amalgam with powdered carbon in a current of hydrogen at red heat. The pure compound is prepared as a black crystalline mass, of density 3.75, by reducing anhydrous barium oxide or barium carbonate with carbon in the electric furnace, or with the oxyhydrogen flame. Its properties are similar to those of the other alkaline earth carbides, but it is more fusible. It reacts with sulphur, selenium, arsenic, phosphorus, chlorine, iodine, bromine, and oxygen.

It dissociates at high temperatures, the metal volatilising and leaving crystals of graphite. When strongly heated in the electric furnace, barium carbide can be made to take up carbon in solution.