Tin: An Interesting Element Trivia Quiz

Answer: Bronze

Around 3300 BC, it was discovered that adding small amounts of tin to copper resulted in an alloy that was harder and more durable than either metal alone. Soon bronze was being used to manufacture tools, weapons, jewelry, and many other items. It was so important to the advancement of civilization that the period between 3300 and 1200 BC is known as the Bronze Age.

Answer: Great Britain

Most of the ancient world's tin came from Great Britain, especially from Cornwall. The Phoenicians engaged in an active trade with Britain, undertaking long and hazardous sea voyages to obtain this precious commodity. New sources in in Bolivia and and the Far East eventually superseded Britain as the world's leading producer. The last Cornish tin mine closed in 1998.

Answer: Allotropes

White tin (also known as beta tin) is the bright, silvery metal with which most of us are familiar. Grey, or alpha tin, is a grayish, powdery substance. Carbon is another element that exhibits allotropism; graphite and diamonds are both pure forms of carbon, but unless you knew this, you'd never guess they were the same substance.

Answer: 10

The atomic weight of tin's stable isotopes ranges from 112 to 124. It also has 28 unstable isotopes.

Answer: All of these

In America we call them "tin cans;" the British call them simply "tins." Although they are called tin cans, the tin coating is very, very thin. Interestingly enough, while tin cans were invented in 1810, the can opener wasn't invented until nearly 50 years later! Today many cans are made out of aluminum, and in the future "tin cans" may contain no tin at all.

A similar thing happened to metal foil used to wrap food; it was originally made of tin, and though nowadays it is made from aluminum, but some people still refer to it as "tin foil."

Answer: True

As strange as it sounds, at very low temperatures (below 0 degrees Celsius), tin will transform from white, metallic tin to gray, powdery tin. This process is called "tin disease" or "tin pest." You will sometimes hear stories about the tin buttons on the uniforms of Napoleon's soldiers disintegrating during the retreat from Moscow, but these are not true.

The process is a slow one, and can be prevented by adding small amounts of antimony or bismuth to the tin. One area where it was a problem was in church organs, whose pipes were made of tin alloys.

In northern countries, the pipes would begin to disintegrate after exposure to many cold winters.

Answer: Neither of these

Tin plays no known part in human nutrition.

Answer: The ceiling

Pressed tin ceilings were used in many buildings from about 1850 to 1920. They were made from very thin sheets of rolled, tin-plated steel, and were embossed with beautiful designs. They were very durable, and can still be seen in many old buildings. Tin ceilings caught on because they could be used to imitate much more expensive plaster tiles. Most tin ceilings were originally painted white to look like plaster. If you have a tin ceiling in your house and decide to replace it, don't throw away the tiles.

They can fetch as much as $15 each in the antiques market.

Answer: Solder

Tin is used for all these purposes. Pewter is an alloy of tin and lead used for making plates, stemware, and jewelry. Glass for window panes is manufactured by floating molten glass on molten tin using something called the Pilkington process, which was invented in 1960.

The fluoride in your toothpaste is in the form of the tin compound stannous fluoride (SnF2), which helps to prevent cavities. Over half of the world's tin supply, however, is used to manufacture solders used in plumbing and electronic circuits.

This use of tin is likely to continue to rise as many countries are now banning more traditional lead-based solders.

Answer: Demand far exceeds supply

We are running out of tin, and rapidly. In 2008 it was estimated that there are about 6.1 million tons of economically recoverable tin reserves, and total reserves of about 11 million tons. If current consumption rates continue, we will run out of tin in 20 to 40 years! Countries with the largest reserves include China, Malaysia, Peru, Indonesia, Brazil and Bolivia.