so is the balanced equation
MnO4+C2O4->Mn +2CO2.. that doesnt make sense because there are 8 oxygens on the right side..
MnO4 + 2C2O4 -> Mn + 4CO2
Now there are 4 carbons on both sides and 8 Oxygens and one Manganese. You did good. Just forgot to put a 2 on the left side.
correction...your answer is correct. I read your 8 and didn't look closely. There are NOT 8 oxygens on the right side...there are only 4. 2 X 2 = 4. The answer I gave reduces to what you had. Therefore your answer was correct.
Bad news for both Lisa and K. No, the equation isn't balanced. To be balanced, a redox equation must:
1. have the same number of atoms of each element on each side. That part is OK, for now, but it won't be true when you fix 2 and 3 below.
2. have the same amount of charge on both sides. If written correctly, that isn't so. You have omitted the change on MnO4^-, C2O4^=, and Mn^+2.
3. The number of electrons lost must be equal to the number of electrons gained. That isn't so either.
Here is a hint:
a. Put the charges on permanganage, manganese ion, and oxalate ion.
b. Mn in MnO4^- is +7. Mn in Mn^+2 is +2. That is gain of 5 electrons.
c. C in C2O4^= is +6 (for both C atoms) and changres to +8(for both C atoms in 2CO2). That is a loss of 2 electrons.
You are correct, the given balanced equation does not have an equal number of oxygen atoms on both sides. To balance the equation, we need to adjust the coefficients in front of the chemical formulas to ensure that the number of atoms of each element is the same on both sides of the equation.
To balance the number of oxygen atoms, we can start by balancing the carbon atoms. There are two carbon atoms on the left side, so we need to have two carbon atoms on the right side as well. To do this, we can change the coefficient in front of CO2 to 2.
The equation becomes:
MnO4 + C2O4 → Mn + 2CO2
Now, let's balance the oxygen atoms. On the left side, we have four oxygen atoms from MnO4 and eight oxygen atoms from C2O4, making a total of twelve oxygen atoms. On the right side, we have two oxygen atoms from CO2, so we need to balance it by adding ten more oxygen atoms.
To do this, we can add five water molecules (H2O) to the right side of the equation because each water molecule contains one oxygen atom:
MnO4 + C2O4 → Mn + 2CO2 + 5H2O
By counting the atoms after this adjustment, we have one manganese (Mn) atom, four carbon (C) atoms, and twelve oxygen (O) atoms on both sides. The equation is now balanced.