Nitrogen Triiodide (NI3) Synthesis
I'm not going to write a whole big intro here. I'm going to keep this very simple. NI3 is extremely sensitive and extremely dangerous. I fancy my fingers, do you? So... Do not make NI3.
And to be technical for those who like that - nitrogen triiodide 1-ammonate (NI3.NH3)n and nitrogen triiodide 3-ammonate (NI3.3NH3)n. If you don't understand that, then you can look it up.
Right now with that out of the way, here's the procedure I follow. Materials required are iodine crystals (I2) - these stain everything - and ammonia solution. The stronger the ammonia solution the better, but household ammonia works as I will show here. The following are the ratios used and can be scaled very easily.
1 (one) gram of I2 is placed in a container and crushed to a powder if needed. It is then covered with ~50 (and some synths call for more) ml of household ammonia. KI can be added to increase solubility, but I don't do that. It is then mixed around and left to react for anywhere from 10 min - 2 hours. I have seen various times in various syntheses.
The solution is then filtered and left to dry where it has been filtered. It is not moved after this point.
When dry (and possibly even before), the NI3 is sensitive to just about anything. The NI3 in the following video was made with I2 that was not crushed down to a powder beforehand and was not completely dry at the time when it was set off. The results can be clearly seen.
