Is sulfuric acid a strong acid?

Answer 1

Yes, it is extremely strong. It is a very corrosive acid and is a 1 or so on the pH scale which is very acidic. I have tested and concentrated sulfuric acid melted through a rag folded twice.

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Sulfuric acid is a strong acid, but an acid being strong or weak doesn't refer to its corrosiveness. A strong acid completely dissociates when you put it in water--all the hydrogen atoms break away from the SO4 group in the molecule. Sulfuric acid does this. A weak acid is one where some of the hydrogen atoms remain attached to their partnered atoms. One strange one is hydrofluoric acid--HF. It is a weak acid because fluorine really loves to hold onto hydrogen atoms, but it is an extremely corrosive, hard to handle and hazardous acid that will eat glass, almost all metals, and most plastics. They have to ship it in Teflon bottles, it's that bad. Oh, and if you spill it onto a 25-square-inch piece of your skin, the HF will soak through your skin, pull all the calcium out of your blood and kill you, unless you immediately get treated. (The treatment consists of rubbing a gel containing calcium gluconate into your skin over the site of the burn. By giving the HF enough calcium to react completely out, you can keep from dying--however, you've still got to deal with the huge hole it will make in you.)