flames test color: disappear?

for an atom to release a specific among of energy, it has to firstly be ionised, i.e. remain single, when you give some energy to the atom, or ion, the energy is absorbed, some energy increase the vibration of the atom, some of the energy activated the electrons and push it to another level. When the ion became too excited, it will reacts with the surroundng, e.g. the O2 in air, and will give out specific among of energy that can characterized the atom. e.g. K+ will give lilic color and form K2O.

I think this is the mechanism for flame test... please correct me if I am wrong!

2010-06-15 13:08:33 補充：
if you use KCl to start the reactions, there are a couple of "thing" in the system,

firstly, you would have KCl, then the acid, let say you use H2SO4, you have O2

as a result, what could happened? what are the possibility?

I think, as a result of the flame test, the following would present...

2010-06-15 13:12:46 補充：
KCl, HCl, H2SO4, KHSO4, K2O, KOH? and so on....

it shouldn't smell like chlorine gas...

There are some reasons,I show it in point form(use potassium as example)
--When you heat potassium,the kinetic energy of K increase
--increase the chance of effective collision bewteen K and oxygen
--K will react with O to form potassium superoxide(KO2)

The reason for the disappearment of the colour is all the K+ ions react with O

2010-06-10 15:00:51 補充：
remember, potassium superoxide is KO2 but not potassium oxide K2O