Do all acid-base reactions produce a salt? If so, why?

Question

I know that salt is primarily composed of NaCl, but how does the sodium and the chlorine get there if not all acids have sodium and chlorine?

Answer 1

In everyday use, salt means NaCl.

However, in chemistry (or any other natural science), the term "salt" is used to name the product of the reaction of a base and an acid (aside from water).

For example:

NaOH + HCl --> H2O + NaCl
Base acid water salt

It's basically the same for all acid-base reactions, with the acids NOT necessarily containing Cl and the base Na.

Example:
H2SO4 + CuO --> CuSO4 + H2O
Acid base Salt Water

Hope this helps.

Answer 2

All acid base reactions produce a salt simply because the former compounds have replaceable H+ ions and the latter OH- ions which have an affinity towards each other and also because the other components can undergo ionic bond formation to produce a salt(any compond with positive ion not H+ and negetive ion not OH- and not necessarily NaCl).
Salt formation is intended at neutralizing aid and base characters. Insoluble bases react with acids by neutralization and alkalis by titration.

Answer 3

In chemistry, it's a more expanded definition of the word. Chemists define salts as the product of an acid-base neutralization.

NaCl is a salt that is produced from the reaction of NaOH and HCl. It's just common usage for non-chemists to only refer to NaCl as salt.

Answer 4

This is a problem of common usage of words vs. scientific usage. We use "salt" or "table salt" for NaCl. In fact, the word comes from the latin when soldiers were paid in salt (thus the term "worth their salt"). Later on, chemists used the word for the neutralization product of an acid with base.