Why when water is heated it's volume first decreases and then

[mia5]

Why is that when water is heated it's volume first decreases and then increases ?

 

[jedishrfu]

the theory goes that water as ice the molecules are more widely separated and then as the crystal shape is destroyed by the added heat the water becomes liquid and takes up less space and then when its hot enough it will transition to steam taking up a lot more space.

Wikipedia describes it better:

An unusual property of ice frozen at atmospheric pressure is that the solid is approximately 8.3% less dense than liquid water. The density of ice is 0.9167 g/cm3 at 0 °C,[2] whereas water has a density of 0.9998 g/cm³ at the same temperature. Liquid water is densest, essentially 1.00 g/cm³, at 4 °C and becomes less dense as the water molecules begin to form the hexagonal crystals[3] of ice as the freezing point is reached. This is due to hydrogen bonding dominating the intermolecular forces, which results in a packing of molecules less compact in the solid. Density of ice increases slightly with decreasing temperature and has a value of 0.9340 g/cm³ at −180 °C (93 K).[4]

refer to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice

 

[mia5]

thanks

Thanks for the answer :)