Australia's Science Forum

A faster way than rubbing perspex/ebony rods is Prof Bunsen's Fun-Fly Stick! (its a hand-held mini Van der Graaf) Just turn it on (without the fun-flyers) and move it near the electroscope/s.

Yeah, laundry & shopping (supermarket, abbatoir etc.)

I keep a voice recorder in my vehicle to record trips - so much easier than a written diary. Play it back and type the info into an Excel file on my home computer.

We use the round quickfit flasks, attach condenser and reflux in an electric heating mantle.

Just to clarify ...no, wait... contradict my previous post: I put in a requisition which included 500g ammonium nitrate earlier this year. The company could not supply because " Item 1038058 is no longer available as the supply of this product to Australian schools has been banned by the Austra...

12g potassium nitrate 8g white sugar Place dry ingredients in a beaker and using hot plate, heat with stirring until molten and caramelized. Beaker tongs are recommended. Do not heat ingredients with a naked flame/Bunsen. Pour/scrape into evaporating dish or a paper cup. Allow to set. Take outside a...

There's a real easy method under 'Bromine' in CSIS Appendix F: just add a few drops of H2O2 & H2SO4 to dilute KBr solution.

If there's a no-denim policy here, no-one's told me. I wear black jeans (mainly cos I hate blue), shirt with collar. What cactus155 said about ties:

Flowers? Flowers? Bribery & Corruption!

0.100M? It is meaningless if she wants standardised solution to 3 decimal points unless you have an analytical balance capable of weighing the primary standard to at least 3 decimal points. Even if you have such a balance, schools aren't analytical laboratories and if the students end up working in ...

I use a 10-dropper tray with the divider removed to set the agar. Gives nice sharp corners and a depth of 3cm. I tape some graph paper under a sheet of perspex for cutting the set agar. I like to make it a really strong colour, so fading isn't a problem. Here's my recipe: PINK/PHENOLPHTHALEIN AGAR B...

We built one from scratch, uslng a small aquarium. Instructions here:

http://www.lns.cornell.edu/~adf4/cloud.html

Works really well using heaps of dry ice in a dark room.

We got a new Data Harvest electrode last year which read way over in pH 7 buffer. I tried calibrating using the Sensor Config, but the ADC values were basically all the same for ph 4,7 & 10 so the program wouldn't accept the calibration. I rang the supplier and was interrogated as to why I neede...

Back (with a vengence) today, with yrs 7, 11 & 12. The rest back tomorrow.

Isn't it great to get the holidays out of the way and get back to work?

Come on, think positively!

You could try igniting it under an upturned wheely-bin? Listen for 2ndry ignition.
We've fired rockets horizontally at a mannequin's head positioned inside a wheely-bin on its side. Testing PPE you know; the mannequin was wearing safety goggles.

Old yeast can be a problem. I use the 7g packets for Coopers home brew; high turn-over means its usually fresh, plus its not too fussy if it gets a bit hot.

There's a real easy method under 'Bromine' in CSIS Appendix F: just add a few drops of H 2 O 2 & H 2 SO 4 to dilute KBr solution. I dispose of products in Halogenated Organic Waste bottle, and leave test tubes in fume cupboard to evaporate off residue. Cyclohexene is particularly horrible stuff....

Daughter back in one piece @ 10pm last night, and she didn't leave her stuff strewn all over the English countryside (well, just her diary); mother has stopped fretting.

My 14-Y-O daughter is flying to England tomorrow with the school choir tour. She's never flown on fiixed-wing aircraft & 1st time OS (besides Tassie). Mother is in melt-down mode.

smiley-you guessed it. And its because I just follow the instructions instead of saying "this should go there, no that should be opposite this" etc.

We've got a 71-piece 'Zome' DNA kit (and a buckyball). The plastic bits for bonds and nucleotides are colour-coded. The teachers get the expert to construct it (rather than the kids), so we haven't lost any pieces (yet)!