Australia's Science Forum

My new containers LEAK!!!! thank god for bundage trays is all I can say! eh what can you do but send em back

How annoying!! I hope you didn't lose too much out of them.

A whole litre of 1M HCl!

Robyn
Thanks for the tip, where to get the containers. I have put in an order today. I don't want to run out. They do last well, and particularly for the price. They do go brittle after a long while but all in all I like them.

In another thread, I started to collect 2L plastic bottles, that used to hold buffer for use in Path Lab at local hospital, as I go down the shelves replacing the old glass round 1L bottles it looks So much neater,BUT now I come to Nitric acid, My knowledge of nitric is that it will attack anything organic.
Now on the shelf all these beautiful neat bottles then it's all spoiled by the old nitric bottles. Any Suggestions

Don't look?

I mean, Ocker, it's all sounding very OCD there. Do you have all the labels facing front and exactly the same height on the bottles?

smiley wrote:Don't look?

I mean, Ocker, it's all sounding very OCD there. Do you have all the labels facing front and exactly the same height on the bottles?

Glad someone else said it poor Ocker, I suffer from the same things, I am a Virgo, what can I say, I need things to be perfect, some may call it anal retentive, others pedantic or OCD, my self I call it cleanliness But I soon learnt I was fighting a loosing battle here at school, and I have learnt to let it go, but it hurts...

Hi Ocker,
If you're using the same/similar bottles to the ones I suggested, I keep 1M Nitric in them and have had no problems. I still keep 2M in the winchesters though. Look up what type of plastic it is and if you have "The Laboratory" check it against the table in that to see what you can store and for how long. HDPE plastics will hold pretty much anything...
Rosalie

Thanks! Friends???
Yes My shelves looked terrible then 5 years ago. started labeling and colour coding according to CSIS, and had a Tame parent come in 1 arvo / week, he put all labels on at same height and standard format,(Looked so much better but a mix of different bottles and the ones I did when in panic mode stood out like a "sore thumb" when I thought I would be refurbished tried to get some order before hand so when it goes on new shelves.
I'm about 15 to 20% done with tame parent who is obsessive / compulsive all labels uniform colour spot in same position. LOOKS WONDERFUL but where I skipped over nitric acid really stands out

Half your luck in acquiring a "tame parent"

Yeah his daughter lasted 3 months but he has been coming in for 5 years.
He was in high stress job and told to retire but he is a workacholic and I find I have to work twice as hard every wed just not to seem slack. What a Bummer!

Just so you guys know...

I once visited Ocker in his prep room ...and was shocked at what i saw. made me feel really bad I tell you. His organisational and hygene are outa sight

There was not a thing out of place

All the washing up done ( and beakers gleaming)

pracs all lined up in height order..as well as yr order, AND chronological order. ( dont know how he manages it... but it looks amazing)

All his tools in height order and colour themes on the walls..all outlined with marker so you know where to put them back.

Benches gleaming.
spotless it was

Even his coffee cups are lined up in height order, and he served me coffee on mug, saucer & a doilie.

hes a hero I tell you.
We could all learn a thing or two from Ocker

Is that the day after you ate the magic mushrooms Rainbow?

Works for me!

Just proves the point though doesn't it, Ocker = OCD

Sorry Ocker, just jealous really, I wish I could be that spotless, as soon as I clean up I turn my back for a second and when I get back someone has left me a new mess

Ocker I'm in awe of your organisational skills..... I think we need pictures of these so called storage bottles, you never know you may start something here

WOW! I've still got a complete cockatoo skeleton to deal with, that was brought to me in first term! Truth is, I don't WANT to deal with it, so I just haven't. If you leave something in my lab for long enough, it just becomes part of the background - white noise effect really.

Wow - I've learned so much from reading the last three pages. Thank you!
(One of the things I learned was that I have an OCD tendency too!) Cleanliness - good one Sassi!

LOL
Patti

Maybe Ocker could give us a few tips?

Go Ocker, I say

My first 4 days in the new job at Farrer were spent clearing the decks so I could find the benchtops! Have my own office here, and it was the same, but once I'd organised the cupboards and drawers things felt better. Then straight into the preparations for labs refurbs at the end of next term. The idea is to have the Prep Room moved to the smaller second one by the end of this term, then concentrate on the labs next term.

Although exhausting, it's actually been a great way to work out what we've got, and how best to store it for the duration. Then I can organise things how I want them when they go back into the new rooms

I counted 36 Winchesters worth of stock solutions, plus about the same 1L brown glass bottles, both of which I find difficult to handle now that arthritis is setting in. Plus lots of 500mL bottles as well. Time to rationalise the solutions! I'm definitely changing over to plastic bottles, so reading this thread was very timely, and thanks for all the advice and ideas.