Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Need an Idea! (Science fair stuff)

jgourlay - 26-4-2010 at 13:44

Gents, I have a very close friend for whom I am the closest thing he knows of to 'a science guy'. I'm not a very good 'science guy' but I'm better than, say, Leticious in Accounting.

He's trying to help his 13 yr. old come up with an idea for a project. It's got me stumped. I thought you all would be a veritable El Dorado of good ideas. The project is, "improve something through chemistry" The parameters are:


• The technology has to involve Chemistry
• It has to be practical – it has to do a job
• It has to give the impression that it is improving something or creating something new
• It has to be simple enough for a brochure to be turned in this Thursday and a prototype to be built by next Thursday

psychokinetic - 26-4-2010 at 15:26

Produce Sulfur with the Barking Dog. Stinks out the room, so he's the only one left to receive an award ;)

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HukfX5lRb70&feature=related">Barking Dog</a>.

franklyn - 26-4-2010 at 23:07

As they say a good plan now is better than a perfect plan later.
I don't know how much of even theoretical " hazard " is
tolerated these days but fire and brimstone seems pushing it.

Clear plastic chips from soda bottles can be melted in a
small metal dish on an electric hotplate to the point it emits
fumes. Caution it is combustible. The point here is that a
sample of cotton cloth can be made water repellant by a
light application of the fume. A portion of cloth can be
secured by a rubber band over one end of a segment of
sheet metal air duct about 6 to 8 inches long and the open
end placed over the heated dish on the hotplate. After a
period of 1 - 2 minutes the treatment should render the
desired property of water repellence to the fabric.

.

psychokinetic - 27-4-2010 at 02:34

Quote:
As they say a good plan now is better than a perfect plan later.
I don't know how much of even theoretical " hazard " is
tolerated these days but fire and brimstone seems pushing it.


Good point. Especially in OP is in the USA.