Sciencemadness Discussion Board - Amateur chemistry and school

Amateur chemistry and school

trinitrotoluene - 1-6-2003 at 17:16

Just wondering if any one of you had told anyone in school about the experiments you do etc..? If you did had anyone of you gotten a response like "drug lab" or "blowing things up?". I'm currently in highschool I don't tell anyone about what I do at home. Alot of ignorent people at my school they will just spread rumors about me "making drugs huh?" or "you make bombs". I just keep my mouth shut, because if it gets to a certain point the teacher will hear about them then I will get into legal trouble, since I have so much glassware at my house, that any excuse will not cut it. So I keep my mouth shut. Anyone else who had not told anyone I advise you to not brag about it. For those who did ,either form the past or currently I would like for you to share your story so we won't make the same mastakes.

DDTea - 1-6-2003 at 19:34

Yes, I get responses like that from some people, that I "Make bombs." Honestly, it annoys me; while explosives are fun, I don't like the idea of "bombs." "Bombs" are what kewls make. "Bombs" are things pulled from the Anarchist crapbook. "Bombs" are the excuses-of-weapons that kill more operators than targets. Besides, I don't do anything with explosives anyway...they scare me

.

Nevertheless, some people will always be like that. To them, I am a silly "pyro" and Amateur Chemistry is equal to bombmaking. I don't care what they think though, I let them be merry in their follies.

I do talk about my hobby and current projects, should people enquire. If they ask about it, more often than not they are interested and willing to listen to what I'm up to. But if they ask, "Hey [Samosa], how do I make a bomb?" or "Can you give me a recipe to Nerve Gas?" I rarely feel like answering- though I give them a basic explanation... why? Because I know it's over their head, and since they don't understand a thing I said to them, they will forget it in 2 minutes.

I do not, however, bring up my hobby if people do not ask. Though I am forthcoming with answers to questions, I am not going to just tell them what I am doing. Also, I do make suitable use of cover stories where needed- Chloropicrin is NOT a war gas, it is a pesticide or a tear gas (surprisingly, people don't find either of these two explanations to be very threatening)

. Why do I do this, you ask? Because by keeping people somewhat informed, and not being evasive, they are not suspicious of me. They "know" what I am doing, and they are not afraid. This way has worked well for me.

[Edited on 6-2-03 by Samosa]

I agree with Samosa

Organikum - 1-6-2003 at 20:46

on this absolutely. There is the point keeping the mouth shut gets dangerous as the "he hides something" syndrome comes up. Nothing makes peple so crazy than a possible secret near them. Next step will be wild rumors and against rumors one is helpless. (It´s best to create the rumors by oneself btw.)
So at a certain point you have to tell something so be prepared and make it your game. All of a sudden you have encountert someone interested in what you do - take happily your chance and tell him chemistry. Chemspeak. And don´t stop but tell. Be happy for this listener - make him a listener, ignore questions friendly hold tight conversations leadership. It´s unbelievable easy if you do what all do:
- Start speaking when the otherone hasn´t finished his sentence. (be sorry for this in a halfsentence and do it again at once)
- ignore what the other person told - thats unimportant, important is what you want to tell.
- don´t stop speaking. Not what but that you speak is it.
- stay friendly overhear all teasings offenses attacks open or hidden. If the other says: "you are an idiot", tell him "maybee" and explain a fractionating column and azeotropic distilation of tertiary azeotropes.

You won´t have to do this very often.
Promised.

madscientist - 1-6-2003 at 21:26

I simply plead ignorance.

Organikum - 2-6-2003 at 00:44

Quote:

I simply plead ignorance.

Thus can come hard to oneself if very successful.

PHILOU Zrealone - 2-6-2003 at 01:05

If you have true good friends you can make them participate to a tiny pyro show and explain that pyrotechny is great but as anything it is the use you make of it that is important; if it is only for fun, no troubles; but of course one can use it to arm people or destroy things.

Most of the time people will ask you if it is true, you must answer yes, but add that it is only for fun to make tiny fireworks, perfumes, crackers...never say bomb or explosives (unless real friends).
If ever they say bomb, you may add that to make a bomb is simply to make a large firework.Once satisfied they will leave you and have a certain respect and scare of you.

Krypton - 8-6-2003 at 08:22

I think amateur chemistry is not to making
bombs or explosives more likely for sience
and fun. Everybody have other interrests
in chemistry and can share the interrests with others in a forum.
The people which thinking we making bombs from peroxides ... are fools.

Nick F - 8-6-2003 at 10:13

Last night I was camping with some mates - well, not really camping, just out in the countryside with some beers and a campfire, and a tent in case anyone did actually go to sleep - and we obviously needed to light the fire. The others had brought firelighters, which were not having much luck with the slightly green, quite big firewood. I got back from collecting wood and pulled out a 300g charge of plaster incendiary surrounded by a pound of paraffin wax, and got the fire going almost instantly.
That's the sort of situation when you can safely show people your skills; no-one is going to think you're an insane weirdo if you do something useful with pyrotechnics. They were all quite impressed, and very grateful that I had come prepared so that they didn't have to mess around trying to light the fire for hours.

Iv4 - 10-6-2003 at 00:13

I place a bomb inthe same catogery as a knife or agun,a weapon.While I'm not a 'full'(lack of a better word)but a physiscst(well not necceserely a good one

).Though recently(after fidning this site)I've become more interested in it.I try to plead ignorence as much as possible.Did slip once but I gave them some shit starit of the anarchists cookbookafter that they dont belive me).

Nick F - 25-9-2003 at 07:15

Now, while I agree with the logic of not telling anyone and everyone about your hobby, here is proof that telling the right people can be productive:

http://www.boomspeed.com/mrcool/FreeGlass.jpg

It didn't cost me a penny

.
(I do have the stand for that clamp, but it was being used when the pic was taken)

Basically, I have a "contact" who works in the field of medical research, and one of their labs was relocating for some reason, and they were having a clearout. I might even be able to get some more stuff, she basically just grabbed some stuff and put it in a box for me, then asked me to go and pick it up. Maybe even some useful chems too, but I'm not sure about that. I did get about 5kg of citric acid, I don't really have a use for it but it seemed a shame to let them throw it away.

Now I come to think of it, most of my glassware has been free from various sources. I've had to buy some of my quickfit, but that's mainly been due to breakages of the original free stuff

.

Edit: sorry, I've just realised how awful the quality of that pic is! But it gets the point accross.

Another edit: I've just got 47 (yes, 47) pipettes, ranging in capacity from 0.1mL (in 0.005mL increments) up to 20mL, with just about every capacity and accuracy in between. Maybe more stuff on the way...

[Edited on 25-9-2003 by Nick F]

[Edited on 25-9-2003 by Nick F]

I Call Bullshit On You madscientist, lol!

PrimoPyro - 31-10-2003 at 13:06

Quote:

I simply plead ignorance.

Haha, bullshit, I dont believe that for a second. :p

Who here can tell me that they resisted the desire to be known for being smart beyond what is normal? Oh please, most of you are still in highschool or younger. Having such intelligence is most apparent at those ages. It shows every time youopen your mouth, whether you talk about quantum mechanics or ask for a donut.

I know what it's like, I'm not old at all, lol. And for those ofyou that are older and out of school, there's no way you can tell me you were absolutely quiet about your knowledge, that none of it leaked into the open, and you were never known by peers as one who carried lots in your head. And you liked it,too. We all do/did.

You can argue all you want, but I'll never believe you, especially those of you in high school or younger, lol.

It might just be my personality, but I never had too much problems at school or in the workplace, and eventually everyone knows that I do things. It's just the way I've always handled it. In high school, my sophomore year when the columbine tragedy occured, I got a little bit of hell, but I was already established as a science freak,not a bomb freak.

The year after that I really came out of my shell. Our school had a video broadcast system (pretty common now) for the morning announcements and stuff, and those of us taking the Media Technology classes used the labs to create videos and productions for our class projects, which included the news studio that we usedto bring the morning announcements to the school every morning. Exceptional projects got aired after the announcements and credits, where the teachers could turn off their TVs and continue class if they wanted, or they could wait and watch the "shorts" as they were called; the short video presentations from media tech for that morning,.

I was on so often in my sophomore year that in my junior yr in advanced media tech I was given the opportunity to use school funding to finance a "show" of sorts, aired one "episode" every friday. All my shorts were about science and stuff, or random explosions or jumping cars off ramps, you know the normal "whoa" things young teenagers like to watch, especially if its someone they know.

My first airing was with a CO2 laser I built with the help of two teachers. It wasn't very strong and used a 5 gallon jug of water to keep it cool enough to operate more than 1 minute, but the effect was awesome.

I have a ton of great memories doing those shorts for school, and believe me it got me a lot of attention, both good and also bad. But I wont lie, I loved every second in my limelight. Even before my little show I had the same thing in my circle of friends, which Im willing to bet you all have too.

Whenever someone has a technical question, they go to you, don't they? Whenever there's an argument between friends of a technical nature, they cometo you for yoiur input to 'prove' their adversar wrong,dont they? Im sure they do, thats how it has always been with me and my peers, and I know I cant be alone in the world.

And you love it. If you say you dont then you're a liar, lol. I can understand not wanting the negtive attention, I hated being called 'the unibomber' too, but those idiots already didnt like me, it wasnt people that didnt know me that brought negative attention, it was always people who already hated me and just used that as more ammunition to throw at me. Everyone goes through it.

Most people know the majority of my 'hobbies' because for them to to so doesnt seem weird once they get to know me well. My hobbies arent constrained to backyard chemistry though, either, so it appears less weird, although usually more funny.

"What are you doing?
"Im melting plastic coke bottles."
"Why????"
"I'm going to see if I can saponify the polymeric ester that makes up the plastic."
"????? Uh ok.....why?"
"So I can decarboxylate the terphthalic acid to benzene and use that to make explosive."
"Jesus, why!?"

"Damnit, quit askin why, Imtrying to concentrate. Ialready told you yesterday, my remote controlled micro-aerial vehicle is going to have horizontally launched mini-missiles on it. I told you I wasnt kidding. You didnt believe me I take it?"

Heh, she rarely doubted what I said after that. :p

PrimoPyro

BromicAcid - 1-11-2003 at 18:51

None of my teachers have ever had anything bad to say about me doing chemistry at home and are usually very helpful when I ask them about things that we are not covering with the intent of going through with their advice later on in the day. My inorganic teacher the other day explained to me the practical advantages of using activated carbon over air float charcoal for the production of carbon disulfide in relation to the industrial process preparing it from coke. He knew full well that I would be doing it later in the day and looked foreword to me telling him how it went. All of my teachers have been like that, even in high school.... Well, most of them, my first organic Chem teacher gave me some weird looks so I used to go to my academic supervisor whenever I had a question during that semester, she's very good at inorganic.

kickflip_333 - 8-10-2005 at 18:57

whenever i tell people of experiments or anything that has happened, i get responses such as "whoa dude your stupid" or "you did what?". i also have been given nicknames such as "explosives", "scientist from hell" and "bombs away".

its sad that the general publics idea of a "chemist" is a person cackling hysterically and pouring random bottles into a beaker, when really chemistry is one of the more exact sciences.

Magpie - 8-10-2005 at 21:08

Kickflip this is a very good question. Although I'm, no doubt, decades older than you I still struglle with how to handle this issue in all cases. I have read the earlier posts of Samosa and Organikum and think they are very good responses. You have to tell them something. So have a planned response. Above all do not get angry or ruffled. I like axehandle's technique of passing himself off as a "harmless geek." I think that is what Organikum is saying too.

I had a fume hood fabricated to my drawing. I titled the drawing "Hood." I told the fabricator I was going to do some metallurgical work and would have some acid fumes to deal with. It's times like these that coming up with some lie would just get you caught in your own jockstrap.

The_Davster - 8-10-2005 at 21:54

Back in highschool, word got out about my chem/energetics hobby among other students, and occasionally I would be confronted about it at which time I would say things like "no, I dont make explosives, I had an experiment explode on me, there is a difference there". The chem teachers may have suspected something about me, I was "infamous in the chem department"(to quote one of my teachers), but I played dumb about energetics except the time my chem teacher said sulfuric acid is a catalyst in nitrations and I started ranting on nitronium and dehydration and so on. Every one of my chem teachers knew I did chem experiments at home, I even brought in my homemade magnetic stirrer(remember it....the cardboard one

) for bragging rights as well as some sodium I produced via electrolysis it impressed them to say the least, and I got in good with the chem department to the point where I got free glass, and lab access. They may have suspected something, as one of my chem teachers came to me for more info on the halifax explosion. They knew I made picric acid though, after my chem teacher mentioned it was good for cleaning glassware. It makes you seem more legit if you hold up a 100% average in chem for the final two years of HS though

In university I met professors who would say things along the lines of "its so nice to see young people getting so interested in chemistry" and others who were completly aginst the home chemistry idea.

So simply put, just be carefull who you tell, and don't tell people to make yourself sound cool. The "popular group" in highschool it is important to keep this info from, as the popular group is usually much more closeminded about this. Teachers are fine as long as you get a general feel for what they would think about it, and then only discuss it with them in a scientific manner.

So again...be a harmless geek...its for the best.

[Edited on 9-10-2005 by rogue chemist]

Oxydro - 9-10-2005 at 08:47

In grade 7 I got in trouble for giving a few students instructions for making various explosives (mostly crapbook stuff I'm ashamed to admit) and after that I was labeled.

Nobody seemed to care, this was a smalltown school and far removed from bigcity paranoia (not that rural ppl are more rational always... but they are more destruction-friendly in my area as it is expected that kids will play with guns [without permission but also without any serious attempts to prevent it], throw stolen ammo into fires and other such acts.)

So, in my last year of high-school* I was in my pre-calculus class along with the other 4 (yup small class... thats how many out of 50 had any intention of *possibly* going into the sciences) and one of them (popular-crowd girl, just to muddy the preconceptions) asked me what the most interesting way I could think of to blow up a microwave was.

Instead of authority squashing the topic, the rest of the 1 1/2 hour class was spend in a game of competition with the teacher trying to come up with the wierdest most spectacular geeky way to destroy a microwave. A fair number of ideas were useless and could not have worked, many were boring, and a good few were suicidally dangerous, and the rest of the class was missing about 60% of the conversation, but we all had fun.

My teachers seemed very frustrated by the limitations placed on them by school board etc... and they were not going to discourage a student from being interested in science just because he was doing "dangerous things".

* last year of high school: actually the last year I attended, grade 11, I did all the necessary courses minus 2 electives, which I decided to do via correspondence.

[Edited on 9-10-2005 by Oxydro]

DeAdFX - 16-10-2005 at 15:00

90% of stupidity or dumb things done by humans is inspiration to impress your friends that is why I don't give much details of what I am doing. I have a fear that my friends might try to peer pressure me into doing something stupid(corny but possible). "Hey man I double dog dare you to light a fire cracker out of your ass." So far I still have all limbs intact so my saying must be good? Common sense is always a good thing to have too.

I do not think that my chemistry teacher really likes me making various rocket fuels because I use to be reckless and make "big batches". However I got over the oo wow flames thing and haven't done anything over 10-20ish grams. Another reason is that I am doing some Magnesium Ammonium Nitrate mixtures and magnesium is pricy. However my 8th grade science teacher, 9th grade science teacher and biology teacher were some what happy that I was intrested in science.

Ashendale - 11-11-2005 at 13:19

Some people in my class know that. Altough I have never done anything pyrotechnical, they say things like "well, how many bombs did you make yesterday". What is with people being obsessed with idea that chemistry=bombs?
Well, my chem teacher knows, as I am really interested in chemistry and one day it came out. Well, partially my fault, as I asked where does the school gets its chemicals. :/
Altough he said I can use the school lab

But I try to keep it a secret...And I can't really do many things too, cause my parents are obsessed with the idea that HCl is too dangerous chemical for me to have. Altough I do have it, they don't approve it...And they don't want me to have any hydroxides or acids..I'm really not that irresponsible...

Ok, I went out of topic, sorry

[Edited on 11-11-2005 by Ashendale]

Chris The Great - 11-11-2005 at 17:15

Everyone who knows me knows that I can and do make explosives as a hobby. I even gave a couple of my friends a demonstration (splintering a 2x4 block) a while ago.

Never had a problem.

They also know I am interested in chemistry but other than making nerve gas I don't get asked much about that, probably because to your average teenager explosives are far more interesting than organic chemistry.

I've never been "Hai guyz I make explosivez lol" but even so everyone knows. If they ask, I tell them, and I get asked a fair bit nowadays.

I get more trouble from my parents than from anyone else, because my mom is a complete safety freak and won't let me do anything remotely dangerous (which means pretty much everything). I do it anyway and don't tell her because she can't figure out what I am doing anyway, unless I directly say something like "I'm making nitroglycerin!". Making esters of glycerin with NO2+ ions is ok though

Theoretic - 13-11-2005 at 08:39

My chemistry teacher (very nice guy btw):
"If the science block goes up I'll know whodunit lol"
People know I'm into chemistry and make jokes about (nuclear) bombs, but that's about it.

mrjeffy321 - 18-11-2005 at 20:42

For the most part, I keep quite about my hobby, I dont walk around telling everyone I see what I do. But my inner circle of friends get to hear more than they probably want to on occasion about my experiments.
I started talking to my Chemistry teacher about "hypothetical" reactions for a while until my practical chemistry knowledge overwelmed him and that did help me anymore. I borrowed a force sensor from my school one weekend for use in a rocketry experiment.....well my rocket exploded into 1000 peices and with it the very expensive force sensor, leaving me with a hige gash near my eye. After that that teacher would never let me leave the room without saying, "Dont blow yourself up".

thalium - 19-11-2005 at 04:43

I keep quiet and don't borrow stuff from school. I have other sources

. Anyways my mates are the kind to wich you say something and the next second they forget.

oneup - 18-1-2006 at 10:18

I always wanted to stay quiet about it, but some time a go a friend came to my place, and he just happened to see the garage so he obviously asked what I was doing so I told him everything, and he seemed to like it so much that now he has his own lab as well

and yes I have 'borrowed' stuff from school sometimes.... all the rooms are always locked becouse there are TVs and such but the chemistry room is never locked

I don't do this becouse I'm a thief and can't afford to buy the stuff but in my country nearly every chemical is banned so school is my only source for potassium chlorate and other stuff.

Quantum - 18-1-2006 at 12:02

I keep it quite. I have only told 2 people my age and only after knowing they were cool with it. I think the risks outweight the rewards of talking about the pratical aspects. I of course do very well in chemistry as I already know about it and I think my teacher might wonder why I seem to be familiar with the properties of compounds beyond mp, bp, formula ext. But I do not discuss doing any lab work. It's always a good idea to project the image you want people to see and not give them a reason to think otherwise...

woelen - 18-1-2006 at 12:18

Quote:

Originally posted by oneup
I always wanted to stay quiet about it, but some time a go a friend came to my place, and he just happened to see the garage so he obviously asked what I was doing so I told him everything, and he seemed to like it so much that now he has his own lab as well

and yes I have 'borrowed' stuff from school sometimes.... all the rooms are always locked becouse there are TVs and such but the chemistry room is never locked

I don't do this becouse I'm a thief and can't afford to buy the stuff but in my country nearly every chemical is banned so school is my only source for potassium chlorate and other stuff.

Its not a smart thing to "borrow" things from school. It spoils the hobby of home chemistry and if you get caught with that, again there is a case for all journalists and so on. Please don't do that. I also have no affiliation with a chemical company, lab or whatever, but I managed to find every chemical I wanted (chlorates, perchlorates, even cyanides and azides). Look well, search forums, eBay etc. In due time, you build up contacts and suddenly all kinds of places pop up, where you can buy chemicals

. The Netherlands is not bad at all, actually, for finding chemicals. If I read about Australia, or the UK then I think that the Netherlands is quite well. Having a PayPal account or credit card helps though. Having patience helps even more

. Sometimes you find interesting chems at totally unexpected places.

[Edited on 18-1-06 by woelen]

oneup - 19-1-2006 at 07:01

I also don't do this anymore, the only thing I've ever 'borrowed' from school was potassium chlorate, but that was before I knew that it could be made by electrolysis of NaCl, so now I do it myself. I can also get almost every chemical I want, I often read about people having trouble getting ammonium nitrate and removing it from expensive instant cold packs, I can still buy 5Kg 70% ammonium nitrate for €5,50 wich is easy to purify as the impurity is some kind of brown shit that's insoluble. (off topic: can ANFO be made from 70% AN without purification? and do I need to crush the prills first?)

The_Davster - 9-3-2006 at 20:21

I figure this is the best thread here for this....not 100% sure though.

In short, I was applying for a summer research position at my uni, and it required a resume. I decided to include that I did chemistry as a hobby at home. I made sure to say that I mostly did inorganic chemistry though as that would (hopefully) dissuade unfounded drug/explosive fears. According to proffs at my uni, my chances were rather slim for getting the research scholarship. Anyway, today I got the letter that I got the scholarship :cool:

I believe it was because of my talk of hobby chemistry as well as a glowing referance letter from a teacher who knew me, and my home experimenting, and included talk of it in the letter.

The scholarship is from the gov...wonder what big brother is thinking

Im in a real good mood because of this....
I get to use caesium metal this summer :cool:

[Edited on 10-3-2006 by rogue chemist]

Magpie - 9-3-2006 at 22:30

Congratulations Rogue on landing that scholarship! That tooks some balls to list your home experimenting on your resume.

woelen - 10-3-2006 at 02:06

Congratulations, this is good news

. Good to read that doing home-chemistry sometimes helps. So, we sometimes also hear good news about home-science, not only the bad things about drugs, terrorism and so on.
Probably the people who had to judge all applications have a real good feeling for what drives scientists. Probably they think that someone, doing things at home must be a really interested person, who is willing to dive deep into research problems.

The_Davster - 25-4-2006 at 16:57

Minor update: I think I will be using cesium azide, not cesium. At the temps I will be using it will decompose into cesium and nitrogen, so I guess that simplifies things by not handling ceasium metal. I saw a 1kg(?...might not be 1 kg, but the bottle was huge...) bottle of cesium azide (HOLY

) on his shelf and only a little cesium metal.

EDIT: They must go through CsN3 fast, I saw an empty bottle of equall size in the used bottle bucket....

[Edited on 26-4-2006 by rogue chemist]

enhzflep - 26-4-2006 at 16:11

Ah ha, ha. Man this thread is killing me. All those fond memories...

Back when i was about 12 or 13, dad pulled me aside one day and said "I probably shouldn't be showing you this, and don't tell your mother" Then proceeded to take out an ordinary safety match, place it on an anvil and hit it with a hammer. Bang!

My little brain lit up like a carnival.

Wow! The possibilities were endless. Firecrackers i immediately thought. It wasn't long before i was cutting the red stuff off matches like there was no tommorow. Making fuses with them, crackers with them and shortly there-after rockets (well helicopter rockets) for some strange reason i kept all of the skun matches and in a year or 2 had some 30,000 of them

After many trips to the local shooting range it suddenly occured to me that i could use .22 shells as excellent cracker bodies. Ram some powder in, insert fuse and close. Worked fine until i decided to hit the stuff in, and not just ram. BOOM - blood everywhere and 3 pieces of shell stuck in me i had to pull out with pliers. he he he. (Was just pissed off that mum cleaned the blood off the walls in my bedroom before i could look at the spray pattern. Hell - what difference was 5mins gunna make mum?)

That soon got boring, so in around year 8 decided to make a cannon. Only a pissy little thing 4.5mm bore, but wait for it - 40cm long (several pieces drilled in a lathe from each end with a standard drill, before being threaded at each end.) I even took it to Saturday sport(compulsory at the school) and showed it off to all my mates. Hey, i was young and i couldn't have them thinking i was full-of-shit now could i?

Well eventually got the powder-load up to 0.7gm chlorate-powder, followed by 0.7gm chlorate powder mixed with 0.7gm ground sparklers (About 2inches of rammed powder in the barrel or about 2.1gms pushing a 4.5mm slug

)
Dad knew what i was doing the whole time - hey he even helped me select the correct dies to cut the thread and gave me rudimentary training in how to use his lathe.
Best i ever did with it was get that slug through 2 white-pages. Or about 12cm of solid paper. he he he.
Oh, i nearly forgot to mention that M&D would watch through the lounge-room window as i fired this thing, time and time again.

All the while keeping virtually everybody that knew me at school completely informed.

I was of the frame of mind at the time that knowing what i was capable of doing to them if they told the wrong people minimized the risk of them doing so. Completely the wrong attitude, but we were/are all young once.

Anyway, let all the pyro stuff slide for a number of years untill i took up chem and physics for the finall two years of high-scool. Wow! Excellent theory & chems/materials. Well, i proceeded to borrow pieces of apparatus over the next 2 years, culminating in a physics assignment that had us design our own prac. Well, this was perfect thought my little brain. They've got digital scales capable of measuring down to 1/10,000th of a gram. Cool - i'm gunna do an experiment that measures thrust of a solid-fuel rocket motor based on the nozzle geometry. Submitted my idea and had it approved. Woo-Hoo.
So the fatefull day came along and i decided to test the one with the smaller nozzle first(greater thrust), Placed motor upside down on the $5,000 scales and lit the fuse. BOOOM Holy shit there was smoke everywhere and the 25 kids in the class were _all_ shitting themselves. Oop sorry.

. But "don't worry" i told everybody the next one is a low-thrust version, so there's no-way it'll blow too. Boy was i wrong.

Think i ended up doing that assignment on wave theory and diffraction grates.

But anyway - everybody that knew of me knew what sort of stuff i got up to. I made it absolutely clear i had no intention of hurting anybody at all, but that if i did it would most definitely be me first.

Hmm, hardly much chemsitry in those years - but all that fun was still ahead of me through my University days and time thereafter.

(still LOL'ing)

[Edited on 27-4-2006 by enhzflep]

Zinc - 29-6-2006 at 02:01

I have told my chem. teacher of my hobby. Fortunatley she supports me. She gave me and my friend who is also interested in chemistry potassium chlorate,potassium permanganate,magnesium powder and ribbon,aluminum powder,bromine,potassium dichromate,potassium bromate,potassium nitrate,tetrachloromethane and even benzene. She also promissed us to give each of us one gass mask.
We also 'borrowed' some chemicals from school.

P.S. I now just have to distill HNO3 and then I can make nitrobenzene (useful) and dinitrobenzene(holy)

[Edited on 29-6-2006 by Zinc]

[Edited on 29-6-2006 by Zinc]

Zinc - 7-7-2006 at 13:50

Quote:

Originally posted by Zinc
She also promissed us to give each of us one gass mask.

Today we got them.

UniversalSolvent - 26-8-2006 at 10:45

Quote:

Originally posted by trinitrotoluene
If you did had anyone of you gotten a response like "drug lab" or "blowing things up?".

Just last night, in fact. I was discussing synthesis of NI3 with a non-chemist friend and how I was preparing to extract iodine for the reaction from KI through subliming iodine out and then allowing crystals to form. A friend of mine, listening to my conversation, turns to her other group of friends and goes "That guy runs a drug lab in his basement."

What the hell?

Not only is NI3 not a drug, I'm the type of person whose chemistry interests are about as far flung from drug production as you get. It's ignorant assumptions like these that give our hobby a bad name.

[Edited on 26-8-2006 by UniversalSolvent]

mrjeffy321 - 18-10-2006 at 15:43

I have a very important writing assignment coming up, a persuasive essay in which we have essentially the freedom to write over any topic we please and argue almost any point. I figure as long as I am going to have to devote so much time into doing this, it might as well be for something I care about, so I thought about writing about home experimentation and/or the difficulties there are due to the legal restrictions and the stigma which is attached to individuals who pursue such activities.

Whatever I choose, I don’t just need ‘good’ sources for the paper; I need ‘EXCELLENT’ sources, the best there are to defend my position. Do you all think there are such sources out there? Of course it is hard to say at this point as I have not done much in-depth searching yet, but I would think a lot of the stuff I could find which would support my position would be non-authoritative internet sites/forums with the opinions of people who really don’t matter. Government statistics would be good, but of course if the government is going to go to the trouble of putting out a statistic it will likely in the opposite direction which I want my paper to lean. Well known scientists would be good too, or at least people who have the credentials to back up their opinion…but I also cant see too many of these people being very active in their opposition to a system which they already have over come with their education and experience (how much do they care about the teenaged kid in their backyard.
So, in you-all’s opinion, is the idea worth pursuing? Is there the information out there to make a good case?

The_Davster - 18-10-2006 at 16:38

I'd go with it, no matter the sources, but the Society for amateur scientists, and the wired article make good starting points.

If you look up the old discoveries of many things, most of them till the mid 1900s were done in home labs. Hell the current aluminum process was discovered in Hall's backyard as a university student(IIRC he wanted to show up a professor

). Problem is, it was so common back then that no mention of where the discovery took place was made. Not untill around edison's time did commercial research move from home labs to corporate labs.
Many old books for university students studying chemistry were explicitly stated that they were meant to be done at home. Slight more recent ones (50s?) have students taking a reaction home to sit on the windowsill a give a shake on occasion. That happen these days? Fuck no....I made sillyputty in a lab at uni...the precautions for working with the nasty Si(CH3)2Cl2 were size 12 font in caps. The DO NOT REMOVE ANY PRODUCT FROM THE LAB was twice as big, and bolded, and repeated twice thereafter.

Wait....I think I am off topic and rambling now...but most was semi-relavent I think.

Waffles - 18-10-2006 at 18:03

The essays on Mr. Theodore Gray's site would be perfect for you I think. You could also email him, and I'm sure he'd be able to provide you a professional-sounding quote or two, he's one of the real 'good guys' to our cause.

Magpie - 18-10-2006 at 18:21

As already stated many of the early chemists made their discoveries at home. IIRC Priestley and Lavosier would be among them. The biography of Alfred Nobel, of which I happen to have a copy, would be an excellent source.

In modern times we have Apple Computer and Hewlett-Packard both having started in garages.

I think there is a lot of "good" sources out there. It may take some time to find them. I agree that somebody's opinion on the internet isn't worth much.

I think this is a good project. Please let us know how it turns out.

mrjeffy321 - 18-10-2006 at 20:45

Quote:

the precautions for working with the nasty Si(CH3)2Cl2 were size 12 font in caps. The DO NOT REMOVE ANY PRODUCT FROM THE LAB was twice as big, and bolded, and repeated twice thereafter.

And of course instructors must always remind the students not to eat any of the chemicals. Of course, as silly and idiotic as it sounds, there is actually reason why they say not to eat the stuff…because people do, I witnessed it with my own eyes….we were doing a lab in class using a fine CuSO4 * 5H2O powder and a girl said, “it sure does look like pixie [stick] dust, I bet it is”, and then proceeded to lick her finger and taste it! She quickly learned it was not candy and had to go get a drink very immediately.

I agree, the Wired magazine article from back in June would be good to use, or at least reference for other ideas. I think I remember the article referencing well known people who experimented at home when they were younger, plus the other examples suggested (Aluminum refining, …), even Apple Computers would be good even though it doesn’t directly tie in with ‘science’ per se, it still shows that the stuff you experiment with in your garage still can be worthwhile.

Theodore Gray would be good too since he reaches audiences beyond the small group of home experimenters (although that’s who he appeals to) since he writes in Popular Science and has his element collecting web site which is fairly popular as well.

The reason I stressed the need for ‘Excellent’ sources was because the teacher must have repeated it 3 or 4 times in class, stressing how we need to look for the ‘Best’ possible sources to use….this is THE major project of the semester.

I am feeling much better about the topic already. Like I said, I have not really begun any in depth research as of yet, just skimming around getting a feel for what is out there before I begin.
I figured if anyone would be able to suggest some sources off the top of their head it would be the people at this forum.
I’ll let you know what I find in the next couple days, and if you come up with any more suggestions I’d love to hear them, thanks.

Sergei_Eisenstein - 19-10-2006 at 11:03

Imagination is very important when chemistry is your hobby. Sadly enough, imagination is being killed in the Western "civilization", and as far as my experience reaches, it is as good as dead in the Land of the Free. Overregulations and supersecurity wreck havoc in these nations that have initiated a zombification process, aimed at cultivating mindless scientists(TM) ordering isopropanol in 50ml quantities from Sigma and sodium sulfate in 100g packages from Merck-VWR. In another decade, a scientific discussion with your colleague PhDs in Europe may be inspiring enough to dig up those fentanyl references you read as a teenager...

[Intermezzo - this is an advertisement from the European Union.]

http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/avs/files/photo/JPEG/newsphot...

[/Intermezzo - please continue enjoying your zombification process]

Back in "those days", freaks (the word doesn't have a negative conotation for me) did whatever they thought they should do, or in other words, they could unleash their creativity and imagination on whatever they could get in their hands. Today, not so. Because the Supreme Zombies allow all the producing industries to leave and settle in the Far East, many zombies become jobless. To solve the problem, new jobs have to be created. This is easy: one zombie is responsible for all the lab's chemical orders and another zombie has to check that whatever the other zombie does is correct. Then one zombie accepts a huge 25kg drum stating SODIUM CHLORIDE - STORE DRY, IRRITANT. Irritant, WTF? 25kg? We're gonna die! So they hire a third zombie responsible for the security in the lab. He sees how one of the chemists is enjoying a sandwich at a distance of 5m from a bottle of TOLUENE and arranges a 4th zombie is hired to make the chemists aware of all the dangers in the lab. Obviously, they now need a 5th zombie to coordinate the tasks of the other four. Also obviously, they are a bore and a threat to the chemists unless they're zombies themselves. The construction of this kafkaesque service "industry" has a catalyzing effect on the zombification process for some, and brings the stress hormones at a violent reflux in others.

I was in an Asian country last month. I visited a plant shop and there were 25kg bags with big letters ZINC SULFATE and "fertilizer" in small print. Never try to convince me people in developing countries are retarded.

Quote:

If you see her tasting other chemicals in the future, try to date her. I'm sure she'll be a nice girl. The chemistry will follow over time

[Edited on 19-10-2006 by Sergei_Eisenstein]

Sandmeyer - 24-10-2006 at 15:07

Quote:

we were doing a lab in class using a fine CuSO4 * 5H2O powder and a girl said, “it sure does look like pixie [stick] dust, I bet it is”, and then proceeded to lick her finger and taste it! She quickly learned it was not candy and had to go get a drink very immediately.

Ah, that's my kind of a girl! I'm sure she would like to taste certain organic chemicals, they are much more fun. :cool:

quicksilver - 25-10-2006 at 06:57

"we were doing a lab in class using a fine CuSO4 * 5H2O powder and a girl said, “it sure does look like pixie [stick] dust, I bet it is”, and then proceeded to lick her finger and taste it! She quickly learned it was not candy and had to go get a drink very immediately."

You gotta' love it. The nobel scientific mind at work. And who said that women don't have their place in the sciences? JESUS H CHRIST! That's unbelievable. Is she in a seroriity?
That brings to mind all the things that "look like" something else; mercury salts look entertaining....
Who taste tests things as an adult???????

Waffles - 25-10-2006 at 09:24

Quote:

Originally posted by quicksilverWho taste tests things as an adult???????

*raises hand*

Well, LEGALLY I'm adult, but I think you're talking in terms of maturity.

mrjeffy321 - 25-10-2006 at 10:29

I had no idea my anecdotal story about my high school chemistry class would be so "popular".
The girl was certainly not the brightest person in the world, as the story illustrates, and there are people out there (as stupid as it sounds [no offense to "iamthewaffler"]) who will taste unknown chemicals. The next day in class the teacher was talking about the lab and mentioned that Copper Sulfate is used as a root killer...everyone looks over to see if the girl was still alive after that even though the teacher was unaware of what happened.

Something which was suggested to me concerning the paper was the idea of comparing the chemical restrictions in the United States (the focus country of my paper) to what of other countries and their respective drug use / fire work statistics (since those are often cited as the reason for such laws). What countries are known for their especially restrictive or lenient chemical laws?

Another idea would be to compare the effectiveness of these chemical laws within the United States in terms of the change in drug/firework manufacture before and after the laws starting getting severe. Obviously 50 years ago the chemical restrictive laws we have no were not in place, when did the majority of them start appearing? In the 1980s - 90s? And there was likely also a drastic increase after 9-11-01 as well.

I was toying around with the idea of interviewing actual police officer(s) to get both their personal and "official" opinions on the matter. I am somewhat reluctant to do this however because they would mean having to talk with a police officer on the subject (red flag raiser). I could perhaps show them pictures of 3 drastically different, common, chemicals (CuSO4, NaCl, and Fe2O3) and then ask them to identify the "root killer" versus the cocaine or some such thing or ask them whether possessing "Nitroglycerin" in and off itself should label one a terrorist, or just someone with a heart condition.

I found a couple quotes which you all find interesting...

From a US government Text book,
"The office of Technological Assessment, which provided congress with analysis on scientific and technological issues, was abolished in 1995."

Another is from this web page,
http://www.rotten.com/library/crime/drugs/methamphetamine/
"In North Carolina, crystal meth is considered a weapon of mass destruction, invoked in accordance with the Patriot Act under the state's Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Weapons Act. Under the law, a meth conviction results in a sentence ranging from 12 years to life in prison on each count."

On a semi-related matter, I recently read an email which claimed (I have no way of verifying its legitimacy, I but I have no reason to believe it is not true) to be from a law enforcement officer to a member of an MSN group I am part of dealing with Hydrogen gas technology. The email basically stated that although this law enforcement officer was sympathetic to the cause and personally interested, still, in his professional opinion, his first thoughts when seeing Sodium Hydroxide and a number of other common chemicals in a car would be either "Meth lab" or "Pipe bomb" and not anything legitimate unless the individual can PROVE otherwise (so much for innocent until proven guilty, now it is the other way around).

Magpie - 25-10-2006 at 10:58

Assuming you are in high school you are familiar with the C- jocks who like to get drunk on the weekends, drag race their cars, and generally enjoy indulging in various misdemeanors. These are the same characters who, in a few years, after flunking out of college, are going to become the law enforcement officers of your community. They will be some of the most chemically ignorant people on earth. Upon seeing a container of lye they will react in only one predictable manner. Ditto for scales and coffee filters.

Someone else on this forum said it first and I believe it is true: "The more you are interested in them the more they are interested in you."

mrjeffy321 - 25-10-2006 at 12:12

Quote:

Originally posted by Magpie
They will be some of the most chemically ignorant people on earth.

Someone else on this forum said it first and I believe it is true: "The more you are interested in them the more they are interested in you."

I believe this is very true, which is why I am reluctant to go this route. I certainly do not expect the average patrol cop to be able to name off chemical compound names or distinguish between various substances...that is not what they are interested in (usually), not is that what they are trained to do. Their job is to enforce the laws and make their best judgment in the particular situation they find themselves in. But when the situation deals with distinguishing a potential drug manufacturer or terrorist and someone who just likes to perform harmless experiments in their kitchen, I would hope they will be able to perform.

I am actually in college, not high school.
To give an example of poor scientific education, even at the college science level....in my General Chemistry lab, a non-negligible portion of the students did not have a clue as to the names of many types of glassware. When the instructions said something to the effect of "add 50 mL of NaOH solution to an Erlenmeyer flask and titrate with HCl...some would literally have to ask the instructor which is the EM flask and which was the burette. These are not just your run-of-the mill college students either which might or might not be science-savvy, these are science majors in one form or another (chemistry, physics, biology, ...).
And by the way, the chemistry labs we did (at the college level) were essentially a joke, they lacked any whiff of imagination or freedom in the process, it was essentially a very cook-bookish style lab which anyone could complete without having any understanding of the topic (aside from knowing the names of the glassware).