Australia's Science Forum

We've done the clock reaction and it's been HUGELY successful . One of the tricks is to have the sodium metabisulfite really fresh. Go out and buy some fresh from your local homebrew shop. I'll dig up my recipe and post it.

Cheers, K

I buy de-ionised water from a car battery manufacturer/distributor. His water has to meet various "ppm" industry standards, so its pretty clean. Its also better than pouring thousands of litres of water down the drain to distill just a few, even if I do live where water in not in shortage....

Our diocese has paid for all the Catholic Secondary Colleges in the district to be on Chemwatch Gold, on the net. However, I'm still receiving the CD's - don't know why. However this week I discovered the difference between producing labels on the CD compared to the net, and the CD version wins hand...

Happened to me. We had a whole ox liver in the freezer section of an upside down fridge/freezer. Apart from cleaning up a stinking maggot-ridden mess, there was the added bonus of little cherubs telling me "Gosh that stinks! Shut the door!" every time I walked from the prep room into a cla...

When we made soap I measured the 15mL (or whatever) into individual bottles, and put them in the fume cupboard, to be poured out one at a time. That way there's no little cherubs with measuring cylinders etc to spill, over pour etc . It also meets safety standards blah blah blah.

Cheers, K

BYO safety glasses. A fascinating concept - but would it just become another thing to forget, like textbooks, workbooks, even pencil cases! :-o Not to mention the option of "Mine broke in my bag, now what do I do?" #-o And would they vandalise them any less if they were their own? There is...

I note with interest that Robb's astronomy contributions are usually added at uncivilized hours like 1.19am :w00t: So the question arises, does Robb ever sleep? Is he posting these little snippets while star-gazing? Does he have a daytime job, and if so, how does he function after being up half the ...

Speaking of microwaving, have you ever microwaved grapes before. That is a Super-cak! You cut a grape almost in half across the middle, so that you end up with two halves joined by a little flap of grape skin acting like a hinge. Place the grape on a microproof dish and nuke on high 10-15 seconds. W...

We have a staff uniform, which for me is a sleeveless shirt and shorts. So I wear my coat all the time in what passes for winter up here, and as required in the hotter months. Obviously, I wear it during dissections, or when PPE is needed, but when the wet season arrives its just too hot! Cheers, K ...

Do you mean for you or for your little cherubs? I personally own 2 Hard Yakka coats from the usual working men's clothing shops. All our coats for the seniors appear to be second hand, wrap around and tie at the back style, possibly from an Army Disposals store after WW2. They are an intelligence te...

Who buys photographic film these days? And aren't lots of the containers translucent anyway? Sorry Richard, just stirring. Actually, we store ours with those little packets of silica gel that come in lots of packing materials, vitamin jars etc. If you want real drama, try storing Cobalt Chloride pap...

Fume cupboard chimneys! Luxury 8O We can't have fume cupboard chimneys, because they'd blow away in a cyclone, and wrap around a tree somewhere. This happened to one of the schools on the Tablelands behind Cairns, just after they spent $3000 installing it! So now we have a portable fume cupboard on ...

We have recently begun replacing lard with copha, in an attempt at cross-cultural sensitivity. Muslim kids can be "contaminated" by contacting pig fat, and Hindu kids have issues with suet, so copha is an acceptable alternative. However, I still find that results vary so much that for an i...

Bindi, My recipe goes like this: Heat 100mL distilled water to boiling in a 250mL beaker. Remove fromheat and add 1g agar. Return to heat & stir until agar forms a suspension. Don't burn the agar. (Safety messages blah blah - be careful hot stuff etc) Add 5 drops of 0.1M Potassium Ferrocyanide &...

Once again I find my perspective on life is not that of all my peers! After doing some dry ice experiments - self-inflating balloons etc - some of the really nice kids asked me if there was anything else exciting we could do with dry ice? "Well," I say, rolling my eyes in the direction of ...

I could lie and say what I frequently tell the students in this school - especially when they're busted phone texting under the desk - which is that I know everything! However, it never looks good as the representative of a catholic school to be putting lies into print, so to speak. 8O SO, yes, I lo...

Hi Robb,

Me too please! Fax 07 40315807

Thanks.

Cheers, K

The episode is called "Lisa the Simpson" and its from season 9.

Cheers, K

I buy my de-ionised water from a battery factory here in Cairns. It's half of nothing at all to buy - maybe 50c a litre - and they have all these standards they have to meet so the water really is de-ionised properly. It still works out cheaper than buying a unit myself. I buy 40L at a time, and it ...

Can't recommend an educational one, but there's a Simpsons episode that's just mandatory! It's where Grandpa tells Lisa the Simpsons carry a "dumbness" gene and soon she's going to lose her intelligence and become stupid. Homer gathers up relatives to disprove Grandpa's theory, and they're...