Last week we had an article on how to make Nitrous Oxide, today we have fun experiments you can do with mercury, a poison. Mercury is considered toxic enough that when it is spilled in schools they are routinely closed and decontaminated. The article does point out that it is a poison and should be handled with care, then goes on to explain how to build a little straw-device for picking up stray globs of mercury. While this device does prevent you from sucking up mercury, it does nothing about the fumes.

Just to be clear: Mercury is a poison, it can cause neruological damage, it can give you cancer, it can kill you. Do not do any of these experiments.

view additional pages

FUN with QUICKSILVER

Mercury, the Liquid Mystery Metal, Offers a Fascinating Field of Experiment to Amateur-Chemistry Enthusiasts

MERCURY seems to be nature’s joke on the scientist. The only metal that is liquid at ordinary temperaatures, it still outweighs most solid ones-lead included. Volume for volume, among all the substances you encounter in your everyday life, only a few such as platiinum, “gold, and tungsten are heavier than mercury. Though it runs like water, it does not wet objects, and a drop of mercury in the palm of your hand is so elusive that it defies you to pick it up with your fingers.
Read the rest of this entry »

view additional pages

The Amateur Telescope Maker’s Page

A Grinding Rig

WALKING around a barrel is undoubtedly a tedious procedure, but on the other hand it is the simplest method of grinding and polishing a telescope mirror. However, a number of our disciples have evidently gotten just a bit tired of this ambulatory procedure and have written to inqure whether there exists a more satisfactory and sedentary method of grinding said telescope mirrors. There is. As a matter of fact a number of such grinding rigs are described in Amateur Telescoping Making edited by Albert Ingalls.
Read the rest of this entry »

This is the tank driving around in fast-forward at the beginning of the movie Tucker: The Man and His Dream.

Armored Tank Attains Speed Of 114 MPH.
AN ALL-WELDED armor-plated army tank which, it is claimed, can attain a speed of 114 m.p.h. over a level road and 78 m.p.h. over rough ground was recently demonstrated at Rahway, N. J. Invented by Preston Tucker, an armament manufacturer, the tank weighs 10,000 pounds, which is 2,000 pounds less than the present conventional type. Besides machine guns, it features an anti-aircraft cannon, which is mounted in a turret atop the rear of the armored body.

Salvaged Bomb Makes Juvenile Space Ship
Its central structure a discarded 500-pound aerial bomb, a juvenile “space ship” gives two-foot-power transportation to Gene Montoya of Honolulu. The space ship was built by Gene’s father, D. L. Montoya, in a single week end at a cost of less than a dollar. The surplus bomb is lined with rubber padding and the wire wheels are from another juvenile vehicle.

Transients Build Skyscraper Wigwams
ALONG the shore of Medicine Lake, near Minneapolis, Minn., homeless, unemployed men have built one of the strangest communities in America—a white man’s village of tepees and skyscraper wigwams.

Originally started as a minor relief project, the camp now covers 93 acres and is one of Minnesota’s largest relief depots.

Local building and wrecking companies. donate material for the structures which range from a two-person hut to a three-story community dwelling. These buildings have the customary Indian ridge poles, but the sides are covered with shingles instead of skin. The interiors are attractively equipped with rustic furniture.
Read the rest of this entry »

Gee. I wonder what magnanimous lobby could have paid for that study….

Women and Smokers Have Steadier Nerves, Device Proves
WOMEN are better than men when it comes to a steady hand and certainty of aim, according to Dr. H. H. Seashore, University of Southern California psychologist. More startling, perhaps, is the discovery that tobacco-users are steadier than non-users. To carry out his experiments, the doctor employs an unique device. A pistol handle is grasped by the subject so that rays from a tiny mirror are deflected through a grid into a photoelectric cell which automatically records hand tremors.

LIMITED TIME OFFER!
VIEWER FREE!
To introduce a new series of Art Studies, we offer you, free, a valuable three-dimensional Viewer with your first order for 2 Art Study Slides at 50c each. Send $1 today to-
M. G. MALNICK 7402 Sonta Monica Blvd
Hollywood 46, California
Dept. P. S.

I have an issue of this and will be scanning in some of the projects. However I must say, the current Make is much more interesting.

Sticking with the theme of nitrous oxide, we have this adorable piece of head-gear.

New Device Permits Patient To Administer Gas
A NEW device makes it possible for a patient to administer gas rather than having it done by the dentist. The patient takes the gas by working a small bulb held in the hand. Thus it is possible to take only as much as necessary for producing a state of analgesia.

Cream Whipped By Expanding Gas

AT THE push of a button, ordinary cream, subjected to a new process, can now be turned into whipping cream. The cream is first put up by the dairy in containers of automobile steel. Rendered air-tight by the elimination of oxygen, the container next receives an injection of nitrous oxide gas. As the housewife presses the button on the top of the small cask, the nitrous oxide expands, forcing out the cream under pressure and, through aeration, whips the product.

This is a Popular Science article from 1949 which teaches budding young chemists how to make nitrous oxide. It even helpfully explains that the gas produces “a feeling of exhilaration when inhaled”.

Other articles in this series include:

• The crystal which eliminates the need for sleep.
• The dust that lets you lift a car.
• The weed that makes you feed.
• The liquid that gives you control of time and space

view additional pages

The Gas That Makes You Laugh

Chemists call it nitrous oxide. You can generate this and other oxides of nitrogen in a home laboratory.

By Kenneth M. Swezey

AN ACHING tooth is never tunny, but i. the dentist who yanks it out may well first put you to sleep with a few whiffs of nitrous oxide, commonly known as “laughing gas.”
Read the rest of this entry »

Personally, I think these wacky “turn signals” are just a fad.

AUTOMOBILE DRIVERS Flash Your Turns

New Model SIMPLEX DIRECTION SIGNAL KIT fits most ears. Gives new safety and comfort when making turns. Eliminates arm signals. Flashing parking and tail lights show other cars which way you’re going to turn. Flashes 60 to 80 times a minute. Works like factory installed models on expensive cars. Does not interfere with operation of present lights. Install it yourself. All parts furnished. For most 1942 to 1949 cars. SPECIFY MAKE AND YEAR. Adaptable to earlier cars at extra cost. MONEY BACK GUARANTEE.
DEALER INQUIRIES INVITED