I would like to have one of these...

[Jerevan]

Yes, yes, I know - I nabbed the picture from the internet (or at least the eminent Light Farm), but I wonder...



...where can I get one of these contraptions made? Preferably in Europe but if I have to get somewhere else, so be it.

 

[summicron1]

it would help if you'd tell us what it is or does. Looks like something you could assemble from the wares of any good chemistry lab supply house ...

 

[markbarendt]

It all looks like standard laboratory supplies. Google it.

 

[Kirk Keyes]

It looks pretty easy to make -

1) Rubber Bulb
1) length of rubber tubing
1) Test Tube, I'm guessing it's about 20 x 150 mm in size.
1) Rubber Stopper, two hole, get a #3 size to fit the 20 x 150 mm test tube.
2) some 5mm glass tubing. 5 mm should fit the holes in the stopper nicely.
1) propane torch.
1) triangular glass file to cut the glass tubing.

Light the torch, stand it up, have your glass already cut to length, and then heat it up and bend the tubes to match what's shown. To make the dropper tip, heat the glass and pull the tubing apart until it's thin but don't pull it all the way apart. When it's cooled, us the file to nick the glass and then wrap it in a paper towel and pull the ends of the tube away from each other with a slight bending motion at the same time. Some people think that wetting the spot there the glass is nicked will help it break...

Also remember to fire polish the ends of the glass where it has been cut.

It's probably best to watch some youtube to see how to bend and cut glass tubing. Something like this:
http://youtu.be/P-ldT5-aDiM

Wear safety goggles when working glass.

It's a 10 minute project once you have all the items.

 

[Kirk Keyes]

it would help if you'd tell us what it is or does./QUOTE]

It's a cheap, manual pump.

When you squeeze the rubber bulb, air pressure pushs liquid up and out the glass tube with the dropper end. Squeeze hard and a lot of liquid shoots out, sqeeze real gentle and you can add it drop-wise. When you release the pressure on the rubber bulb, air comes back into the test tube via the dropper end to replace the volume of liquid that was squeezed out.

 

[Nicholas Lindan]

You can also use a wash bottle - squeeze the bottle to dispense or add an extra tube and squeeze bulb:
http://www.bioexpress.com/divinity-cart/item/582150/DYNALON-Round-Narrow-Neck-Wash-Bottles-LDPE/1.html

The proper way to do this is a burette:
http://www.amazon.com/Polylab%C2%AE-Burette-Plastic-Acrylic-25mL/dp/B001CL6NES/ref=sr_1_1?s=industrial&ie=UTF8&qid=1342381158&sr=1-1&keywords=burette (you can probably find it cheaper...try ebay)
Set the burette to drip the stuff into the beaker at the right rate - a drop is around 0.05ml, so 1 ml/minute is a drop every 3 seconds or so. The burette is graduated to allow accurate measurement of the flow rate. The educational supply places sell kits with a stand, burette and burette clamp.

You can make a half-arsed version with a funnel, some plastic tubing and a buldog clamp.

Here's a really cheap way of getting a drip dispense - an IV drip kit:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/75-100mL-Burette-Set-60-drip-Vented-Latex-Free-Soluset-Microdrip-4965-/150836264493?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item231e8abe2d

 

[Jerevan]

Thanks gentlemen for ideas and instructions how to make one - much appreciated!

Maybe I can have someone make one - or most probably, I'll just buy a burette (thanks for the proper technical term!) right off.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Not standard equipment you will have to make your own. It would take some one who is familiar with glass blowing about 10 minutes to polish the ends of the glass tubing, make the nozzle and the two bends. Every university I am familiar with has a glass blower in residence. With a few kind words he might do the work for you.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Wear safety goggles when working glass.

When working with soft glass you really need to use special glasses which filter out the strong sodium ion glare from the hot glass. This not only allows you to see what you are doing but protects your retinas. Without them you get something like snow blindness. Very painful and possiblely damaging. These glasses use special didymium lenses.

 

[Kirk Keyes]

Gerald - good point. But for making just a couple bends and polishing a few ends, you can get away without using the didymium glasses.

But you're right about the glasses, and they also help you better see the glass while it's in the flame.

 

[Mustafa Umut Sarac]

This is called Scientific Glass Blowing , one of the purest art form

http://www.allenglass.com/scientific-glassblowing-process.html

Umut

 

[pbromaghin]

In college I knew a premed chem major who had a bong that looked a lot like that.

 

[dwross]

That is the silver addition gadget from Mark Osterman's GEH darkroom. There are a lot of much simpler ways to add silver to an emulsion, but I absolutely love the look of the thing! Off and on I wonder if it couldn't be used as a hook to tie emulsion making into the Steam Punk culture. Mark's emulsion recipe comes from just about the era the culture parodies. Unfortunately, my marketeering creativity totally breaks down when I start to imagine all the Steam Punk things that you could fit your darkroom with! On top of Mad Scientist culture, maybe?? The mind boggles.

 

[Jerevan]

Yes, it is Mark Ostermans' Steam Punk gadget. Through this thread I got the technical term for what it is, and then I remembered you had some description of the stopcock buret. So I am going to get one of these. Or two.

Good call on the Steam Punk angle - maybe that is the way?

BTW, darkroom is getting closer now. Some things are starting to fall into place.

 

[dwross]

Excellent news about the darkroom! I hope it comes together by winter. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you. Summer without a darkroom is just fine, but a darkroom is the blessing of winter.
d

 

[Kirk Keyes]

It needs a lot of brass fittings or tubing to fit into the Victorian Era. But that would interfere with the emulsion making to have brass.

It looks ot me to be out of any chemistry lab from about 1850 to the current day...