Today we started to test how different chemicals help to turn nails into rust. We mixed chemicals with water and put nails into little wells with water and chemicals. We will see in a few days which chemical helps make rust faster.

But now, here is the story:


"The molecule fight"

One day, sodium tetraborate, or Borax for short, and ferric
ammonium sulfate, also known as Ferric to his friends, were watching Naildown.
　
BORAX: beat him! Beat him YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
　
FERRIC: you know I can eat more nails then you.
　
BORAX: GIVE IT A BREAK y,you molecule!
　
FERRIC: that was lame that was really lame.
　
BORAX: I know I ………………Who wrote this script?

Today we did one experiment, and we learned about how other atoms mix together. We made a model of how molecules are made of different atoms. Atoms get hooked up together because some are missing electrons, and some have too much. If you look at this picture, the atom of Co is missing two electrons, and each of two atoms of Cl have a extra electron. So they hook up together and they're happy because they are not missing any electrons.

But sometimes when molecules meet they relize they may have better friends than another. Like on the picture below. The atoms of Cl like atoms of Na more than they like atom of Co. So they split, and from Co they go Na.

So that was paper model. Here is the experement with real chemicals. One little bottle in this picture has chemical CoCl2, another has Na2CO3.

So we (1) took one skoop of one chemical and put it into the well of the reaction plate (upper right with white stuff in it), and (2) a skoop of another chemical and put it into another well which is below the first one. And we added 10 drops of water into each well and mixed each well . Then we took two drops from each well and mixed in the third one. They reacted together and made pinkish jello. That's because they reacted into two other chemicals: NaCl and CoCO3 which is solid and makes the stuff look like jello.

First experiments with Chem-X1000

I am Science Man, Jr., SciManJr for short. I am 8 years old.

In this blog, I write my science experiments and projects.

Today I did experiments with my chemistry kit. I use chemistry kit called Chem-X1000 Science Lab.Today, February 14 2010, I started my experiments. First, we assembled the scale. Then we weighed a big paper clip. Then we weighed a penny, and a dime, and a nickel.

Here is the picture.

We found that penny was 3g 170mg, which is the same as 3170 mg.

Dime was 2g 350mg.

Nickel was heavy and we run out of half-gram weights. We used a dime, which is 2350 mg, and 2 g of weights, and the scale was 875 mg. All together, nickel is 5g 225 mg.

Next experiment was called Paper Chromatography. It is experiment number CH1 in the Chem-X1000 Manual.

We cut up sides on the top of chromatography paper, we put a marker dot on the place where we cut the paper (see the pictures), we made holes in the bottom of the paper strip. This way we made 3 strips, and spots were made with markers: blue, green, and red. And we hung them of the straightened paper clip.

Then we put three strips in a glass of water, hanging on the wire, so that only the tips of the paper strips touched the water. Here is the picture of how the strips are hanging in the glass with water.

The paint from the marker spot spread all the way up to the top of the paper and showed what colors it was made from.

My next experiment was D1 in the Manual. It was about bubbling chemicals. We got all our supplies ready. We got some table salt because it is sodium chloride, and our experiment was to break it into elements.

We mixed some water and salt. We took pencil leads and wires and attached to 9V battery. It is a normal square battery. We put the pencil leads into salty water, and we see bubbles coming out. And it smelled like chlorine. The pencil leads looked like started to burn.

My brother helped to hold one of the leads, and I was holding the other. Then my dad dropped phenolphthalein into the water, and it became purple and bubbly.