We helped out set up a science room for a local school. Most of the things we found had an obvious function, but we were unable to figure out a couple things. Anyone got any idea what these do?
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Steve Hobley works for a software company, but in his spare time likes to deconstruct all the lovely consumer goods with a goal to make unique and interesting things.
A few years ago he posted a short clip of the laser harp he developed, solely to show friends back in the UK.
Automagically that one clip got picked up by Gizmodo, Engadget and a bunch of other tech journals. The end result (apart from a ton of views on Youtube) was to get hired as a consultant for Little Boots – creating a laser harp for her 2010 US tour.
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According to the patents, the bottom item is a microscope. The wooden block is set on edge, so the metal piece is on top and the two knobs/cams are on the side. The red knop rotates the mirror, allowing the user to direct a light source up through a hole in the top surface. A microscope slide mounts on the top surface of the wooden block, and the two metal leaves hold a glass bead above the slide and light-hole. Turning the black cam raises and lowers the glass bead adjusting the focus.
It is designed to be an easy to use, cheap to make, microscope for elementary school use.
The last 3 pictures are a simple microscope. The USPTO has patents on file for both of those numbers with complete descriptions of the aparatus:
http://bit.ly/GBhsSZ
http://bit.ly/GDk7d2
(note: You will need to be able to view tiff files in your browser or use something like Google Chrome to inspect the broken image and save it off)
No idea what the top thing is, something to do with the properties of different metals, I imagine.
Awesome – thanks!
We were actually able to to figure out what the “magic wand” was for, and yes it was something to do with the properties of the different “spokes”.
The “wand” is a thermal conductivity experiment. There is a similar one here:
http://www.mta.co.nz/catalogue?TREE_CODE=MTA2012NZ&ACTION_LOAD=SCIENCE-ENERGY-HEAT
“Find out which metal conducts heat best by placing a small amount of wax at the tip of each rod and heating from beneath in the centre. Features brass, copper, nickel, aluminium and iron. Using the wooden handle, hold the brass hub over a flame, the wax will melt at different times.”
and? what was it with the magic wand?
Hi. The magic wand is to show the conductivity of different metals. A simple way to use it is to use petroleum jelly to stick some drawing pins to the end of each rod. You heat the rod in the very centre where all the sections meet and the pin that drops off first shows which metal conducted the heat the quickest- most thermal conductivity. Hope that helps!
Gareth is right.. it is a thermal conductivity experiment tool. I love figuring out what things like that are…