Each month, Popular Science features one of Theodore Gray's DIY (if dangerous) experiments. See the whole list here.

2006

January

Making a Perfect Match

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Build a Battery

Cost: $20
Time: 3
Hours
Safe | | | | |
Crazy

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See the interactive Flash verion here or purchase a hard copy.

Sometimes the best things in life are just a big mistake. My writing PopSci's chemistry column the past few years? All based on a complete misunderstanding.

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See the video at the bottom of the page for a behind-the-scenes look at PopSci's fiery photo shoot. For excerpts from the shoot, click here

Creating a Salt Cloud

Cost: $500
Time: 2
Hours
Safe | | | | |
Crazy

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There are great things to come in the future, jet cars and all that. But the past held a few wonders too—for example, jars of mercury available at the corner apothecary. Just 50 years ago, people treated the shiny
liquid metal like a toy. Sadly, I’ll never experience the strange sensation of sticking my entire arm into a barrel of mercury, as kids once did during factory tours. Today mercury is considered a horrific poison, so bad that schools are evacuated for
a broken thermometer.

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Food contains an amazing amount of energy. If you don't believe it, feed candy to some kids and watch them bounce off the walls. Of course, tot-baiting is only one way to turn food energy into noise and destruction.

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In 1938 the E.I. DuPont de Nemours Company, known at the time mainly as a maker of explosives, announced what was arguably the single most important invention in the history of legwear: nylon.

Nylon wasn’t discovered by accident or extracted from a natural source. It was one of the first materials engineered from scratch, based on an understanding of polymer chemistry and a desire to plug what was, apparently, a serious hole in the hosiery department.

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Plating at Home

Cost: $30
Easy | | | | | Hard

You may not want to rechrome a '57 Chevy, but you can coat small objects using kits designed for plating jewelry. This $30 plating pen (pmcsupply.com) uses electricity the same as the bumper factory does, just with a couple AA batteries instead of a car-size transformer.

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Dept.: Gray Matter
Element: Titanium
Project: Anodizing a titanium birdhouse
Cost: $75
Time: 2 hours
Dabbler | | | | | Master

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