what is it
rallain | September 10, 2010Here is the next item.
There is a threaded plug on the top. I took it off so you could see inside. The whole thing is pretty heavy.
Good luck, and let's be careful out there.
rallain | September 7, 2010Congratulations Fran. Not only did she answer the "What the heck is this?" correctly, she was the first commenter.
Here is the original item:
It is of course a gas discharge tube. You put these tubes in there (as shown above) with helium or neon or whatever in there and it excites the gas to give off light.
Honestly, we have like 10 of these things laying around. Some of them are newer and say "Danger 5000 volts"), but these older ones say nothing. Here is an example of one of the first ones I saw.
I didn't figure out what it was for a while because most of the ones we have don't have those…
rallain | September 3, 2010Please note the official change of the title of this game, it is no longer "what is this".
Here is the item:
I suspect someone will know what this is. Honestly, I didn't figure it out right away. However, I have found that the readers as a group generally are more knowledgeable than me by myself.
Oh, I don't think there is really much description to add here. I included a meter stick for scale.
P.S. How come a device for measuring temperature is a thermometer and a device for measuring electric potential is a voltmeter? Shouldn't the meterstick be called either a length-meter or a meter…
rallain | August 31, 2010Reader Fruity was the first to correctly name this device - on just the 9th comment. Impressive. Honestly, when I found this thing I had no clue. I asked other physicists and none of us were sure. However, I did find the answer. Let me show you my secret.
I don't know how old this thing is, but it is old. When I open it, my nose and eyes get all tingly - probably from the mold. Here is that apparatus in the book (tome):
I can't show you the whole page because it has other stuff of awesomeness that I want to show you later. But, I can show you the description for that item.
I am…
rallain | August 27, 2010Here is my plan. Post a "what is this" on every Friday until I run out of things. I will post the answer on Tuesday. Maybe we should start keeping points. You get more points for being the first one to get it right. You lose points for getting it wrong.
Last week was easy, but I think this is more of an appropriate level. Here it is:
Nice - it has a tag, but no part number. Honestly, this one stumped me for a while. If you have any reasonable questions, I might answer them.