4 ms·

I looked up some science kits recently and was quite disappointed. Nobody produces anything close to the great kits I used to enjoy as teenager. I was especiall

I looked up some science kits recently and was quite disappointed. Nobody produces anything close to the great kits I used to enjoy as teenager. I was especially fond of my chemistry set. The new versions all seem neutered in comparison. I guess science kits can't compete with all the distractions available to modern teenagers, and these kits were quite expensive making them probably a hard sell. Still, I wish someone would make these again.

fullspectrumdev 3y ago
Old style chemistry sets with actual glassware and actual chemicals seemed to die a painful death during the GWoT and meth lab panics of the early to mid 2000’s. They were fantastic fun too.
- dietrichepp 3y ago
  During the same era, science museums picked up some of the slack and now have hands-on chemistry labs. Depending on where you live. I have a lot of fond memories of, like, going to OMSI and doing the experiments in the chemlab.
01100011 3y ago
Yeah, this. I suspect I'll have to cobble something together myself for my kid. I have fond memories of making crystal gardens, distilling wood gas, bending glass tubes, making gunpowder, etc.
StillBored 3y ago
The Thames & Kosmos Chem C3000, is a pretty solid chemistry kid for a late elementary early middle school age child. I think I picked it up with an actual glassware kit from amazon ten years ago. At least in TX they have repealed the dumber restrictions on glassware. In the US the local Barnes and Noble stocks science kits, as do science museums, and the internet is a source for a lot of this stuff from places like https://www.homesciencetools.com/ https://www.homesciencetools.com/. Getting chemicals for some of the more "dangerous" reactions sometimes takes a bit of digging, or simply knowing how to synthesize it for your kid, who of course should probably have a parent on hand anyway. And of course ebay and archive.org/etc is a source for the old manuals or even kits (I recently saw the SFX-4000 aeronautical lab kit in an old fashioned toy store in town BTW) if you can't be bothered to grab the manual and do a bit of footwork to restore an old kit. But frankly people have to fond of memories for those kits. For example, a good used microscope from a college can be picked up on ebay and some slide + stains for just a few dollars these days and its a far more useful tool that the cheap toy oriented kits. And while I printed and bound a copy of the golden book of chemistry some years ago, one should really read more recent criticisms of that book before handing it to your child (ex; don't go tasting lead based compounds).
- Lariscus 3y ago
  The C3000 is great. Unfortunately, they only sell it for the US homeschooling market, it is no longer available in Europe.

fullspectrumdev 3y ago

Old style chemistry sets with actual glassware and actual chemicals seemed to die a painful death during the GWoT and meth lab panics of the early to mid 2000’s. They were fantastic fun too.

dietrichepp 3y ago
During the same era, science museums picked up some of the slack and now have hands-on chemistry labs. Depending on where you live. I have a lot of fond memories of, like, going to OMSI and doing the experiments in the chemlab.

01100011 3y ago

Yeah, this. I suspect I'll have to cobble something together myself for my kid. I have fond memories of making crystal gardens, distilling wood gas, bending glass tubes, making gunpowder, etc.

StillBored 3y ago

The Thames & Kosmos Chem C3000, is a pretty solid chemistry kid for a late elementary early middle school age child. I think I picked it up with an actual glassware kit from amazon ten years ago. At least in TX they have repealed the dumber restrictions on glassware. In the US the local Barnes and Noble stocks science kits, as do science museums, and the internet is a source for a lot of this stuff from places like https://www.homesciencetools.com/ https://www.homesciencetools.com/. Getting chemicals for some of the more "dangerous" reactions sometimes takes a bit of digging, or simply knowing how to synthesize it for your kid, who of course should probably have a parent on hand anyway. And of course ebay and archive.org/etc is a source for the old manuals or even kits (I recently saw the SFX-4000 aeronautical lab kit in an old fashioned toy store in town BTW) if you can't be bothered to grab the manual and do a bit of footwork to restore an old kit. But frankly people have to fond of memories for those kits. For example, a good used microscope from a college can be picked up on ebay and some slide + stains for just a few dollars these days and its a far more useful tool that the cheap toy oriented kits. And while I printed and bound a copy of the golden book of chemistry some years ago, one should really read more recent criticisms of that book before handing it to your child (ex; don't go tasting lead based compounds).

Lariscus 3y ago
The C3000 is great. Unfortunately, they only sell it for the US homeschooling market, it is no longer available in Europe.