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ScienceHideout

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posted on 27-7-2011 at 08:24

Antiques

A visit to an Antique shop in Flagstaff brought me 3 reagent bottles, etched with HYDROCHLORIC ACID, CON SULFURIC ACID, and PHENOLPHTHALEIN. They are very old, and i believe well worth the $14 each I paid for then. They will look great on a shelf in my house. But I was wondering if anyone knows how old they might be? I was thinking 30s. On the bottoms of them, they read: "MBW USA" and "WHEATON NO-SOL-VIT 3 USA". They all have stoppers and are very clean. Any imput on their value/age?

hey, if you are reading this, I can't U2U, but you are always welcome to send me an email!

Mr. Wizard

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posted on 27-7-2011 at 08:47

They are worth $14 each.

peach

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posted on 27-7-2011 at 09:29

^what he said.

Plus or minus a bit, but not a lot.

Unless it's really, really old, science gear does not tend to command a particularly high value. I see old beam balances from that period coming up all the time, and selling for 5, 10, 25 pounds. Another reasonably common one are doctors electroshock machines, complete with weird and kinky looking electrodes.

I have a Victorian conical measuring cup. The numbers are hand ground into the glass. Cost me 99p.

I bought it just because I liked the way it looked rather than because it was worth much.

We have a program in the UK called the antiques road show, which everyone loves because people bring in such odd items and stories, and some of it's worth a fortune, but a lot of it isn't. A really good piece of advice was given by one of the guys when he was looking at someone's 'modern antique', which was a print they'd bought of a WW2 plane. They'd bought it from somewhere for a few hundred, being told they would turn into collectible AIRlooms. It was nothing of the sort. It was a mass produced print and the sales pitch is common.

The auctioneer simply said "Do you actually like the picture?".

His point was, unless you're darn sure of what you're looking at, or simply like it for what it is, don't starting paying out money just because it looks or sounds like it might be worth more. It probably isn't. And there's a good chance the person selling it is onto you being sucker susceptible.

Quote:

Wheaton 400, also known as No-Sol-Vit, is a borosilicate glass that falls well within the limits for USP Type I chemically resistant borosilicate glass, as specified in the XXIII revision of the U.S. Pharmacopoeia. Examples include safety-coated wide-mouth bottles 34501-20, -50 and -70.

These shock machines don't sell for much at all.

These 'violet wands', S&M people seem to love them, so they can make quite a lot more. A few hundred if the set is complete and tidy.

These, despite looking very nice, don't make much. This is actually one of the nicest examples. I'd like one for the house.

This is similar to the cup I have, but it's someone else's

I have even seen one of these floating around! It's a trepanning saw. People used to, and some do still, use them to drill holes in people's heads to 'relieve pressure'. The one I spotted was £20, and didn't sell.

There's a girl on the interweb who runs a custom clothing shop called 'Steampunk Couture'. One of the items she has in her shop at the moment are these bottles. They're $9 and artificially aged. I think most people prefer them without the possible chemical remains inside.

An old bottle of meths I have. This one is so old, I don't remember the chemist ever being there. My neighbour still had this in her garage. That's probably the original meths in there. It has the times it's to be sold at during the day, so alky's don't stumble in there and buy a bottle.

And there was this odd bottle of blue grog beside it. Which I think is IPA, dyed blue. And again, it's probably the original stuff she bought decades and decades ago. Her house was a vault of history. She bought it when it was built in the 40's, bought expensive stuff and then looked after it very well. There was a bed in there from the war. A HMV stereo from the 70's, still in next to new condition with the original sales booklet in there. The house still had it's bell system, so a chime would ring and a flapper with the rooms name on it would move in the kitchen when someone pressed the buttons in the rooms.