kjpmi
Harmless
Posts: 13
Registered: 9-11-2014
Member Is Offline
Mood: Chemical-y
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Account with Fischer Scientific or Sigma Aldrich for home lab?
To be fair, there's a lot I can and have purchased off of ebay from some of the well known chemical resellers there and so far everything has been as
described.
But there are obviously certain things that you just can't find unless you go thru Sigma Aldrich or someone like them. The problem is that they WILL
NOT ship to a residential address. And not only that buy they have to approve your business as having all the safety requirements for hazardous
chemicals. Fuck that.
I have ordered other chemicals from other suppliers who would only ship to a business address and weren't Nazi's about what type of business it was
and I just had it shipped to my boyfriend's employer's shop. That worked for one thing but it's kind of a pain having to do it that way.
What do you guys with home labs do? (in the US here). Are there any big suppliers comparable to Sigma Aldrich who will ship to residential addresses?
I wouldn't even mind if I had to verify that I were running a business out of my house. It's easy enough and cheap enough to set up some LLC. Or if I
had to show that I had safety measures in place.
[Edited on 5-3-2017 by kjpmi]
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Elemental Phosphorus
Hazard to Others
Posts: 185
Registered: 11-11-2016
Location: Is everything
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Most home chemists in my experience purchase from suppliers like Elemental Scientific, buy on ebay, or here on SM if necessary (Mario840) or extract
chemicals from over the counter sources. Mostly the last one. Almost all of my chemicals are from eBay or various OTC sources.
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Dr.Bob
International Hazard
Posts: 2736
Registered: 26-1-2011
Location: USA - NC
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There is a thread a few lines below asking roughly the same question. The answer is that few big companies will sell to individuals. There is not
enough financial gain for them to take the risk of just one person doing something dumb with a chemical from them. It is not just drugs, but
terrorists, people trying to poison someone, people doing chemistry in an apartment building who start a fire, the list of things that can go wrong
are endless. And in our lawyer infested world, anybody can sue any company for any reason.
I can't blame them in some cases, when I was young, I was able to get lots of hazardous chemicals, my parents had no idea what they did, and I almost
burned the house down a few times, until my mom made me "play" outside. I also had a number of really toxic chemicals that I had almost no idea of
how to handle. So I can understand their fears. But there are smaller companies that cater to individuals, they do so because most are LLCs which
can take more risks than multibillion dollar corporation. So I would encourage you to give them your business, as that will encourage them to
continue to exist.
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kjpmi
Harmless
Posts: 13
Registered: 9-11-2014
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Mood: Chemical-y
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Any others you can recommend?
I've bought from Right Price Chemicals, Elemental Scientific, The Science Company, and of course ebay. I'm sure there have been a few others over the
years.
Oh, Chemsavers, they list on ebay but you can get stuff off their website which isn't always listed on ebay.
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kjpmi
Harmless
Posts: 13
Registered: 9-11-2014
Member Is Offline
Mood: Chemical-y
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FYI for anyone interested, Right Price Chemicals actually carries a lot. You can get acetic anhydride and nitric acid from them for relatively cheap.
And yes, I've extracted stuff from OTC products. DCM being the main thing, but only because it's so easy. Just gets to be a pain after a while,
especially when cost isn't really an issue.
Just wondering if there are any other suppliers who cater to individuals and offer larger selections of chemicals, not just solvents and acids.
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