I'm a moron wigger who saw on youtube that it's possible to set up a science station in your garage and grow precious gemstones at home. I want to seriously explore the possibility.
-What chemicals do I need? Where do I get them? How much do they cost?
-What equipment do I need? How much does it cost?
-What's the average return per batch of chemicals that I use?
-What's a good estimate of the total startup cost?
-Is it easy to accidentally kill myself during this process by being moronic?
-Any laws I should be aware of?
-How easy is it to sell opal? Where would I go to sell this stuff?
The israelitetuber didn't tell you all this? Looks like you better subscribe to their patreon NERD!!!!!
>The israelitetuber didn't tell you all this?
He did, OP is just a homosexual, as usual
No one is going to buy your homegrown opal, but it is fairly easy to grow
>I'm a moron wigger who saw on youtube that it's possible to set up a science station in your garage and grow precious gemstones at home. I want to seriously explore the possibility.
see youtube
>Is it easy to accidentally kill myself during this process by being moronic?
yes, being moronic makes accidentally killing yourself a much higher likelihood in ALL things.
moronic guy at my work got fired but he had:
nearly cut off his finger with a grinder
nearly sliced open his stomach with a sander
got his arm pulled into the drill press
If you are moronic, you can just do the heavy lifting, it's better that way, trust me.
It sounds like you need to do more research and thinking about general issues before asking for help....
>-What chemicals do I need? Where do I get them? How much do they cost?
Most processes AFAIK utilize the careful and controlled hydrolysis of tetraethylorthosilicate, followed by settling, drying, then calcining in a kiln, and finally impregnating with zirconium oxides for durability. Color can be added using various metal salts during the zirconia step.
You can buy supplies online; nothing involved in the process is especially hazardous or suspect.
How much it will cost can vary wildly depending on what kind of suppliers you're using and what grade of materials as well as the scale/quantity of course. Expect less than $50 per kilogram for the materials cost of finished opal when operating at a reasonable "home gamer" scale. Expect it to cost 20x that much if you're operating at a tiny scale.
>-What equipment do I need? How much does it cost?
you need to do more research. No offense, anon.
>-How easy is it to sell opal? Where would I go to sell this stuff?
If this is primarily a business venture for you, then these questions should be the first and most important questions that you need to figure out for yourself. Any advice I could offer here would be too general and nebulous to be of real use. For one thing-- try talking to people who are already in the business of merchanting the stuff and try to find an angle. I had a specialty lampworking glass merchant tell me that he would be happy to pay $500 a pound for custom colors.
>-Any laws I should be aware of?
heh, maybe. It's probably breaking a handful of laws to do this kind of stuff in your apartment, but its also hard to imagine that anyone will care or be able to find out as long as you don't burn anything down. Everyone you know will think you're cooking meth though, because normies have no concept of chemistry except for what they learned from watching Breaking Bad.
continued....
There's a ton of research papers written about how to synthesize this stuff, and I recommend that you start reading. If you get confused when they start to talk about pH, then do a LOT more reading. The Kyocera patents and the related works from the authors involved are a decent place to start digging.
Be warned that there is a lot of sensitivity in this apparently simple reaction because of the need to carefully control the size and shape of the precursor particles formed. On a broad level, you're just hydrolyzing TEOS to form silicon dioxide particles, but specifically you need to make a solution of just the right concentration at just the right speed with just the right agitation etc to get the matrix needed for 'play of color' to be apparent. Particles too small or large, or of the wrong shape or arrangement will make your product a white or clear useless piece of glass. Read up on this; there's been a lot of work done about this subject and you can find some very helpful data with a brief dive into the literature.
In case you are too much of a newbie, don't try this recipe.
It's well known because the food coloring don't work.
this, skip the food colouring
don't know what this gay is on about
Mustard gas. Will burn your skin and lungs horribly, as you slowly die.
That's not how you make mustard gas you dumb frick. If it was that easy, the entire world would be covered in chlorine gas. Why the hell would you spread bad information like that.
I did try this and
is right, the food color doesn't do much here. I did try it with printer ink and got some killer results though.
Google it or believe a homicidal nutter j that thinks he's funny on PrepHole.
produce chloramine
will burn your membranes pretty fricking bad
do it.
Yes. Can also produce nitrogen trichloride with an excess of bleach, which is a super-sensitive explosive.
don't fall for this op, I know you're moronic and I'm looking out for your safety.
If you're too moronic to google this yourself, then you're too moronic to build it, tard.
For no reason other than curiosity, I want to create a device that holds onto the side of a water jug and drives around the edge of it. The device is held on by magnets on springs attached to the device, and inside the jug there are magnets in the water. The force of the magnets either side of the barrier holds the device in place. A small motor in the device then turns a wheel and that slowly drives the device around the jug.
The casing of the snail to be 3d printed at 10% infill, continuous servo attached to a 2032CR battery drives the wheel.
I'm hitting two problems
1) The weight of the servo/battery means the device just falls down the jug. I'm trying to counter this with more magnets but I'm open to suggestions.
2) Biggest problem is that jugs are curved. This means the magnets on the device have to be attached to springs. Can anyone think of a better solution. 2nd picture regarding this incoming.
>2) Biggest problem is that jugs are curved. This means the magnets on the device have to be attached to springs. Can anyone think of a better solution. 2nd picture regarding this incoming.
Re pic related.
Inb4 making the device curved; I don't know what size of container will be available yet.
>Inb4 making the device curved; I don't know what size of container will be available yet.
Put hinges on the device to make it fold and conform to the surface, like a trifold letter
Good idea, I'll 3d print the hinge to decrease the weight too
Derp this isn't /sqt/
Goddamn I'm moronic. Wrong open tab
just check what the mix do before actually doing it.
Tip: It's not crystals.
u can grow salt crystals in water pretty ez
Fricking nobody buys gemstones. I had a bunch of them when I was a deadbeat 17 year old and ran around the entire city trying to find someone to pay anything for them. There was nobody even remotely interested in looking at them.
gem and mineral shows are your only safe bet
No one wants to buy fricking quartz from some 17yo
Also, if your ok with fiddling with it to get something monodisperse, and you don't want to use TEOS, you can also use sodium silicate as a silica precursor.