Scientific Apparatus

This looks like it is from Frankenstein's lab.

I was thinking that as well!

is lynne available for above explanation of this unit?

Early light bulb attempt???
Heated soap dispencer maybe!

Sorry, Chris, I was too busy thinking what Janice and Richard were thinking!

Tsk! People, it's what they make the soap in for the soap dispenser / light fixtures! :-)

Actually, it's an early attempt at a lava lamp

Awesome... I want one!

Silliness aside, that is a really nice black and white shot.

Most likely this was used for water distillation. Water is heated up, changed to vapor which then exits the container through the smaller output tube on the top - the water vapor then recondenses back to a liquid in a purer form in another collecting container. Impurities whose melting/vaporization point is much higher than water is left behind in the container with the heating coil.

This process can be used to separate any two liquids capable of existing as a gas at sufficiently different boiling points.

i.e. If liquid A becomes a gas at 120F and Liquid B becomes a gas 212F and the two are mixed together in one container they can be separated again by heating the container up to 150F. Liquid A will become a gas while liquid B will remain a liquid. The gas can then be collected and cooled back to its lquid form.

There are some corollary rules depending on the composition of the substances being distilled. (Some substances may actually break down when they are heated so that they never regain their original liquid form during condensation). This is particularly true of liquids made up of several different substances all of which may have differing boiling points.

In most environments this is done to purify water. However, in a medical environment perhaps they were actually interested in the substances left behind from distillation.

Sodium or other minerals from urine for analysis perhaps? An early way to identify calcium oxalate? - The last is speculation on my part. Lynne...opinions??

Boy, I don't have a clue - sorry.

Those windings do look like an electric heater element, so it may be the pressure vessel of a still.

yep, looks like an old evaporating unit. We use something vaugely similar in the lab i work at.

the coils heat up the flask and the liquid boils. you have one entry to insert the liquid, and a smaller entry that you can use to let out the steam. possibly the arms make it so tha tyou can rotate the flask/heating coils so they're not concentrating on just one part of the bottle.

maybe to purify liquids - we use them to boil down a tincture into a syrup. you can be amazingly accurate with how thick you make the mixture.

Very interesting!

Yo! Everyone after reading all this information my brain now itches!!!

John, thanks for the elaborate explanation... I didn't want to have to type it. ;)

I'm actually surrised that you haven't come across more of these; I would expect quitea few hospitals to have a small, quick distillation device.

*scratches chin* now what could i do with this?

My guess is that the round thingy on the foreground is actually detached from the electric cord thingy on the background, and they just happened to be put on the same surface. The round thingy was probably used for heating things, while the other... a lamp?

C Soapdespenser

***hic.....It made wikky-wakky-woos.....
: > )

Tony, you remembered my favorite drink! :-)

That make a sick bong. neat picture

First thought: Soap Dispenser, Second thought: Bong! This is what I get for moving and not having an internet connection for over a month!!!!!!!!!!!

It's a dual temperature distillation flask. It works on the refining method, separating multiple liquids.

Or making an ultra smoooooth liquor..
not that I or my past lab partner would EVER know...

Or it would blow up a drug lab real quick!

Killer Freebase pipe!

A must for films with Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney Jr., shadowy and in black and white; now crackly, grainy, and hard to hear.
But thank goodness for them.
....what do you think, Igor...............

I could make chicken soup in that thing

It's for making soap for the soap dispensers.

Its for making vodka for the patients

I think your onto something, Levi.

i think its to distil vodka,
instead of buying already distilled,
they probably bought it in big bottles
undistilled as it would of worked out cheaper
im not sure tho, just a guess.

for those who are sitting there say why would
a psych hospital have vodka
it would of been to numb pain
much the way doctors use cotton wool
buds dampened with alcohol before you get a needle.

a lot of chemistry students i see. Organic chemistry 101... where i distilled my very own alcoholic beverage. ;) nice to see there are some educated viewers in the house

Why it's a meth lab!

Actually, It reminds me of the mint dispencer at the local diner... they look exactly the same.

Some kind of space bong.

It's Dr. Frankenstein's soap dispenser! LMAO

hahahaha its a huge vaporizer!!!!!!!!!