25 December 2008

Things to do with methanol, ie, HEET in the car-parts section of your local grocery.

With lye, also from your grocery, and oil, make biodiesel. You need to avoid water in this process, and its hard to remove water from ethanol, which would otherwise work.

With salt & detergent, separate & purify your DNA. Any alcohol, ethanol or isopropyl, will work.

With boric acid (roach powder from grocery) make green flame. You must use methanol as other alcohols have a yellowish flame that messes with the green.

With ground up greens (eg spinach) do some paper chromatography. You could use other alcohols or water for this too. You might get different results with different solvents.


Remember, MeOH is toxic and flammable.

Anyway, look 'em up, if you're bored on a break with a little kid.