Exploring Liquids: An Experiment

October 16, 2008 3 Comments

Heres a fun experiment you can try using the contents of your kitchen cupboard. Explore the effects of
different densities and learn about refraction, viscosity and the planet Jupiter. Youll need five different
liquids; I used golden syrup, dishwashing liquid, water, alcohol and vegetable oil. I also used some food
colouring to make it easier to see what was going on (and because the alcohol I use is Tequila which
looks just like water). If you have a chopstick around that will also be handy but any stirring implement
will do.



Instead of golden syrup you could use treacle or corn syrup: something gloopy and messy. For alcohol
you can use almost anything from spirits to rubbing alcohol. If youre a kid, please ask whoever is in
charge before raiding the drinks cabinet (this is generally a good rule in life).

You will be putting all of these into one glass, so find a tall one that is reasonably straight-sided. The
more angled the edges of the glass are, the more of each liquid you will need as you go along this
could get tricky. Youll need about one sixth of a glass worth of each liquid, as shown above.


Start with the glass containing the syrup and carefully pour the dishwashing liquid into it. You want to
pour down the sides of the glass if possible, this will help stop the two liquids mixing. For these two it
should be easy enough as they are both fairly thick. Let the glass stand for a moment and you should see
that the two liquids make layers in the glass.





Now we add the rest of the liquids, in the order shown in the image at the top. Pouring down the side of
the glass may not be enough to prevent these remaining liquids from mixing. It helped me to use a
teaspoon. Hold the teaspoon inside the glass just above the surface and pour gently into the spoon,
allowing the liquid to pour over the sides. In this way, the liquid you are pouring is placed on top of the
existing ones much more gently. Be careful and pour slowly and you should be fine. You can always
practice your pouring in another glass if you want to.







Hopefully you will end up with a nice, layered glass of different coloured liquids. Why? Well it is all to do
with density the mass per volume of the liquids. Liquids at the bottom have higher densities than
those at the top. All liquids have different densities as well many other properties. We can explore some
of them using our layered glass.



Take a chopstick, or similar stick-like object and insert it into the glass. Dont disturb the glass too much
though. See how the chopstick looks now. Each liquid bends the light coming through the glass in a
different way. This is related to the density but is actually a property of all materials called the refractive
index. In general the refractive index increases with density. It is a measure of how much light is bent as
it passes through a material.

We can also explore two more properties of liquids: viscosity and miscibility. Take hold of the chopstick
and stir the glass up. Stir well, but try not to spill the contents. Watch and feel how the liquids mix.



Youll notice that it is very hard to mix the syrup and that you can also feel the washing up liquid
dragging against your stirring. This is because heavy liquids tend to be viscous. Viscosity is the measure
of a liquids resistance to you changing its shape. The syrup is highly viscous, i.e. it resists your chopstick
very strongly. The water, alcohol and oil offer almost no noticeable resistance at all, by comparison. This
is because they are all similarly viscous and we are all used to how water feels.




After you stop stirring the glass, wait a few moments for it to settle down again. Watch it during this
time and you will see it appear to organise itself. Miscibility is the measure of how well two substances
mix. Water and alcohol are miscible because they mix together just fine. You can see that they do not
separate out again after you stop stirring.

Water and oil are immiscible. This means that they do not mix. It doesnt take long after you stop stirring
for the oil to float back to the top. Would you say that the washing up liquid is miscible with any of the
others? I found it hard to tell because both it and the syrup were so viscous I could not stir them up very
easily!

Liquids, and their many properties, shape all sorts of things in the world around you. Refraction, density,
viscosity and miscibility are important in our everyday lives.

Anyone who has had to clean oil-based paints off a brush with water knows something about miscibility.
If you have tried to hook something out of a pond or swimming pool who have experience the
frustration of refraction. You also know that you float in the sea, this is because of the difference in
density between the salt water in the sea and the water in your body. Have you ever had to wait for
ketchup to slowly pour out of a bottle because of its high viscosity?

In astronomy you can see some of these properties in action. The planet Jupiter has a series of coloured
bands running across its surface. The different fluids that make up Jupiters enormous mass do not mix
well because of their make-up. The hydrogen- and helium-based fluids are thought not to be miscible
and this is part of the reason that we see the striking bands or colour on the planets surface.