Gadget Watch | Good Vibrations
Who hasn't experienced this frustration: When measuring out a minute quantity of a precious reagent in the microgram balance, your hand slips, and whoops! You've just dumped--and possibly lost--way more powder than you need. The Quaver® nonmotorized vibrating spatula and its nimbler sibling, the Quaverette®, could make such problems things of the past.
Manufactured by Bel-Art Products (www.bel-art.com) of Pequannock, NJ, the Quaver and Quaverette purport to improve upon standard powder-dispensing practices. Instead of shaking the spatula over a weighing dish to measure out a powder, the Quaver and Quaverette feature small, toothed thumbwheels that vibrate the devices to control more effectively how much reagent is used.
The two products differ slightly in length (the Quaver measures 19 cm; the Quaverette, 21 cm) and in geometry: The Quaver is a standard, curved spatula, while the Quaverette features a narrow, V-shaped blade for use with small-mouthed ...
