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Microscale and Miniscale Organic Chemistry Laboratory Experiments
This book offers a comprehensive introductory treatment of the organic laboratory techniques for handling glassware and equipment, safety in the laboratory, micro- and miniscale experimental procedures, theory of reactions and techniques, relevant background information, applications and spectroscopy.
- GenresChemistry
640 pages, Hardcover
First published July 29, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
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July 15, 2017We didn't go through every experiment in this (thank god), so I can only generalize from what I did use.
It covers concepts differently than our lecture text, and has quite a lot that weren't covered in that book at all, which was nice. The procedures are pretty easy to follow, and seemed to work well when we followed them.
That last is the trick, though. Often our instructor adjusted reagent amounts to give better yields, or to reduce time spent in synthesis. Occasionally the other lab section would benefit from this, as amounts were tweaked further after my class ended up with uniformly poor yields.
Evaporations are always done with an erlenmeyer flask in this book. This is a wonderful idea, if you have a spare two hours. We learned to ignore these specifications, and use beakers instead. Of course, UCCS has nice hoods, and if you're in the open, you might have to suffer the longer wait. On the other hand, why are you evaporating poisons in the open at all?
My biggest difficulty with this was the critical thinking questions. They're interesting and pertinent questions, I'll grant, but they aren't answered anywhere. The answers aren't indicated in the text at all in most experiments, leading most to that compulsive liar, the internet. Even the internet failed in a couple of cases. They did induce critical thinking, but most of that thinking was the wrong sort of critical.
The safety sections are pathetic. If you want to know safety information, use hazard.com or another msds database. If you don't want to know safety information, do it anyway. There're some nasty reagents used in this, and there's no guarantee you won't get exposed to them.
It's not bad, but does require a very available and on the ball instructor to use. On the upside, this might be the only text that doesn't come out with a new edition every year. The current edition is ten years old. This makes it pretty easy to find used. Also, considering the author teaches at my university, any new edition might use the aforementioned tweakings (undergraduates make good labrats, after all). I see no sign of such an edition, but when a publisher might profit, there is hope.
I wish to add that my relief at not doing every experiment in the book was not a comment on the subject or quality of the experiments. However, the relatively small number we did over two semesters kept me in a state of perpetual exaustion, and the thought of cramming more in that time period is madness.
I have left this unrated because in most cases I did not follow the procedures as written, using the tweaked versions instead, and therefore cannot accurately rate its use without said tweakings.
It covers concepts differently than our lecture text, and has quite a lot that weren't covered in that book at all, which was nice. The procedures are pretty easy to follow, and seemed to work well when we followed them.
That last is the trick, though. Often our instructor adjusted reagent amounts to give better yields, or to reduce time spent in synthesis. Occasionally the other lab section would benefit from this, as amounts were tweaked further after my class ended up with uniformly poor yields.
Evaporations are always done with an erlenmeyer flask in this book. This is a wonderful idea, if you have a spare two hours. We learned to ignore these specifications, and use beakers instead. Of course, UCCS has nice hoods, and if you're in the open, you might have to suffer the longer wait. On the other hand, why are you evaporating poisons in the open at all?
My biggest difficulty with this was the critical thinking questions. They're interesting and pertinent questions, I'll grant, but they aren't answered anywhere. The answers aren't indicated in the text at all in most experiments, leading most to that compulsive liar, the internet. Even the internet failed in a couple of cases. They did induce critical thinking, but most of that thinking was the wrong sort of critical.
The safety sections are pathetic. If you want to know safety information, use hazard.com or another msds database. If you don't want to know safety information, do it anyway. There're some nasty reagents used in this, and there's no guarantee you won't get exposed to them.
It's not bad, but does require a very available and on the ball instructor to use. On the upside, this might be the only text that doesn't come out with a new edition every year. The current edition is ten years old. This makes it pretty easy to find used. Also, considering the author teaches at my university, any new edition might use the aforementioned tweakings (undergraduates make good labrats, after all). I see no sign of such an edition, but when a publisher might profit, there is hope.
I wish to add that my relief at not doing every experiment in the book was not a comment on the subject or quality of the experiments. However, the relatively small number we did over two semesters kept me in a state of perpetual exaustion, and the thought of cramming more in that time period is madness.
I have left this unrated because in most cases I did not follow the procedures as written, using the tweaked versions instead, and therefore cannot accurately rate its use without said tweakings.
July 2, 2012
I didn't like the table of contents and it was kind of weirdly put together but I guess it wasn't the worst textbook to have. Some parts were good, others okay.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews