THE VIRTUAL BENCH
Run the experiment before you run it.
Every experiment runs as a sequence: read the brief, collect your apparatus off the shelf, build the setup in the right order, then run it. Make your mistakes here where they're free — then walk into the real lab already knowing the moves.
The titration is free to try. Log in with a demo account to unlock the rest.
Titration: ethanoic acid vs sodium hydroxide
Open the tap drop by drop, chase the pink endpoint, and calculate the concentration.
Flame tests: identifying metal ions
Clean the loop, burn the salts, and name two unknowns from their flame colours.
Food tests: starch, sugars, protein and fat
Run iodine, Benedict's, biuret and emulsion tests, then identify a mystery food.
Microscopy: onion epidermal cells
Mount, stain and focus a real slide — then draw what you see at ×400.
Ohm's law: V–I characteristics of a resistor
Wire the circuit, sweep the current, and read resistance off your own V–I graph.
Simple pendulum: measuring g
Time the swing at five lengths and extract g from a T²–L plot.
Double-indicator titration: phosphoric acid against sodium hydroxide
Catch both end-points of a triprotic acid in one run — red to orange, yellow to green.
Qualitative analysis: identifying the ions in two unknown solids
Run the full test series on two unknown solids and name every ion from the evidence.
Dye uptake in celery: does warmer water speed up the xylem stream?
Time dye moving up celery in ice-cold and warm water, and find the rate that warmth buys you.
Moments: finding the weight of an unknown mass
Balance a pivoted ruler against two known loads and find an unknown weight two independent ways.
Resistance of a wire: R depends on length (slide-wire method)
Slide a contact along a metre of wire and show resistance is directly proportional to length.
Refraction through a rectangular glass block
Trace a ray through a glass block with pins, and see why spacing them out sharpens your angle.
Redox titration: ethanedioic acid vs potassium manganate(VII)
Heat, then titrate a self-indicating redox reaction to a permanent pale pink — no indicator needed.
Thermal decomposition: water of crystallisation in hydrated zinc sulfate
Heat a hydrated salt to constant mass and calculate its water of crystallisation.
Qualitative analysis: a mislabelled salt and three manganese oxidation states
Catch a mislabelled bottle with your own tests, then compare manganese across three oxidation states.
Iodine clock: estimating hydrogen peroxide concentration by serial dilution
Time an iodine clock across a serial dilution, then read an unknown concentration off your own curve.
Microscopy and stereology: a plant stem cross-section (slide J1)
Count vascular bundles in a sample sector and scale up to a whole-section density.
Spring oscillations: series vs parallel stiffness
Time the same springs in series and in parallel, and plot √T2 against √T1.
Deformation of paper cylinders: testing w = k(y − p)
Squash a rolled paper cylinder under a spring-loaded mass and test w = k(y − p).