Links found whilst thrashing about the internets on my computer machine.
RCS Rocket Motor Components supplies, well, rocket motor components for the serious “non-professional”. RCS offers propellants, casting resins (i.e., polybutadiene), bonding agents, tubes, and other pieces-parts for the rocket builder. Good stuff, Maynard.
It turns out that my fellow Iowegian and former US President Herbert Hoover published a translated and annotated version in 1912 of De Re Metallica by Georgius Agricola (1556). Hoover’s translation can be found on the web and a copy is on display at the National Mining Hall of Fame and Museum in Leadville, CO. This work by Agricola is nothing short of amazing. A series of images of the text in the original Latin can be found as well.
It is interesting to note that Agricola (1494-1555) and Paracelsus (1493-1541) were contemporaries in central Europe. Agricola, a Saxon, spent much of his time in Joachimsthal and Chemnitz whereas Paracelsus, Swiss, is famous for being a bit of a wanderer. While I have not encountered a reference indicating whether these two polymaths had any knowledge of one another, they very much exemplify the meaning of Renaissance.
This USB temperature logger is pretty cool. I can hear it calling for me.
Here is a collection of links to monographs on Radiochemistry from LANL.
Lamentations on Chemistry 
I’m not sure what you are planning on doing with the temperture logger. In many cases, knowing that a particular temperature has been crossed can be enough, but in many other cases, both the time and temperature are important, and that is a nonlinear relationship. Simply taking the mean of the temperatures over time yields a meaningless number; the higher the activation energy of the system, the more meaningless the “average” temperature is.
I spent 4 years working on the time-temperature degradation of perishable food, only I had to take the Macgyver approach- using only sandpaper and adhesive tape. (When you work for the world’s largest manufacturer of sandpaper and adhesive tape, you have no choice.)
Hi John, No lab use intended. I like to collect widgets. Eventually I find a use for them.
Such devices are useful in shipping products that may be prone to precipitation. If your product shows up crashed out of solution even while in a heated container, a temperature history is good to have so you can beat the shipper about the head and shoulders with it.