For this independant lab me and my group decided to challenge ourselves so we decided to take on a project that had many different components to make the final product. We thought making cologne would be a good challenge because it involved gathering our plants for fragrances, extracting the oils and then mixing them with ethanol and finding the perfect measurements of each oil to make an actual pleasant scent. the question leading this project is how is cologne made?
The ingredients for our cologne were Lemon peel, rosemary and lavender. to start our cologne we needed to extract the oils from our ingredients. Our first method to try extracting oils didnt work so well. We tried bringing our lemon peels to a slight boil in a container connected to a tube to try and condense the vapor coming off and then later try to get the oils out. This method took too long and was not very efficient in getting the oils out so we decided we needed to try something else. Andrew found a better a lot more efficient way of extracting oils by using dry ice in a pressurized container. When we put the plants in the container along with the dry ice and closed it off it pressurized, causing the oils from the plants to be pressed off. when we released the pressure out of the container the oils came out with the now solid CO2. The CO2 evaporated and the oils were left behind in the tube.
The ingredients for our cologne were Lemon peel, rosemary and lavender. to start our cologne we needed to extract the oils from our ingredients. Our first method to try extracting oils didnt work so well. We tried bringing our lemon peels to a slight boil in a container connected to a tube to try and condense the vapor coming off and then later try to get the oils out. This method took too long and was not very efficient in getting the oils out so we decided we needed to try something else. Andrew found a better a lot more efficient way of extracting oils by using dry ice in a pressurized container. When we put the plants in the container along with the dry ice and closed it off it pressurized, causing the oils from the plants to be pressed off. when we released the pressure out of the container the oils came out with the now solid CO2. The CO2 evaporated and the oils were left behind in the tube.
We used the same method to collect the oils from our other plants. After collecting our oils we borrowed some ethanol from another class and began mixing our oils into it to make our actual cologne. It took 3 trials to get a cologne with a scent that seemed to please everyone. We named our final cologne FUCCI.
Our independent experiment turned out very well. We got a very pleasant smell that most people liked and was put into neat containers that are easy to use.
I learned that the ethanol is used as a carrier fluid and absorbs the scents of the oils we put into it. There wasn’t much of a scent to the ethanol so every oil we put into it really stood out.
I believe our results were very desirable because we made a cologne that smelled very nice to many people. One thing I did as an individual that was good was remaining patient even when things didn’t go so well with the first extracting method.
The people I worked with were Franky Diaz and Alexander Popov. We all worked well together, there wasn’t any conflict and the work was spread out evenly, even when somebody was absent we still worked towards making our final product.
If I could do this again I’d try to extract more oils to make a more complex scent but there isn’t much else I’d want to change.
For my next independent project I would not mind working with my group again. We all collaborate well and are patient. I don’t think I would want to continue this project as there isn’t much more that we can do.
During this project, I learned a lot about how much goes into cologne and how complex it is to get certain smells.
I learned that the ethanol is used as a carrier fluid and absorbs the scents of the oils we put into it. There wasn’t much of a scent to the ethanol so every oil we put into it really stood out.
I believe our results were very desirable because we made a cologne that smelled very nice to many people. One thing I did as an individual that was good was remaining patient even when things didn’t go so well with the first extracting method.
The people I worked with were Franky Diaz and Alexander Popov. We all worked well together, there wasn’t any conflict and the work was spread out evenly, even when somebody was absent we still worked towards making our final product.
If I could do this again I’d try to extract more oils to make a more complex scent but there isn’t much else I’d want to change.
For my next independent project I would not mind working with my group again. We all collaborate well and are patient. I don’t think I would want to continue this project as there isn’t much more that we can do.
During this project, I learned a lot about how much goes into cologne and how complex it is to get certain smells.