Silly putty
Silly Putty® is a silicone plastic "clay", marketed as a toy for children
by Binney & Smith Inc.
It is another one of those scientific accidents on the way to solving another problem: finding a rubber substitute for the United States during World War II.
Silly Putty is a .47-ounce glob of a plastic clay with unusual characteristics. It is packaged inside of an egg-shaped plastic container. When pressed on comics pages or other newspaper media, the loose ink transfers to the Silly Putty, which is then able to be stretched out, a source of amusement for many children.
It bounces, revealing its rubber roots, yet it breaks when given a sharp blow.
Even though it seems like a solid, it is actually a dilatant non-Newtonian fluid. As a dilatant liquid, it will melt into a puddle over a long enough period of time.
Since the 1980s, Silly Putty has been available in various colors, including glow-in-the-dark and metallic, and colors can be easily combined to make new color shades.
The origins of Silly Putty are controversial, as is typical of many inventions. Two researchers, working independently during the same time period, both came upon the product separately. The world may never know who was actually first.
Silly Putty was accidentally invented by James Wright of General Electric when he dropped boric acid into silicone oil. He was looking for a substitute for artificial rubber. GE supplied the newly discovered dilatant compound to researchers around the world. None found a use for it, but they all loved playing with it.
In 1943, Dr. Earl Warrick left the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research to join the newly formed Dow Corning Corporation. His research was refocused – help the war effort by developing a synthetic rubber substitute. Although he failed to produce a suitable rubber before the end of the war, one result of his experiments was a silicone bouncing putty.
The product was then commercialized by Peter Hodgson in 1949 after the marketing expert attended an informal "nutty putty" party. Renamed "Silly Putty" because of its main ingredient, Silicone, the product was a smash hit.
Raw Silly Putty polymer is available as 3179 Dilatant Compound. There are recipes for homemade silly putty using glue and boric acid. These produce a compound which is similar in chemical structure but is different in the elements which form that structure.
According to an MIT web page on inventions:
- "Ironically, it was only after its success as a toy that practical uses were found for Silly Putty. It picks up dirt, lint and pet hair, and can stabilize wobbly furniture; but it has also been used in stress-reduction and physical therapy, and in medical and scientific simulations. The crew of Apollo 8 even used it to secure tools in zero-gravity."
