SCHOOL ITEMS

We don't know why, but Bergamo, a town in the Lombardy region of northern Italy, has given its name to high-quality spiral-bound notebooks. They’re popular as journals or travel notebooks, and this one has (100) ivory pages lined on both sides. Also has a plain “soft-touch” cover (think suede-like). In a dark maroon/chocolate color. Measures 5-1/2" x 8-1/2". Jot down your thoughts and musings (you know you’ve got some good ones) or they might be gone forever.

Or enough mechanical pencils to write all the copy for our catalogs until the cows come home—and cows have been back-ordered for years. Our each is a dozen TEK Writer™ precision 0.7mm pencils with top lead-advance, soft grip and anti-roll barrel. Includes (48) extra leads and a dozen extra erasers because to err is human. In an assortment of (6) colors, so one will always match your outfit.

Donut magnet you can take to town!! 74mmdia x 14mm thick with a 30mm hole. Verystrong and well pedigreed - in fact, its kin areactivating pacemakers. They are of a high permeabilityferrite material with a lovely light blueor white epoxy coating. Okay, we have thembecause there is the odd bubble, slight scratches orthe word MAGNET painted in the coating which ruled them outof the medical ball, but they're fine company nonetheless. Gooddisplay bases, paper clip traps, and super for classroom demos.

Can't beat a classic. These uncoated ceramic donut magnets have a 1-lb pull, which makes them dandy for classroom or refrigerator use. They measure 1-1/4" dia x 3/8" ID x 3/16" thick and are polarized on the faces. You get a wrapped roll of 29 donuts.

In another triumph of good taste, we are proud to present Toilet Teasers, a top-bound (160)-page book in the shape of a toilet, featuring more than (240) quizzes, word puzzles, factoids, trivia and deep thoughts. Categories include: Pottering Around, Roll Call, Cleaning Up and Loose Vowels--and after seeing that, we don't want to hear any more complaints about our bad puns. Yes, answers are included. The book is flush with them.

Hang it all with this set of (10) magnetic hooks. The 1-3/16" long x 9/64" hooks screw into 1-3/8" dia magnetic bases with an approx 8-lb pull, which is heavier than most jackets and keys. Good for horizontal or vertical mounts, and dandy for adding hooks to gym or school lockers.

It’s a cornucopia of stencils. All shapes, no alphabets. You’ll get a profusion of (8) clear acrylic stencil sheets, including: a raft of ovals; a preponderance of squares; a farrago of circles, hexagons, pentagons and triangles; a collection of a bunch of shapes, including trapezoids; a roomful of interior design shapes; a melange of electronic symbols; and an assortment we can’t altogether identify, but might be for printed circuit design. All have mm rules along at least one edge.

Our thinner picker-upper, but with a powerful 5-lb-pull, 9/16" dia magnet on the business end (for spilled nails, the screw that rolled under the stove, or the heavy wrench you dropped into the sump). The 5/16" dia x 5-1/4" long 4-draw barrel extends to a full two feet. Has a convenient pocket clip.

This plated N52 14,200 gauss neodymium magnet is shaped like a miniature silver ingot, measuring 1-1/2" long x 1/2" wide x 1/8" thick. Has a big hangonability quotient, which the manufacturer claims is 15 lbs of pull, meaning it's probably closer to 13 lbs. Impressive either way for such a cute little magnet. 

Scientifically speaking. This 8-1/2" x 11" science reference notebook is three-hole punched for inclusion in a binder. From McGraw-Hill, it's heavily illustrated and filled with facts, illustrations and definitions about biology, geology, astronomy, physics and much more. Science! Surplus factor: some may have been packed before the cover ink was dry, leaving a slight speckled pattern that has no effect on the science inside—we checked. And Science is our middle name.

50 Science Things to Make and Do is just that, a passel of experiments, all illustratively explained in two facing pages of this big 104-page flip book, and all easily done with common household items. Includes wind and water power, bugs, crystals, paper planes, rubber-band guitars, balances, gloop, optics and a ton of other fun, informative stuff. Officially classified as "cool" by several of our geekiest staffers.

Our each is a package of (2) steel tech rulers. One is 6” x 1/32” for the first 2-1/2” then 1/64” for the next 1/2” then 1/16” for the last 3”. The other is 150mm x 0.5mm. Both have sliding markers/pocket clips, and both have mm:inch tables on the reverse side. You’ll need excellent eyesight.

These are very nice (48)-page cardboard-bound notebooks with themes and some unobtrusive notes/formats that will be easy to ignore if you’re not into the subject, but twice as nice if you are. You pick: the 5” x 7” Star Trek United Federation Captain’s Log with a date/location entry on each lined page and fold-out info on the back cover, like a warp-speed conversion table; the 5” x 7” Stargazer’s Notebook with 1/4” rules plus a lightly printed 3-1/4” dia circle with 30-degree markings to chart the sky, and a fold-out back cover with an astrolabe and constellation chart; the 3-1/2” x 5” Star Trek Engineering notebook with a red cover, diagrams of a communicator, phaser and tricorder, grid pages, famous engineering quotes and room for your name, rank and serial number; the 3-1/2” x 5” Entomology notebook with a beetle cover, fold-out back cover showing a metamorphosis of an adult insect, ruled pages and room for observational notes and sketches; or the 3-1/2” x 5” Botany notebook with a fold-out back cover with illustrations of leaves for identification, ruled pages and room for observational notes and sketches.

What would you use to fill in those little circles? You’d use this extra-wide Scantek™ test-taking mechanical pencil? You passed! The lead in this beauty is the famous #2, and is .9 mm wide, like an italic pen nib. Comes with refill leads, a pocket clip and a large eraser. If our Tech Whiz Billy had had this pencil when he was younger, he'd have made double 800s on the SAT and wouldn't be working here today. Also great for doing calligraphy in pencil, which makes teachers swoon.

Start them out right with this (profusely) hand-illustrated, 96-page book: The Story of Inventions. Includes toasters, toilets, television, computers, cars, chocolate bars, dishwashers, pianos, flying machines, bicycles and blue jeans among many others. Includes a timeline, glossary and index. No age recommendations, but we like it for pretty much anyone.

Voted most likely to attract by the judges, this magnet has the relative strength of 10 men. A shiny silver 1/2" cube of neodymium magnetism, it packs approx a 15-lb pull. If our boss Pat were that strong he could lift 2,160 lbs! Besides its superpower strength, this beautiful cube also would improve the looks of your fridge or bulletin board to no end.

Our coolest ruler, hands down. It’s dark blue plastic, T-shaped, and packed with information. It’s an American Wire Gauge and a screw-size gauge. It measures UTS and ISO screw pitch, has SMD capacitor info, conversion scales, transistor and diode diagrams. It has a list of SI prefixes, digital logic gates, logic identities, electrical units and abbreviations, colors and wavelengths, transmission line equations, a protractor, a breadboard and tons more. If you’re not into that stuff, use it a 13”/33cm ruler. Measures 15" x 6-1/4” x 1/16" overall, and you might need a magnifier to read some of it. Made in the USA.

Rare earth magnets are usually killers for their size, and these thick nickel neodymium discs are no exception. The price, on the other hand, for (3) 7/16" dia x 1/4" 5-lb lift or (2) 15/32” dia x 3/16” 8-lb lift magnets each stored on a 2" dia steel disc, is a rare exception.