What I want to do

Test out these claims that mineral oil is a terrible conductor by doing a little home experiment.

My attempt and results

Questions and next steps

• Would filling a water bottle with mineral oil be a nice way of making sure that the flimsy plastic retains its shape deep underwater?

• Only one way to find out ...

Why I'm interested

• It'd be neat to use recycled water bottles as enclosures for underwater datalogging electronics; but they might warp with the pressure at depth. Filling the container with mineral oil is a (potentially terrible impractical) way of retaining the enclosure's shape, so that the waterproof seal doesn't break. Not sure how environmentalists will feel about sending an oil refinery by-product underwater to monitor the effects of oil spills ... but anyway, this experiment was fun!