Collection: Graduated Cylinders

Class A cylinders are manufactured and certified to tighter volumetric tolerances, and are what regulated, QC and reportable measurements require. Class B has roughly twice the permitted error and is entirely adequate for general preparation and rough measurement. Pay for Class A where the number leaves the lab.

Glass is chemically inert, will not scratch or cloud, and reads cleanly — but it breaks. Polypropylene survives being dropped, weighs less, and suits teaching labs, fieldwork and anywhere breakage is the real risk. Polypropylene is attacked by some organics and its graduations wear with cleaning.

At eye level, taking the bottom of the curve for most liquids, with the cylinder on a level surface rather than held. Reading from above or below is the most common source of error in the category, and it is systematic rather than random — it biases every measurement the same way.