The Chemical Heritage Foundations collections include such pioneering and landmark instruments as a 1934 Beckman Model G pH Meter, a DuPont 900 Differential Thermal Analyzer, an early custom Electro-spray Ionization Mass Spectrometer used by John B. Fenn, a 1947 Mettler B5 Single-Pan Balance, a 1963 Perkin-Elmer Model 125 Infrared Grating Spectrophotometer, and a s Automated Peptide Synthesizer created by Bruce Merrifield.
The foundation expanded its instrument collections slowly, mostly through donations of single instruments or small groups of instruments. In 2000, the CIMG was transformed into the Heritage Council Instruments and Artifacts Committee (HCIAC), which included staff and supporters and began meeting under founding chair W. Richard Howe. In 2002, the institution was given hundreds of instruments by Stephen P. DeFalco, president of PerkinElmer, after the company closed a plant in Überlingen, Germany. An interim exhibition of Revolutionary Tools was curated at the Chemical Heritage Foundation by David Brock, showing fifteen 20th-century instruments, including Arnold Beckman's pH meter.
In 2004, a list of "50 Instruments That Changed the World" was identified as a basis for further expansion. In 2008, the institution released a list of its ten most wanted instruments.