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ArcticMyst Security by Avery

Tritium - The self-luminous light source, and $30,000/gram!

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Yes, actually $30k per gram!

To put that into perspective: if you think gold is worth a lot, it's around $40.70 USD per gram as of now (April 28th, 2016)

That puts tritium's value at 737 times more than our precious gold!

So this stuff has been around for quite a while as a constant light source, and I thought I'd check out a tiny amount to see what it's like. Picked up two tiny 0.65*6.6mm vials, one green and one blue, for ~$6 each. These tubes have an insanely small fraction of a gram of tritium, and is probably more comprised of the phosphor that makes it glow rather than the actual tritium itself.

Tritium itself is a radioactive isotope, but a quantity this low will most likely produce less radiation than your cell phone, although since it does have a radioactive signature it was given a customs check. Lucky for me, it looks like it went through.

Check it out!

Here are the containers it came in:

eqt1ti.jpg


Compare to a standard Aixiz focus ring:

zxpocj.jpg

2ldivqo.jpg


The glow they produce:

142a3vp.jpg

Blue on the left, green on the right

It was really hard to get the shot of them in the dark, I had to add a bit of light to give my camera something to focus on. So, a bit washed out, but not entirely inaccurate at all.

They glow more than an un-charged GITD object, but less than a charged GITD object. A bit in the middle.
 
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Razako

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Tritium is amazing stuff. I got a little vial of it from DX 6-7 years ago and it's still glowing today.
 
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The tritium tubes are still glowing strong on my 10 year old Luminox Navy Seals watch. :D

20160428_213152_zpsfgmsofbk_edit_1461893590101_zpsoxafzqva.jpg


20160428_211617_zps6cru5ntn_edit_1461892954405_zpsinmokug4.jpg
 
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Tritium is amazing stuff. I got a little vial of it from DX 6-7 years ago and it's still glowing today.

The tritium tubes are still glowing strong on my 10 year old Luminox Navy Seals watch. :D

Half-Life is 4,500 ± 8 days (12.32 ± 0.02 years). Rapid radioactive decay so it glows in the dark, great stuff for glow in the dark, is used a lot on instruments besides watches like in aircraft. Very rare and valuable because it doesn't last long, is made in heavy water reactors and is used in nuclear weapons, the nukes require maintenance too because the tritium doesn't last, so I think that's where most of it probably goes.

Alan
 
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Good info. Learn something new everyday. My Walter p99 has tritium sights and in pitch black I could see it across the room.
A sample in a marble would be cool!
 

Pman

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I have a lof of watches but none with the tritium tubes. Have almost bought a luminous a few times but I want a more expensive watch made with t100 tubes. I think deep blue has a few decent ones that don't cost a fortune. Then again I don't want to spend money like that anymore and I can't justify another watch anyways. If I bought a smart watch I would probably sell off all my other watches. There's something special though to me about wearing a sophisticated mechanical watch.
 
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Cool pics, Lux!

Elly, I don't really have plans for them, I just found them quite interesting and for the price of such an expensive material I was even more interested lol. They are indeed quite tiny, can't say for sure if I'll use them for something or not, but I'm sure they'll come in handy for some project or another!
 
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Nice , I have a 11mm sphere and a 15mm disk of tritium , plus a few small tubes .
 
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I was wondering why you bought the tritium that got caught up at customs. I wasn't aware that they came with some fluorescent material. Yeah, tritium is pretty cool.
 




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