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Trimphone 722 Tritium Dial Glow Pictures

Started by royalbox, November 28, 2018, 02:35:41 PM

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twocvbloke

I dug out my Trimphone dial and left it by my bed, and it does still have a dull glow to it, but not enough to be able to capture a picture of it, all I get is "Black cat in a coal shed" pictures...  ;D

From waking up in the dark so my eyes were well-adjusted, I could just about make out the numbers, but it was still being outshone by the LEDs from my router on the other side of the room (and said LEDs are actually mostly blocked by duct tape to dull them down!!), so definitely long past its' best...  :)

Jim Stettler

Quote from: twocvbloke on November 29, 2018, 08:45:01 PM
I dug out my Trimphone dial and left it by my bed, and it does still have a dull glow to it, but not enough to be able to capture a picture of it, all I get is "Black cat in a coal shed" pictures...  ;D

From waking up in the dark so my eyes were well-adjusted, I could just about make out the numbers, but it was still being outshone by the LEDs from my router on the other side of the room (and said LEDs are actually mostly blocked by duct tape to dull them down!!), so definitely long past its' best...  :)
So, from a technical stand point,  it still works.
That makes it extra cool with extra points considering the age.,
JMO,
Jim S.
You live, You learn,
You die, you forget it all.

twocvbloke

It's even more impressive given the tube has a crack in it, but the outer plastic sleeve seems to have contained any leakage over the years, so the tritium is still inside the tube... :)

twocvbloke

This thread has inspired me (aka brought about madness) to try something with my trimphone dial, I have a set of LED christmas wire lights (Red, Green, White (should be Yellow!) and Blue) which are tiny, and the colour of the green ones, they're a very phosphorescent green, so, two and two resulted in me loosely sticking the green LEDs on the wire into the recess of the dial where the Tritium tube goes (carefully extracted), and, aside from the lack of LEDs and diffusion, I think it looks pretty good colour-wise...  ;D

Of course the brightness of the LEDs is too much, but with an appropriate resistor value they can be dimmed down a bit if they were to be used for real, makes me want to buy some all-green lights now to see if it's a feasible idea...  ;D

HarrySmith

Harry Smith
ATCA 4434
TCI

"There is no try,
there is only
do or do not"

Jim Stettler

Looks good. Seems to be your  best option for lighting the dial.
Jim S.
You live, You learn,
You die, you forget it all.

twocvbloke

I ordered a string of 100 green LEDs of this enamelled wire type, just need the slow boat from china to bring them for future experimentation... ;D

Owain


twocvbloke

Quote from: Owain on December 01, 2018, 01:25:28 PM
Line powered?

Not decided yet, but very likely, just need the LED string to arrive to see how to modify it, at the moment I'm planning to snip 10 LEDs off one end, shortening the wires to fit 1 LED per digit on the dial face, and from there, erm, not gotten that far... :)

Kind of considering wiring the LEDs in series, as nominal line voltage is 48vDC, and the LEDs probably run at around 3v, so less volts to drop from 48 to around 30v, not sure what the current will be as yet, but probably very little... :)

Only trouble is, I haven't got an actual Trimphone to contain the wiring in, but this is mostly just experimental play to appease my oddball mind, keeps it from going too mad!!  ;D

19and41

I checked another link to the source I have used for Tritium vials, and apparently he is still up and running.  This is a thread from the Candle Power Forums website in which he conducts his sales.  As it is a thousand pages long, after checking out the first pages, it might be wise to check the last few to see the current status of his inventories.  He is located in the Netherlands and I have ordered from him.

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?399475-B-rt-s-Tritium-thread
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
— Arthur C. Clarke

twocvbloke

I've looked into using modern Tritium tubes/vials to recreate a ring suitable for a Trimphone dial, but, the cost, errrrrrm, no, far too pricey (which makes me wonder, how much did the GPO pay for the originals back in the day?!), as nice as it'd be to have a proper tritium glow, it's just not going to be cost effective... :(

Especially when you consider you can buy a string of 100 green LEDs from china for £2.99 as I did, with some snipping, soldering, heatshrink tubing to form a ring, a resistor to lower the current and probably a couple other passive components to protect from AC ringing current, I'd say the LEDs would be a more viable option, if not exactly true to the original... :)

19and41

Just thought I'd offer up the other option.  I would imagine it was less expensive to manufacture the tubes back then with handling and production safeguards being more lax in the days before the full effect of exposure was known.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
— Arthur C. Clarke

Jim Stettler

Quote from: 19and41 on December 02, 2018, 10:51:40 AM
Just thought I'd offer up the other option.  I would imagine it was less expensive to manufacture the tubes back then with handling and production safeguards being more lax in the days before the full effect of exposure was known.

I think this is a very good point.  Have you heard of the Radium Girls?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_Girls

These were war factory workers that painted the radium on instruments dials. They were instructed to "point" the brushes with their lips. Later in life their faces  became disfigured due tumors from exposure.
Jim S.
You live, You learn,
You die, you forget it all.

19and41

I have heard of the radium girls.  They worked in "radium city" Ottawa, Illinois.  the cemetery where a number of them are resting still emits radioactive particles.  When I lived in Utah, a related firm had closed its doors and the city where it was located began to develop the area to have a economic renaissance.  It was found that the earth they were moving about contained resdue from the processing of uranium there at the former Vitro Chemical plant.  The baddies got around, didn't they?
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
— Arthur C. Clarke

twocvbloke

Quote from: 19and41 on December 02, 2018, 10:51:40 AM
Just thought I'd offer up the other option.

I'd looked a few times since getting the dial originally, and it's all quite expensive, if money was no object, yeah, it'd be done, but, yeah, too expensive for the size of tubes on offer... :(