radioactive How to recognize radioactive watches.

[WatchesFarm]

Hello everyone, I recently received a request for advice on purchasing a vintage watch, a Waltham A-11 ORD. DEPT. I asked if they were aware that these types of watches have radioactive hands and dials... but they had no idea what I was talking about. So, I thought of creating a video that could help recognize them, starting from the distinctive details to using a Geiger counter. I hope you like it and find it useful for those venturing into the world of vintage watches.

Bye. 

 

 

[rjenkinsgb]

Interesting, but not very accurate, unfortunately.

Using the word "Radiation" without specifying the specific type of radiation [what is being radiated] is one of the commonest mistakes - and most confusing to non-technical people. 

Also, I believe the commonest lume in general use nowadays is just a phosphor compound that is "charged" be exposure to light?

I've never personally see a watch with tritium lume, and it's not something I would particularly want as the decay is quite rapid with a half life around 12.5 years. Tritium is also of course radioactive, emitting beta particles, and it can possibly cause cancer if ingested!

 

Re. geiger counters, it's also important to note that many on internet sites are fakes that detect RF rather than, or as well as, ionising radiation. Or just low quality that likely only detect gamma, or gamma and alpha.

Only high quality mica window GM tubes will detect beta; all the cheap geiger counters I can see on on ebay at present that show the tubes, use glass or quartz - despite claiming to detect beta 

 

[Neverenoughwatches]

58 minutes ago, rjenkinsgb said:

I've never personally see a watch with tritium lume, and it's not something I would particularly want as the decay is quite rapid with a half life around 12.5 years. Tritium is also of course radioactive, emitting beta particles, and it can possibly cause cancer if ingested!

You've confused me here Rob, are you saying watches with the encircled T symbol on their dials are not using tritium lume ?

[RichardHarris123]

Read this

https://teddybaldassarre.com/en-gb/blogs/watches/tritium-watches

 

 

 

[rjenkinsgb]

7 minutes ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

You've confused me here Rob, are you saying watches with the encircled T symbol on their dials are not using tritium lume

Not at all, they presumably are using tritium - I've just never seen a watch with it, in person. All mine are are either no lume, radium or phosphor (only glowing after exposure to light).

[Other than the digital ones!]

I have other things with tritium "glow", which have noticeably faded quite a bit in the twenty plus years I've had them, from very obvious to rather dim.

I'd guess tritium is mainly used on more recent, high end watches? I buy either vintage ones that look interesting, or ebay juck packs that tend to have either very well worn vintage or cheap digital and "bling" grade stuff..

 

[Neverenoughwatches]

14 minutes ago, rjenkinsgb said:

Not at all, they presumably are using tritium - I've just never seen a watch with it, in person. All mine are are either no lume, radium or phosphor (only glowing after exposure to light).

[Other than the digital ones!]

I have other things with tritium "glow", which have noticeably faded quite a bit in the twenty plus years I've had them, from very obvious to rather dim.

I'd guess tritium is mainly used on more recent, high end watches? I buy either vintage ones that look interesting, or ebay juck packs that tend to have either very well worn vintage or cheap digital and "bling" grade stuff..

 

I have at least one Tritium watch, an mod redial, can't say I've looked into how much it glows.