Reid
Newly Enlightened
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2007
- Messages
- 78
The basic message is here:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=11238&p=175576#p175576
I just don't have the energy anymore to argue against nickle and steel and gold plate advocates.
Springs should be of phosphor bronze, heavily silver plated.
Contacts should be heavily coated in electro-deposited silver, too.
Unknown to myself: the affects of outgassing cells in a sealed flashlight.
Rhetorical question: what oxide products of leaking electrolites in liquid or gaseous form, are produced on silver?
Common silver oxide is the ONLY metal that is nearly perfectly conductive.
Some forms of silver corrosion may well be dielectric.
Take a tip from the old mil-spec equipment? My Korean War-vintage tube tester is all silver contacts: prong sockets, dozens of switches.
It has never ever been serviced, and it clearly has seen a fair amount of service,
and it is a delicate piece of equipment, ruggedized in design, to withstand the test of time, on a shelf, or in the field.
The linked post above is there because it contains a video, too.
The video describes good contact-sealing practice, when silver plate is not practicable for the home mechanic.
LOOK at that jar of silicone compound.
KWYADAWYADI (google that acronym)
Summary: I still hold forth (this was once lightly discussed by self a couple of years ago) that SILVER is probably, likely, pretty surely THE contact material we want for our lights,
NOT micron-thin gold over nickel plate, over steel, etc.
It's just common sense, imo, to =test= and see if silver, exposed to today's common batteries, will withstand, say, lipo fart-cells, or bunny juice leaking from throw-away Enervator
brand cells.
I swear, I sometimes miss, bemoan, the old, now almost obsolete, zinc chloride cell of old.
They did not leak, not in the fifties, not in the sixties, not in the seventies.
They were not good batteries for high drain service, but....
...but WHAT cell-type comes, even today, as OEM with your remote control or other low-drain-rate device? ZINC CHLORIDE. Why? Because they don't leak and ruin the device as do the now-ubiquitous alkaline Bugs Bunny cells all the common stores sell.
But yeah, for flashlites we want lipo or the newer generation lithium chemistries, sure.
IF silver serves for them in service (an open question), then GOOD long term RELIABLE lights and switches (switches in particular) are a done deal.
Cost: pennies extra per unit manufactured.
Am so sick of name brand lights failing in their switches, or the aluminum oxide that forms on the threaded caps fore and aft: dissimilar metals, too, are prone to galvanic corrosion.
So, at the very least, we know to "grease". But what grease?
Uncle Bubbaman's SuperLite Forever grease for $20 per 5 cc tube?
Hell, why throw money away? Your local auto parts store probably still vends....
read the thread? It's sort of a lecture, like this, and YES,
this is all open for debate and correction.
ADMIRE MY DOW CORNING 11 COMPOUND?
Kind re-regards from a failing, old lite-reid
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=11238&p=175576#p175576
I just don't have the energy anymore to argue against nickle and steel and gold plate advocates.
Springs should be of phosphor bronze, heavily silver plated.
Contacts should be heavily coated in electro-deposited silver, too.
Unknown to myself: the affects of outgassing cells in a sealed flashlight.
Rhetorical question: what oxide products of leaking electrolites in liquid or gaseous form, are produced on silver?
Common silver oxide is the ONLY metal that is nearly perfectly conductive.
Some forms of silver corrosion may well be dielectric.
Take a tip from the old mil-spec equipment? My Korean War-vintage tube tester is all silver contacts: prong sockets, dozens of switches.
It has never ever been serviced, and it clearly has seen a fair amount of service,
and it is a delicate piece of equipment, ruggedized in design, to withstand the test of time, on a shelf, or in the field.
The linked post above is there because it contains a video, too.
The video describes good contact-sealing practice, when silver plate is not practicable for the home mechanic.
LOOK at that jar of silicone compound.
KWYADAWYADI (google that acronym)
Summary: I still hold forth (this was once lightly discussed by self a couple of years ago) that SILVER is probably, likely, pretty surely THE contact material we want for our lights,
NOT micron-thin gold over nickel plate, over steel, etc.
It's just common sense, imo, to =test= and see if silver, exposed to today's common batteries, will withstand, say, lipo fart-cells, or bunny juice leaking from throw-away Enervator
brand cells.I swear, I sometimes miss, bemoan, the old, now almost obsolete, zinc chloride cell of old.
They did not leak, not in the fifties, not in the sixties, not in the seventies.
They were not good batteries for high drain service, but....
...but WHAT cell-type comes, even today, as OEM with your remote control or other low-drain-rate device? ZINC CHLORIDE. Why? Because they don't leak and ruin the device as do the now-ubiquitous alkaline Bugs Bunny cells all the common stores sell.
But yeah, for flashlites we want lipo or the newer generation lithium chemistries, sure.
IF silver serves for them in service (an open question), then GOOD long term RELIABLE lights and switches (switches in particular) are a done deal.
Cost: pennies extra per unit manufactured.
Am so sick of name brand lights failing in their switches, or the aluminum oxide that forms on the threaded caps fore and aft: dissimilar metals, too, are prone to galvanic corrosion.
So, at the very least, we know to "grease". But what grease?
Uncle Bubbaman's SuperLite Forever grease for $20 per 5 cc tube?
Hell, why throw money away? Your local auto parts store probably still vends....
read the thread? It's sort of a lecture, like this, and YES,
this is all open for debate and correction.
ADMIRE MY DOW CORNING 11 COMPOUND?
Kind re-regards from a failing, old lite-reid
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