Does chlorine damage LED light?

Just wondering if I should take arc aaa off my neck when swimming. So surfaces come in contact with pool water include polycarbonate, bare aluminum, HAIII, stainless steel, and paracord.

No, nothing to be concerned about as far as I know (it might be helpful to mention that I have a bs in mat sci). Neither chlorine nor water should be able to damage any of those materials (paracord is nylon I believe). Just keep those o-rings lubed.

wearing a light around your neck could be dangerous for you though. If it got caught on something it could cause you some trouble, and more importantly, if you were ever involved in assisting a potential drowning victim, they could grab onto it and drag you down too. I know that the odds of that happening are pretty slim....but so aren't the odds that you'll need the light while you're swimming. I'd leave it with your towell.

GPB said:

wearing a light around your neck could be dangerous for you though. If it got caught on something it could cause you some trouble, and more importantly, if you were ever involved in assisting a potential drowning victim, they could grab onto it and drag you down too. I know that the odds of that happening are pretty slim....but so aren't the odds that you'll need the light while you're swimming. I'd leave it with your towell.

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Certainly something to keep in mind, depending on where you're swimming with your light.

Stainless steel is vulnerable to chloride attack. Teflon (sometimes used in o-rings) is also susceptible to chlorine attack. Polycarbonate can have some problems as well with chlorine gas. Whether or not the concentration is high enough in your application, who knows.

IMO it shouldn't be anything to worry about. However, as previously stated, I wouldn't go with paracord. I would use a simple ball chain.

It's a community pool, so the chlorine concentration should be pretty low. Hate to say it but there are probably more pee in it than chlorine.

I do plan to build a weak link into it soon. Right now what I'm thinking is to replace the split ring came with arc for a crappy one (say one off fauxton), then tie seperate knot for the paracord ends onto the ring. The ring would bend and stretch under tension, and let either end of paracord go.

a weak link is a good idea. Its pretty rare to be involved in a near drowning in a community pool, but I used to be a lifeguard and once you start thinking that way, its hard to stop. (It took me a few years before I could actually sit on a beach and not constantly scan the water ) If the weak link breaks your light could sink to whatever depth the pool is and that might be more than the light was intended for, depending on what light you use.

I imagine it would dissolve whatever lube you have on the o-rings.

jzmtl said:

Just wondering if I should take arc aaa off my neck when swimming. So surfaces come in contact with pool water include polycarbonate, bare aluminum, HAIII, stainless steel, and paracord.

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if stainless steel and aluminum touches each other they can suffer galvanic corrosion. Pool water isn't as much of an issue compared to sea water.

I just took an old mag lens and dropped it into a mix of industrial chlorinating liquid mixed 50-50 with water, which is about 20,000 times more concentrated than the level in a public pool. I'll check it tomorrow afternoon comparing it with another new lens. I'll post the results tomorrow night. Depending out what the result is I may make a longer test out of it, including a straight industrial chlorine bath. :naughty:


Polycarbonate mag lens control shot


One cup water


One cup industrial chlorinating liquid


Adding lens


submersed


sealing until tomorrow

Handlo, that sounds OT...what does galling have to do with water? regardless of sea, or chlorinated...


Crenshaw

Not sure about the US, but in the UK, according to a couple of lifeguard friends, chlorine isn't used in swimming pools any more.

I noticed something at the local bath. When you go to the outdoor pool you have to push your way to those flaps hanging down from the sealing to keep the cool air out. I guess they are made of some kind of silicone. The part that is inside the water plus 5cm obove they turned from clear to milky. Do you think that could happen to the bare led in an arc AAA too?
I dont think it happens over night, those flap are hanging in the water for years maybe.

I Germany there is still a good amount of chlorine in the water. You can small it even outside the building.

Justin Case said:

Stainless steel is vulnerable to chloride attack. Teflon (sometimes used in o-rings) is also susceptible to chlorine attack. Polycarbonate can have some problems as well with chlorine gas. Whether or not the concentration is high enough in your application, who knows.

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Yes, pure chlorine gas is highly corrosive... and extremely toxic. We're talking about pool water here, you can practically drink the stuff. The chloirine in a pool is an entirely different form, not sure of the chemistry exactly.

Crenshaw said:

Handlo, that sounds OT...what does galling have to do with water? regardless of sea, or chlorinated...


Crenshaw

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Not galling, galvanic corrosion, when two metals submersed in salt solution.

If you think about it, the light only has to be more durable than your skin, so I would think that anywhere you can go, your light can go.

+1 galling is not an issue here, but it is in your light's best interest to do routine maintenance on the o-rings just to keep everything inside kosher.

Chlorine is still widely used in the US.

Some high viscosity silicone, like what's used in dive lights, would be ideal. Silicone is highly inert and not easily dissolved, I really doubt that a little chlorine in the water could speed removal of the lube. Typically it takes much stronger solvents to carry away silicone.

As for galvanic corrosion, dissimilar metals in direct contact for long periods of exposure can be a problem, but there shouldn't be sufficient chloride ion in pool water to cause this. Salt water is another story.

I still see no way normal pool water can be a problem here. I avoided overanalyzing this because pool water (especially in a large public pool) is also supposed to be pH balanced which actually makes it less corrosive than your average tap water.

AvidHiker said:

Yes, pure chlorine gas is highly corrosive... and extremely toxic. We're talking about pool water here, you can practically drink the stuff. The chloirine in a pool is an entirely different form, not sure of the chemistry exactly.

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Of course there is dissolved chlorine in the water (which converts to HClO and HCl, both acids). HCl and stainless don't mix. Whether or not there will be an actual problem can't be known since we have no idea as to Cl concentration, exposure duration, water temperature, microstructure of the metal alloy, stress state of the metal alloy, etc. But to summarily dismiss corrosion as "nothing to be concerned about" is not correct.

Machining of threads can leave residual stress, resulting in stress corrosion cracking, for example. Crevice corrosion can occur. All of these thing can and have occurred in industry using stainless steel pipes carrying chlorinated public drinking water.

And there is chlorine gas in the air -- you smell it at any public swimming pool. There is an equilibrium vapor concentration. Human odor threshold is about 0.3 ppm. NOAEL is about 0.5 ppm.

Personally, I would be aware of the potential for corrosion and dry off my gear thoroughly, especially thread areas and metal-metal junctions.

Crenshaw said:

Handlo, that sounds OT...what does galling have to do with water? regardless of sea, or chlorinated...


Crenshaw

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At least know what you're talking about before you criticize my post.