Joseph Herbert on mon 9 apr 01
You Wrote: "I do remember his pieces, which glowed in the dark."
This is a little hard to believe. I guess they could glow, I suppose, but
not from uranium. IF the pieces glowed from radioactivity, your
glassblowing friend should be jailed, unless the display was under several
feet of water. There are radioactive materials that glow, uranium is not
one of them.
It amazes me that such an important part of our recent history is ignored,
except by uninformed gossip, by a huge portion of the population.
When you know nothing, you will believe anything.
Joseph Herbert
Rick Monteverde on mon 9 apr 01
Joseph -
> This is a little hard to believe. [pieces that glowed in the dark]
He probably meant fluorescence glow-in-the-dark, with a UV light
source. Vaseline glass glows in the dark under a black light.
- Rick Monteverde
Honolulu, HI
Jeff Lawrence on wed 11 apr 01
The display of uranium glazed pottery in the Technisches (Technologisches?)
Museum in Muenchen is fun -- each display features a button that turns the
UV light on and the incandescent light off. The visual volume goes from 1 to
10 at the press of that button.
Jeff Lawrence ph. 505-753-5913
18496 US HWY 84/285 fx. 505-753-8074
Espanola, NM 87532 jml@cybermesa.com
Joseph Herbert on fri 13 apr 01
Jeff Lawrence wrote:
"The display of uranium glazed pottery in the Technisches
(Technologisches?) Museum in Muenchen is fun -- each display features a
button that turns the UV light on and the incandescent light off. The visual
volume goes from 1 to 10 at the press of that button."
and there was a previous reference to 'Glow in the dark pots.'
Tungsten is famous (in prospecting and mining circles) for having
fluorescent minerals. The main way of prospecting for tungsten is with a
black light. This either means walking around in the dark in mountainous
country with a black light or sitting under a tarp in the blazing sun
looking at samples. Not a comfortable thought either way.
Anyway, I wonder if any of our correspondents ever attempted tungsten
compounds as a glaze addition and, if so, could they give us a glowing
report of their results?
Joseph Herbert
Michael Banks on sat 14 apr 01
Joseph,
The main fluorescent tungsten mineral is scheelite (CaWO4, which glows
blue-white in UV light), but this fluorescence is attributed to trace
amounts of molybdenum. So molybdenum bearing glazes might be a better bet.
Many fluorescent minerals that emit light when stimulated by UV light, do so
because of trace amounts of other elements. In industry, adding these trace
elements is known as doping. The red phosphor in colour TV screens is a
yttrium compound -doped with trace europium, for example. Doping glass (or
glaze) with traces of rare earth elements such as europium, lanthanum,
cerium, neodymium etc, should result in strong fluorescence.
But in nature, traces of more mundane elements (less expensive for potters)
cause strong fluorescence, for example small amounts of manganese cause
strong red fluorescence in zinc and lithium minerals.
I've tested a number of zinc crystalline glazes with additions of molybdenum
trioxide but have yet to test them under UV light. The crystals in zinc
glazes are often willemite (Zn2SiO4) and natural willemite crystals are
strongly fluorescent (trace Mn), so zinc crystalline glazes should be a
great starting point for fluorescent glaze enthusiasts.
Like you Joseph, I would be interested to hear from anyone having glowing
results.
Michael Banks,
Nelson,
NZ
----- Original Message -----
Joseph Herbert wrote:
> Anyway, I wonder if any of our correspondents ever attempted tungsten
> compounds as a glaze addition and, if so, could they give us a glowing
> report of their results?
>
> Joseph Herbert
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