Half Life X

S

schmiddy

Joined
Apr 21, 2010
Messages
51
Whats the dealio on this stuff? Who makes it and is there other ways to acquire it? I'd like to work with some, but not at the prices I saw.
 
good luck making a sandwich out of that... maybe feed it to your dog and you wont have any surprises walking barefoot in your back yard at night...
 
wow... that is expensive stuff. I would rather use glow powder to add to epoxy and put it in the liners or mosaic pins or something like that.
 
I like spamwich, but I prefer a lurker with cheese. Since I have been lurking for a long time (i love this place and the camaraderie) and my first post was about something you have never heard of and not an introduction (I'm just a beginner hobbyist who's made a couple lame things for family and friends and everything I know I learned from here.) I can see why it looks like spam. But I couldn't find anything on google and I hoped maybe one of you fine gentlemen would know more, like the history, manufacture techniques, etc that would help get the cost down. I could see that being a very popular item. I know id love to be able to see my knife glowing brightly around the camp and would happily pay double, or maybe even triple the cost of other synthetics, but I don't know if 10x the cost is justifiable. I could be rocking the mammoth or walrus tooth for that kind of cash. So I wonder what it is that makes it "rare". Is it a lack of available raw materials? Or the cost of the raw materials? but I cant even figure out who the manufacture of the brand name HalflifeX is. There is very little reference I could find on Google. But I am very surprised that I stumped this forum. :)

Edit: Further searching this morning turned up the raw halflifeX additive for epoxy that is MUCH cheaper. The advertisement answered a few of the questions I had, like the glowing comes "Earth Aluminates" whatever that is.
 
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No sweat. I hate spam as much as anyone. Except maybe with eggs and toast. I hear in the far east they consider it a delicacy.

I did order the epoxy mix. Its only $17. I think it would work well if I grooved a pattern into a micarta handle and laid some clear epoxy with this stuff mixed into the grooves, it might look pretty cool and still visible around the camp at a much better cost. A guy could probable do several handles out of one package that way. I'll post a pic if it works out.

But before I get to that, this weekend I am building my first fly-rod. My cousin dropped off his electric rod wrapping machine before he moved to Alaska. I figured that was my cue to make my own custom fly rod. The blank rod and cork handle finally showed up yesterday. I'm thinking I might be able to incorporate this glow stuff into the rod somehow with the epoxy I use around the guides and hook keeper. You guys are used to seeing new innovative stuff all the time. Fly rod guy are a much more traditional group. The craziest they ever get is adding a little snake skin to the rod.
 
Yeah, a groove along the length of the handle or even around the pins/thong tube might look ok. Even if you put it along the spine ie; alongside filework, clear in the light, glow in the dark. http://www.resinobsession.com/glow-dark-c-7.html?osCsid=dtohdqm18lhc4nka2hpi4a8qj5 all kinds of colours here. As for the fly rods, it might be neat but how often are you fishing at night? Around here, fishing at night with glow would probably cost you your rods, gear and anything else you happen to have nearby. Im sure the rangers would count it as a glow lure which is illegal here. But you never know. :-)
 
I ordered the halflife powder and I missed the statement that it is only 4 grams for $16 plus freight. When I got the package I thought they forgot to ship the powder because I wasn't looking for a little teeny tiny bag. I haven't weighed what I actually received but it looks like about 2 grams and it only seems like half the particles in the bag actually glow. I don't think there is enough powder to do more than one knife handle so I'm a little disappointed at this point. I think I'll mix it with rod building epoxy and apply it to the handle grooves of my Okuden knife and post pics.

I did find the same product in the pure form at 1/7th the cost so if it goes OK I think I'll play around with some different bases and apply it to some other projects.
 
Here is a knife I did with Europium powder I got from www.unitednuclear.com . It is supposed to be the brightest non toxic glow stuff available. They also have Uranium and cloud chamber kits. I did a green dot on one side and an aqua dot on the other. It is super bright, but I could not get a decent pic in the dark.

ClapKnife012.jpg
 
How much for how much??? What was the shipping charge? does the stuff actually have radiation?
 
Unverified, but the red's glow is supposed to only last 10 minutes. The green and the blue are the only colors that will last more than two hours IIRC.
 
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