Radium dials

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Radium Call are watches, clocks and other instruments painted with radioluminescent paint containing radium-226. The production of dial radium culminated in the first decade of the Twentieth Century because radiation poisoning was then unknown; furthermore, the radium disk has largely been replaced by a fluorescent light source or sometimes tritium.

Video Radium dials

Brand

Undark produced by United States Radium Corporation
Luna is produced by Radium Dial Company
Marvelite is produced by Cold Light Manufacturing Company (a subsidiary of Radium Company of Colorado)

Maps Radium dials

History

When Radium was discovered in the early 1900s everyone was fascinated by it. Soon it was combined with paint to make it glow-in-dark-dark, applied to the clock, airplane instruments etc., to be able to read it in the dark.

Radiation calls are almost always painted by young women, who are used to 'point' their brush by licking and forming feathers before painting fine lines and numbers on the fast. This practice results in ingestion of radium, which causes serious jaw bone degeneration and malignancies and other dental diseases reminiscent of phossy jaws. Illness, radium induced osteonecrosis, was recognized as a work-related illness in 1925 after a group of radium painter, known as Radium Girls, of the United States Radium Corporation sued. In 1930, all the call painters stopped pointing their brush through their mouths. Stopping this practice drastically reduced the amount of ingested radium and therefore, the incidence of malignancy, to zero in 1950 among the workers studied.

"The Light Processed Personnel interviewed by a journalist in 1978 had been left unaware of the radium dangers they were told that eliminating lippointing had ended up a previous problem.While working in unventilated rooms, they were wearing the outfits they washed at home. taking readings of pants that are returned from dry cleaners and from clothes stored in cedar wood. "

RADIUM GIRLS & Radiolite Dial Watches. | Collectors Weekly

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Security

Although old radium disks may no longer produce light, this is often due to the deterioration of zinc sulphide crystal structures rather than radioactive decay of radium, which has a half-life of about 1600 years, so even very old radium dialum. remain radioactive. Paint Radium can be digested by inhaling paint particles peeling off. An alpha particle emitted by radium, which is picked up in the bone, turns off the surrounding bone tissue, resulting in a condition loosely referred to as radium of the jaw. Inhaled or swallowed particles can deposit high local doses with risk of lung or gastrointestinal cancer due to radiation dose. The risk is difficult to measure because the level of radium in paints and quantities is ingested or inhaled. Care should be taken in handling these materials especially where the paint is damaged.

The most common Radium isotope is 226Ra, which mainly emits ionizing radiation: [alpha particles]. Alpha particles are protected by most thin materials including paper. However, 226Ra emits only alpha particles 97 percent of the time with gamma emissions 186 keV 3% of the time. Also, 226Ra is rarely present without transuranic or other decay products, which may emit beta or gamma radiation. Therefore, radiation hazards from radium pain may not be completely removed by varnish, container or container. Care should be taken to prevent inhalation or ingestion of debris or dust that may contain radioactive material. Rapid radium has been shown to have near-face dosage levels greater than 10uSv/h, which will provide a dose equivalent to a one-day background exposure in about 20 minutes. This dose rate may only represent gamma emissions because alpha emissions will be stopped by varnish or casing. Therefore, the dose rate after swallowing or inhalation of dust can be much higher.