Uh, that copper is also poisonous if I remember correctly.
“Hazards and risks associated with tellurium: fortunately, tellurium compounds are encountered rarely by most people. All tellurium compounds are highly toxic. Tellurium compounds are teratogenic. Tellurium compounds should only be handled by competent chemists since ingestion in even small amounts causes dreadful smelling breath and appalling body odour.”
Heating it up causes the release of toxic fumes. There’s only .05% in this alloy but cutting it and using coolant on it can possibly cause serious issues, and worse. Might bear some checking into.
Thanks for the extra pictures and link Bucket. Orsm job. So the Carbide parting of tool is a good thing? Have you tried it on anything else? Looks like you could have a full time machining job here.
Thanks. The carbide parting tool is very, very nice. It cuts aluminum like butter and is much better with copper than HSS though it is still pretty finicky with feed rate. I have not tried it on steel yet, but I'm sure it will work well.
Good point to bring up, as I hadn’t even thought of it’s toxicity. From the little bit of research I’ve done since you mentioned it, it appears that the toxicity would only occur if you were smelting it, or alloying it with metals, and that normal exposure through machining wouldn’t be a problem. It appears you are just not supposed to breathe the dust particles when grinding, and I suppose you should be a little more careful with your machining chips. I don’t even know if breathing pure copper dust is any good either. It appears tellurium copper was specifically made for machining operations, and can’t find any data on specific cautions that have to be made during machining. You would think if machining it is so dangerous, there would be more information on the dangers, other than just finding datasheets on the general dangers of elemental tellurium.
It appears the really toxic copper alloy is beryllium copper, which is very dangerous, and you can find tons of information and cautions about working with the material.
While searching for Tellurium Copper, I found that it is often called "Machinist Copper" so you are probably correct. The machining that I have done causes virtually no particulates, so it is likely safe. Grinding or sanding is probably a different story though.
C147 Sulfur Copper has 85% Machinability too. It's even more expensive than Tellurium Copper.
Funny you should show that particular 47’s light, I’ve been thinking about buying that one for quite some time. The lines really appeal to me. That tail cap, however, does not. And that is why I don’t have one.
A 12” bar of 1.5” Tellurium Copper alloy is only $91 at onlinemetals.com. They show it higher but there’s an automatic 10% discount on purchases over $100.
As far as making the entire light out of copper? Why? It would be very heavy (I have one, it is) and if you want the extra copper for heat dispersal consider that the entire body would heat up. What’s in the body? That already heating up cylinder full of Lithium? Ah, yeah, that! Are you sure you want your cells getting up towards 150º in a hard driven light?
Now, if the head and finned pill area were copper, with a carbon fiber battery tube and aluminum tail cap….Count Me In!
Brass is much less conductive and can be had from K&S with a wall thickness of .029” at 3/4” OD. Add a paracord wrap on the handle and keep the rest copper.
It was a lot of measureing and calculating. I like to write it all down so I make fewer mistakes. That paperwork is actually another project, but the 2010 notes are in the same notebook / pile.
I will be offering them for sale. I just need to finalize the design and figure out how much to charge.
Very nice indeed. I for one really like the side switch idea. The fins are very attractive but would it be possible to order without fins or with only very short fins? I would want to enhance the conduction from copper to flesh.
Funny story about notes.
I have to write down everything, my son writes down nothing……………
He raced karts for 9 years at many different tracks and everyone asked me about my notes on the track and I would just point to him.
Everything sticks…………
PS: The fins are like Flames, they just look so coooooooooool you have to have them.
