# Anybody else make their own "Night Glowring?"



## proFeign

Hey y'all,

I posted this in the glowring thread on B/S/T but that thread is primarily used for the seller to talk to his customers about order status so I thought I'd post it somewhere people were inclined to read and give feedback.

The stock glowrings have molded acrylic hexagonal casings with an acrylic plug jammed in the end to hold the traser in. They can simply be pulled out or can come loose on their own and just fall out. Also all of them I have ever carried I have sanded down to remove molding lines and sprue points.

It really helps the appearance to do that because you get nice, flat sides on the hexagon but it doesn't solve the problem that they're an unnecessary fluourescent plastic that doesn't change the color of the traser except to make it dimmer. Also the traser is loose and rattles around in the acrylic, which is asking for trouble in case of shock to the ring, IMO.

Anyway, the details of my project are below. I did it because I like making my own stuff, plus I wanted to incorporate the awesome rich glow of the purple trasers with the awesome bright glow of a green traser in one keychain. Please give feedback! I'll probably make one or two more for my family and/or friends so any improvements are good to think about...

I ordered 5' of .5" polycarbonate rod stock from the internet for my keychain because acrylic, though nice and crystal clear, is brittle and scratches easily... Polycarbonate machines well but is a royal pain to polish afterward, and drilling it out requires an incredible amount of lubrication... But after polishing it's extremely scratch resistant and very nearly as clear as acrylic if it's a small piece. It's the stuff some types of bulletproof glass are made out of, as well as the colorful Nalgene water bottles that are indestructable.

Anyway, machined off a couple of pieces and turned them down to ~.35" OD and proceeded to make as cosmetically appealing as my limited time and machining experience would permit. So the biggest pain was polishing it. Some 600 and a lot of 1200 grit sandpaper later and this is the result:







My camera is hardcore crappy and this is the best I could do. I hopefully will be getting an Elph for Xmas so I'll post better pics in a week or two, with any luck.

The vials are green (brightest) and purple (way cooler and brighter than the blue IMO, and considerably more rich color. Purple is a close second to green as far as I'm concerned, and the green is pretty bad a**, primarily because of its brightness) and are held in at the bottom with stainless steel 3/36 dimple point allen head set screws.

I felt that the existing keychain was too scratch-prone as well as being brittle and with the greatest shortcoming being the lack of a positively secured cap in the bottom as well as the "rattling" due to the size of the hole the tube rests in. It was a pretty big problem in my mind that the thin glass traser was held loosely in a very hard (acrylic) environment, meaning that a sharp drop would cause the tube to collide with a hard surface (inside of tube).

I solved both of these problems with the set screws (very secure) as well as a small piece of very, very soft and porous rubber foam between the end of the set screw and the bottom of the traser, which holds the traser securely in a rattle-free (shaking hard makes no noise at all) position without having any point at which the traser has a point load that would encourage breaking. 

Here's an endorsement for polycarbonate: I drilled the holes in the bottom of a backup (essentially a duplicate but with a *smaller* OD) of this keychain that I made that had a lathing flaw and placed it on a hard linoleum floor and was able to strike it with a steel 20 oz. hammer as hard as I could, repeatedly, with no visible damage to the keychain. After polishing, certainly, the surface would be marred by the hammer, but the fact remains that this bad boy can take some serious abuse. Also I put a screwdriver through the keyring hole and clamped it in a vise and couldn't break the screwdriver out through the top of the polycarbonate... Go polycarbonate, it's your birthday! 

Anyway, I like the way it turned out but there are also some things I'd change in rev.2...


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## HighLight

Would that clear liquid resin that you can get at a hobby shop for making keychains be any good for encapsulating these tritium tubes I wonder? Make a mold and suspend the tube on a piece of thread and pour the liquid around it and wait for it all to harden. It would solve the rattling problem at least.


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## paulr

Very nice work. Stock glowrings are relatively expensive and I've never understood why they're made in such a crappy way that the tubes can fall out.


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## Morelite

very nice work, I have been thinking of doing something very similar. I was going to try and turn some brass or titanium to make some caps (very similar to the ones that came with the older X2 style glowring), but I wasn't sure of what to use for the tube. I like the idea of the polycarbonate. Where did you find it? Maybe Mcmaster-carr has it? Where did you find purple H3 vials? I have never seen purple, only green, blue, and pink? I would love to see a purple one in the dark.

Keep up the good work, I like it


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## Darell

Very nice! Are your services for hire? (not your photographic ones!) 

These H3 vials just beg for nice enclosures. What I'd like to see is a narrower end that clips to the key ring (maybe a metal cap), and the shortest possible package. I don't need any fancy way of holding the vial in there. Epoxy to fill the hole is good enough for me! Need to replace the vial? Just drill out the epoxy.


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## proFeign

Darell said:


> Very nice! Are your services for hire? (not your photographic ones!)



:laughing: I know I know. You'll see when I get a camera that is better than the one I have, which is only slightly better than none at all...



darell said:


> These H3 vials just beg for nice enclosures. What I'd like to see is a narrower end that clips to the key ring (maybe a metal cap), and the shortest possible package. I don't need any fancy way of holding the vial in there. Epoxy to fill the hole is good enough for me! Need to replace the vial? Just drill out the epoxy.



There was an older version of the glowring but it was pretty crappy and frankly, though it looks neat and more complicated (aluminum caps and triangular ring on top) it was really poorly made and the plastic capsule was really foggy. 

I'd love for my services to be for hire but I don't have a ton of time to spend in the machine shop, what with mechatronics, thermodynamics, vibrations and numerical analysis... If I do make a run of four or five for friends then I can probably do some extras, which I wanted to do this time but didn't really have a good plan laid out. It really wasn't hard, but for drilling the off-center holes in the bottom I used a special collet mount in the vise of a milling machine, as none of the heavy duty lathes we had had a variable offset chuck. It helped for precision also. My dream workshop would include a full set of tooling stuff and a midsize milling machine and midsize lathe. But now I have access to even a CNC EDM and a very high-tech CNC mill, though I hesitate to ask for time on it and would only do so if I had one bad-*** blueprint.

I'll probably try to run off some new ones before school starts on the 9th, though.


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## Darell

Well, if you ever end up with extra's, look me up!

I'm even willing to trade you a decent digital camera for some!


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## proFeign

Morelite said:


> very nice work, I have been thinking of doing something very similar. I was going to try and turn some brass or titanium to make some caps (very similar to the ones that came with the older X2 style glowring), but I wasn't sure of what to use for the tube. I like the idea of the polycarbonate. Where did you find it? Maybe Mcmaster-carr has it? Where did you find purple H3 vials? I have never seen purple, only green, blue, and pink? I would love to see a purple one in the dark.
> 
> Keep up the good work, I like it



I got the polycarbonate rod from www.plasticsintl.com . It seemed like a ton of websites had the same product list but were, web-form-wise cosmetically different. These guys had by far the cheapest price and I was kinda suspicious because there was no real shipping charge...

Most places have the .5" OD x 5' rods for about $15/piece but they will only sell quantities of five or more, and the first place I found that sold 'em by the one wanted $121! No kidding. So these guys for the .5"x5' was $12 after shipping and tax! I was like, no way, but it was the only option I really had and verisign said it was all good. Anyway, I was pretty worried because it's a screwy shape and UPS isn't that cheap for 5' long stuff...

Anyway it came wrapped kinda cheaply but it got here fast and cheap (really cheap)... I was order #81, which wasn't reassuring either. Anyway, cheap stuff, fast service, same product as everywhere else.

I have maybe 2.5' left, but I wasted a ton of it trying to figure out the best way to drill into it because man oh man does it get hot if you take your time. No discoloration or melting, but I couldn't touch a drill bit after 3 seconds of drilling. Ouch.

Anyway, ask me if you're going to use PC; I learned quite a bit. Syringes would have helped the lubrication and cleaning, though, because it's a 1.2" deep hole that's 1/8" ID... Oil doesn't want to get to the bottom, or come out of it, for that matter.

Finally: Merkava has loose 23mm trasers in a bunch of other colors like orange and purple, but the ones I've seen loose are: blue, pink/red, green, orange, purple. Purple and green kick the *** of all the other ones, hands down. Pink is kind of cool in its own way because almost nothing glows or lights up that color, but go with purple if you can only afford one. I will stand behind that recommendation.


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## tvodrd

McMaster has 1/4" dia Polycarb for $.69/ft, 5/16" dia for $.85/ft, and 3/8" dia for $1.32. You have to buy a full 8ft length and will pay for UPS shipping.

Larry


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## Darell

Larry has made some slick little H3 cases too!

Who do I have to sleep with to get somebody to make me one... or two...?


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## M.TEX

Not me.......


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## Darell

Thanks M. That narrows down my list a bit.


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## tvodrd

Darell said:


> Who do I have to sleep with to get somebody to make me one... or two...?



Larry


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## proFeign

OK, everybody that I've shown it to wants one so I'm going to go turn out a whole bunch of them if I can. I am going back down to the machine shop on probably the third or fourth and, now that I have some syringes (Fry's had some small ones with kinda large needles but they'll work) the drilling will go way faster.

For those of you that doubted my photography skills: here's my first pic with my SD450 Elph and digital macro 1x...






please note that this is probably only a mediocre picture of it but I wanted to get one up fast... It has not been edited for saturation or anything; the purple really is this bright in relation to the green... taken in ambient windowshade light in my room on my black pb desk.


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## Morelite

proFeign said:


> OK, everybody that I've shown it to wants one so I'm going to go turn out a whole bunch of them if I can. I am going back down to the machine shop on probably the third or fourth and, now that I have some syringes (Fry's had some small ones with kinda large needles but they'll work) the drilling will go way faster.
> 
> For those of you that doubted my photography skills: here's my first pic with my SD450 Elph and digital macro 1x...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> please note that this is probably only a mediocre picture of it but I wanted to get one up fast... It has not been edited for saturation or anything; the purple really is this bright in relation to the green... taken in ambient windowshade light in my room on my black pb desk.


 
Sign me up for two, will you be taking paypal? and how much?


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## Christoph

I would like two as well

C


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## proFeign

I don't know if I can accommodate that many... I will try to make maybe five or ten, maybe, and of those at least three are spoken for. E-mail me at: cpf at fouronefive/com and I'll keep you all posted. I'm a full time student and each probably would take an hour or so of work. I also ran out of oil to cut with so I'm going to have to experiment with some other oils because the two they have at the shop give crappy finishes when drilling PC.

For now I guess I'm not going to vary the design at all.

Please note that if I do end up offering a few of them I'm probably going to want to send them out without any trasers in them. I would include all other hardware though. 

For the record, to my eye, purple/green and orange/blue are the best two color combos.


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## tvodrd

proFeign, Drilling an optical finish hole in polycarb is almost impossible, even with a lot of coolant. I've filled mine with silicone fluid to "improve" it several times since I made it over 6 months ago. It slowly migrates out. Someday, I may find a suitable O-ring and cut a groove in the stainless attachment. I haven't bothered yet, as I still have no problems finding my dropped keys in the dark. 

Larry


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## Lunal_Tic

If this happens I'd be in for one too. It looks great.

I've been wanting to try something like this but put 6 colors in one capsule. Of course it may be a bit tough with just a Dremel tool. :shrug:

-LT


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## proFeign

Lunal_Tic said:


> If this happens I'd be in for one too. It looks great.
> 
> I've been wanting to try something like this but put 6 colors in one capsule. Of course it may be a bit tough with just a Dremel tool. :shrug:
> 
> -LT


 
That would be one expensive keychain to lose! You can do a lot with a dremel, but really all you need to do most of what I did is a drill press... Hand drilling polycarb is virtually impossible because it swells a little when it gets hot, which it does quickly, and will bind and seize if you're not ready for it. I used a milling machine to drill the holes in mine because it's got super-fine adjustments in x and y on the table, unlike a drill press.


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## proFeign

I have a really cool idea for a similar but much changed keychain that I hopefully can build soon. I have to do some serious brainstorming to figure out how to cap it, though. Will post pics or report on failure to accomplish my goal in a week or two... Also I need to get some more trasers ordered to get it done...

Thanks for all the interest, guys! I'm not going to promise anything until I can get into the shop again and try to get a few more done...


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## Darell

Not exactly sure what you mean by "cap", but I'll say again that retaining the vials would easily be done with clear silicone or super glue, or whatever. Making a fancy way to cap the vial enclosure is likely more trouble than it is worth. IMO!

Larry - ya gotta run faster than that, buddy!


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## proFeign

Darell said:


> Not exactly sure what you mean by "cap", but I'll say again that retaining the vials would easily be done with clear silicone or super glue, or whatever. Making a fancy way to cap the vial enclosure is likely more trouble than it is worth. IMO!
> 
> Larry - ya gotta run faster than that, buddy!


 
Good point re: epoxy. Must test to see if it'll sit and cure on top of what I plan to plug up.


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## Morelite

Darell said:


> Not exactly sure what you mean by "cap", but I'll say again that retaining the vials would easily be done with clear silicone or super glue, or whatever. Making a fancy way to cap the vial enclosure is likely more trouble than it is worth. IMO!
> 
> Larry - ya gotta run faster than that, buddy!


This is what I mean by caps. I made this one out of a NITE glowring by turning the hex tube into a round tube and making some brass end caps for both ends. The end caps and tritium vial are secured with clear epoxy. I will need to be a little bit more careful with the epoxy next time because some of it ran down the tube opening and it shows up on the inside, No biggie but you can see it.






The green one is the one I made
The blue one is the original X2 Glowring


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## InFlux

proFeign said:


> OK, everybody that I've shown it to wants one so I'm going to go turn out a whole bunch of them if I can.



Wooohooo! That looks awesome! I'd like one please!

(really I'd like two, but didn't want to appear greedy, or scare you off the project :wave: )


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## captianworkbench

Wow, I am learning about soooo many cool things since I joined this forum two days ago. What I would like to know now is where do I get tritrium inserts? What or who is Merkava? Link please.......


Thanks again

CWB


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## Morelite

Merkava is a CPF member, link: http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=72038&page=1&pp=30



captianworkbench said:


> Wow, I am learning about soooo many cool things since I joined this forum two days ago. What I would like to know now is where do I get tritrium inserts? What or who is Merkava? Link please.......
> 
> 
> Thanks again
> 
> CWB


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## proFeign

InFlux said:


> Wooohooo! That looks awesome! I'd like one please!
> 
> (really I'd like two, but didn't want to appear greedy, or scare you off the project :wave: )



Man this quarter has been kicking my *** at school I'm not doing poorly but we have an incredible amount of work. Week after next is spring break so hopefully the shop will be open and I can go machine some more polycarbonate...

Thanks for all the interest!


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## proFeign

Morelite said:


> This is what I mean by caps. I made this one out of a NITE glowring by turning the hex tube into a round tube and making some brass end caps for both ends. The end caps and tritium vial are secured with clear epoxy. I will need to be a little bit more careful with the epoxy next time because some of it ran down the tube opening and it shows up on the inside, No biggie but you can see it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The green one is the one I made
> The blue one is the original X2 Glowring



I messed up like that on the first one I was screwing with of the current variety with superglue. I knew it might happen but it got sucked up in there fast!


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## adirondackdestroyer

Profeign,


As soon as you make some of these I am definitely interested in buying one or two.


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## nemul

proFeign said:


> OK, everybody that I've shown it to wants one so I'm going to go turn out a whole bunch of them if I can. I am going back down to the machine shop on probably the third or fourth and, now that I have some syringes (Fry's had some small ones with kinda large needles but they'll work) the drilling will go way faster.
> 
> For those of you that doubted my photography skills: here's my first pic with my SD450 Elph and digital macro 1x...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> please note that this is probably only a mediocre picture of it but I wanted to get one up fast... It has not been edited for saturation or anything; the purple really is this bright in relation to the green... taken in ambient windowshade light in my room on my black pb desk.



nice!


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## InFlux

InFlux said:


> Wooohooo! That looks awesome! I'd like one please!
> 
> (really I'd like two, but didn't want to appear greedy, or scare you off the project :wave: )


I'm Still here and still interested. Shoot me a PM when you've got some ready


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## proFeign

Finally I'm making some more of them! They won't all be the same but I'll post pics of each when I can. I want to sell/trade them for two L1Ts and one L2T (the T models) and will probably ship them without trasers because I don't have that many. But I can ship maybe one or two with trasers after I order a few more.

Let me know if you guys are interested. They're going to be smaller than the one in this pic because they don't need to be that big. I can also do flat sides for a custom one but that will require a fair amount more work to put them back in the milling machine and get 'em all flat and stuff after they're lathed down to the right size.

Please e-mail me at cpf at fouronefive dot c "o" m. (Please forgive the screwy spelling; i'm sure you get the idea. I get enough spam already)

Also post here so people know what's going on. I'm thinking there will be four or five overall but I'll do my best to get them out in some quantity. They're about two to three hours apiece in a bigger run, after polishing and all the other stuff that needs to happen for them to be presentable.

It's tricky lathing them down to the new smaller OD and I only get one shot at it. I've already wrecked one of the new ones because once you take them down to the smaller OD they can't be touched by the lathe again except for bevelling because the part beyond the keychain area is too flexy to stay put when you move a tool into them and it absolutely thrashes the outside.


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## InFlux

Hi There, 

I'm still here and still interested! But I don't understand your email instructions. Are the numbers spelled out?

_Rob (InFlux)

Edit: PM Sent


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## proFeign

*Way more clarification and info*

Editors: I'm sorry for posting without prices again! I didn't think about it. [Note: I haven't heard from any editor about this but I just remembered and am doing something about it next post in the next twenty minutes; lots more information with prices coming]

Also if you guys want flat sides or anything not too fancy please let me know via e-mail ASAP. I gotta get as much done tomorrow as possible before the shop is closed for the weekend and I get in the middle of another project. I should have four or five or more done before the end of next week as long as the shop doesn't have an unforseen closure.

[Woohoo I got to cut my UTX blade on the wire EDM today! Rad! that is another time consuming (overall) project right now. I love my school.]


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## proFeign

*Way more info PLUS PRICES*

I can't post the pasting of the e-mail conversation until I get clearance from the other CPFer which I haven't done. I'm going to e-mail him the content of the conversation and hopefully he'll give me the go-ahead soon. 

I have to take a nap (too much going on past two days) but here's the gist of it so far:

Actually, here's my side of the conversation only:

Here's the short version; once the other CPFer gives me the OK I'll post the responses to his questions on CPF and send them as a reply.​ ​ Actually, here's my side of the conversation (I don't know why this didn't occur to me earlier):
​ ​ 


_*Pricing info:*

_[proFeign] I'm thinking something like $40 after polishing but WITHOUT the tritium tubes. You'll get to pick your colors etc. I'll ship it with the stainless steel set screws and little foam pads for a good fit plus the keyring part.

This would end up being about $65 after you got the tubes from whomever is currently selling them. Let me know if this is the price range you were expecting. It should last a lifetime, even with pretty rough use because I really was able to hammer the keyring I made before on a hard surface repeatedly without it cracking. You wouldn't want to do this with tubes in it, but if you put them in right it should survive really any fall with tubes intact. I'm guessing even about four stories would be fine if it was dropped with a light keyring. The inside fit is way better than the "Night Glowring" ones you can buy as keychains (see top of thread for crappy pic of one).

Thanks for your interest!

Also I could conceivably make one with four holes drilled through it instead of two, but unfortunately three would be really hard to get even. This would necessitate a slightly larger outside diameter.
​ Regarding three and four hole ones:

With four holes the OD will be slightly under 1/2"... the good thing about that is that it'll be more rigid and will be able to handle more machining, if you want any lathe decoration rings or something on it. I'm guessing, since I might wreck a four hole one the first time I make it that $60 (without trasers) would be where I go with that. Unless you really really want one and are able to commit more than $60 I can't promise a three hole one would come out well, unless they were all side by side in a line, and that would be tricky as hell in a half inch of space to start with (1/8"
diameter hole for traser = 0.125" meaning just the holes would equal .375"
and there has to be space between them and a little extra to peel off the outside printing that comes stock on the rod. It would be a nightmare and potentially prone to breakage, but I can't say for sure. I can try to do a three hole like one every 120 degrees but that will be eyeballed, essentially, and require more work even than a four hole. If it comes out easy the first time I'll charge less than $70 but I may waste a foot of rod trying to get a technique that leaves enough space between them that they don't mash into each other (the rod swells when drilling slightly and it doesn't like holes with less than about 0.1" between them. It's fun to learn all this though and if I get a more efficient process going (I have some ideas) I might drop the price even further. 

I can cut that price back on any one of them if you guys want to polish them yourselves. I do it by hand with a Dremel and a wet polishing wheel on it with McGuire's ScratchX for cars. It's like a wax with fine abrasives.
It's about a solid hour of work per keychain, but these might go faster because I have a better set of lathe tooling than for the one in the pictures. Might go way faster, actually. These don't strictly require polishing. A little fog on the outside actually might make them more visible because the clear one I made only lets you see the light if you can see a traser but if you're only looking at the clear part I can't really see them glowing.

Just a note of clarification about the "flexing on the lathe" comments: the glowrings in their finished ready to ship length are NOT at all flexible, but when they're turned down to .35" OD or so since they have to stick out of the lathe a good four inches (and all of that is wasted rod) it can't be cut on the lathe any more except for minor touches on the extreme ends because once I cut it off I can put it snug up in a collet and hit it with anything while it's sticking out half an inch or so, but on the finish OD pass it's one shot only and whatever OD that is is the OD it's got to stay.
If I want to turn it down any more I have to cut it off first and do each half separately and there's no way to avoid a lip in the middle, even after sanding, unless you've got more skills than I do.

END SO FAR
One more final note: I really would prefer to only deal with shipping them without trasers at all. I don't want to deal with any warranty issues that may result from them or anything like that because I would be ordering them from the same place you get them from (other CPF guys that stock them).

Plus it'll save you money this way (and a lot of time, potentially since they're usually shipped from far [really far] away). I will write a detailed assembly page with instructions and pics so you don't break them on installation. They're held quite closely in my tubes as I'm making them now, so they're a pain to get out, especially if you leave a little oil in the tube so they stick in there good, as I would recommend. They are _*QUITE DIFFICULT *_to get out once you put them in, which is good, but you can if you work at it and are really careful. These fit the 3 x 23 mm trasers.​ 
CPF is awesome! Thanks you all for your interest. I'm going to say one per person max until I've sent around as many as I can turn out for a first run and then I'll take further offers if I can possibly get them done. I'm going to run out of rod sooner or later and it takes a while to get here and is pretty pricey if I can't get it from the same place as last time, which might be an issue.


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## proFeign

Also I have to get my newly shortened Microtech UTX 70 (which is now potentially the only dual-action out-the-front auto [of any type] that is California carry-legal in the whole world[!]) reground very carefully so as not to damage the temper...

I love my freedom from classes (though temporary) that permits me to get work done on my own little projects.

Check out the modified knife at: KF page of forum post  or my page of story of cutting the blade on my own server with lots of decent pics of the process.

I'm very impressed with electron discharge machining! Nothing could have done anywhere near as good a job for the money (no money) in anywhere near the time it took (about five-seven minutes or so).


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## proFeign

Final thing (sorry about the multi-post craziness): I also made a traser holder that threads only a knife lanyard like a long bead with a single hold and a big traser on one side of it. These are kinda tricky but I could do another...

Pics of all these things coming in a few days.


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## Lunal_Tic

Still interested, email sent.

-LT


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## proFeign

Update: 

After some quick calculations it seems that I'm going to have enough rod to made probably only six more of them unless I order more rod. I think six will get me where I need to be on it. I will inform the people who have e-mailed me via e-mail that they are on this list and try to get a better idea of who wants what. It is possible that I can get one or two more out of the rod than this, but I can't be sure.

So here's the deal: if you want one please e-mail me at kelly / at / fouronefive.

Dot / com

I can make ones with four holes, I believe, but I haven't tried it yet. I'll try to turn one out today and I'll try to post pics of the (unpolished) ones that I've finished so far (there are only two that look like this at the moment and they are considerably smaller than the one in the current pictures. I think smaller is better, since keychains already are too big for me.

Also I'll get a pic up of the one I made that has one big hole and one smaller hole all the way through it that holds one traser and then you thread paracord through it and it's held on to a lanyard. These are pretty easy to make but the one that I already did ended up off center so I milled a side flat on it to make it a bit smaller.

So e-mails going out shortly...

*EDIT: If you want one please post in this forum and e-mail me. I don't want to put up a list of other people's names without permission.

Things you can request custom:

*
*Number of holes (two, four, or possibly six if they fit)
*
*degree of outside polishing*
*small or large outside diameter (between about .35" and .45", but you don't have a choice if you want four holes; it's gonna be big)*
*little lathe rings around it.*
*length (between 1.25" or so and up to about 2.5") I think shorter is better, personally*
*
Thanks!*


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## mcmc

Hi Kelly!

Not sure of the price but would definitely like 2, and possibly 4 if there are enough left.
I would want a shorter one as well (1.5" or 1.75" sounds good), with lathe rings (similar to your original ones). I'd want them with two holes...

Thanks!


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## Jumpmaster

mcmc said:


> Not sure of the price but would definitely like 2, and possibly 4 if there are enough left.



I think he said he can only do one per person on this go-round.

JM-99


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## Lunal_Tic

reply email sent

Thanks,
-LT


----------



## proFeign

Pics coming tonight. None are finished yet but you'll see what is going on with them. Two have been turned down for size comparison.


----------



## Pumaman

I'm in for a small, two hole,unpolished, no lathe-ring version, if still available.

great looking work,

Pumaman


----------



## proFeign

Progress details with some decent pictures at

http://www.fouronefive.com/cpf/newglowrings.htm

NOTE: I am OUT of rod for more than this. I have to get it in five foot lengths at least so I'm holding off for now on more...

Please refer to them by number if you have a preference from here out. The off-center ones (please see pic for idea of what that means) are also up for grabs. It shows seven two-hole ones and I'm going to guess that I can only count on five for sure (hopefully all seven will come out great, but I can't say for sure; the lathe is tricky because I have to eyeball all of it).

So far committed list is:

Lunal_Tic - 4 hole
Jumpmaster - 4 hole
InFlux - two hole
Maurice - (nickname?) - two hole
Darrell - no commitment, but he's got priority from long ago for one of them
Pumaman - 2 hole, no grooves, no polish


K L - ?

this means there is up to three two-hole ones not spoken for for sure yet. I will be making sure I haven't forgotten anyone that contacted me before and give them a chance to get back to me before I commit the last two.

NOTE: this could be the very last of the last ones I ever make (or at least count on it for now; I can't use the shop indefinitely for this if you know what I mean, plus I'm out of rod stock as of a few hours ago) so if you really want one please contact me ASAP. I want to make one for everyone but I don't think it's possible.

EDIT: Please tell me approximate dimensions of the ones you want. I.e. "short" "long" "small OD" "large OD" "surprise me"

Small OD will be about .35" and large will be up to about .43". You can tell the difference between those two sizes very easily when they're in your hand.

Short will be under 2" probably and long will be up to 2.5" or so but I have no idea why you'd want a long one. Feel free to request it if you do though.


----------



## proFeign

PRELIMINARY NOTE ON POLISHING: Polishing with the Dremel is tricky and time consuming, as if I (or you) run the Dremel above about 8-10,000 rpm (about 40%+ on my dial) I can't let it stop moving side to side quickly for even a second or so or it will dwell and melt a little dimple in the surface. This would be less of a problem if I sanded it all down with 1200 grit sandpaper and hardly had to touch it with the Dremel, but that's super time consuming also. So the only one of this run that I polished at all is the "Inline Lanyard" which I will have assembled pics of shortly. *The good thing about this is the finish as it stands now is very nice without any polishing. I should have left it alone, perhaps. Anyway, no polishing will look nice and frosted and even, and the plus side of this is the lanyard one with a black piece of paracord through it is visible from any radial angle, which is not the case with the high-polish "0" one* if you block off the direct line of sight to the tubes. When the tube is on the far side of the paracord it looks like there are two slightly dimmer tubes on either side of the paracord. This could be a function of the flat side and the tight spacing between the outside wall and the traser, but it remains to be seen. 

I'll post new pics of this showing what I'm talking about soon. Almost all of the rods above were drilled with the new cobalt bit and a higher-viscosity machine oil, and hence have clearer holes (see "5" for example of issues with lubrication) but I drop a tiny amount of thin oil into them before I put trasers in them and it effectively makes that fogginess totally invisible. If you want a super-secure holding system for the trasers themselves I can make the holes longer by not cutting the rods shown above as short as I plan and you can put in two set screws, but this was totally unnecessary since before the end of last year. I haven't touched the screws since the first post, and they haven't moved a bit. Alternatively you could melt them in place or clean the end and fill it with epoxy or something, but the screws make it possible to switch colors if you want a change. Oh, actually I forgot: I swapped out the green tube for a yellow one for a day sometime around February or March, but it's almost better that they can take repeated screwings without getting loose. I wouldn't recommend more than maybe five or ten removals and replacements though. Sorry for the wordiness; I just want people to know what they're getting for their money.


----------



## Darell

I'm back! I'd like something of the two hole variety, and I want it as small in all dimensions as possible. Would like to use set screws to enable vial changing. Would also like the split-ring end to be as low-profile as possible (so it doesn't hang up on the ring as much as the actual trasers) but of course it also needs to be increadibly strong. 

Anyway... I'm in!


----------



## proFeign

Darell said:


> I'm back! I'd like something of the two hole variety, and I want it as small in all dimensions as possible. Would like to use set screws to enable vial changing. Would also like the split-ring end to be as low-profile as possible (so it doesn't hang up on the ring as much as the actual trasers) but of course it also needs to be increadibly strong.
> 
> Anyway... I'm in!



Okey doke, down for two-hole unpolished smallest I can make. I wouldn't recommend turning the keyring side down any smaller than the small ones in the pic above; it creates what it known in strength of materials as a "stress concentrator." Picture if you will trying to tear open a bag of chips and it's difficult, then add a tiny nick with your teeth or something sharp and think of how much tremendously easier it is to tear with a "stress concentrator" in place. If I tapered the end it would end up longer than if I didn't have a step down or taper at all, and you will be pleased with its ultimate size.

The stock all clear glowrings that Merkava has are 10mm wide on the flat sides (and 12mm wide corner to corner) by 50mm long.

The smallest one I've made is 38mm long by 10mm wide, and this might be a tad short to comfortably get a keyring through, but I'll make it work without being flimsy. It's a much bigger problem to not be able to fit the trasers in than having it be longer than absolutely necessary by 5-10mm.

Better yet, here's a picture:






Both of them look noticeably smaller than the stock one in person. This is about as narrow as I want to make them so they'll withstand any abuse you can throw at them. (I don't recommend by hammer test with tubes installed, though). I kinda like the unpolished finish a lot. I put my lanyard one (I'll post another pic soon) next to the one I made before and it might be a tad brighter if it's highly polished but it's hard to tell. From across the room they're undifferentiable in the dark.


----------



## Darell

Looks great! As small as possible while still being sturdy is the answer for me.


----------



## Jumpmaster

PayPal standing by -- just let me know when to fire it off...

JM-99


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## proFeign

Hey guys, I hope to have them done tomorrow. :rock:All are turned and beveled and all that's left to do is drill and chamfer the thru hole for the keyring. 

One of the two four-hole ones has a little skew to the side on one of the holes but it's not that noticeable. I'll post final prices and who's down for what and pics of each of them hopefully tomorrow (if they are done).

Would people that have signed up for one tell me if they have a nice keyring that they'd like to use or if I should put one of the ones I have through it? 

Thanks!


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## Lunal_Tic

I'm covered for split rings.

Thanks,
-LT


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## proFeign

Lunal_Tic said:


> I'm covered for split rings.
> 
> Thanks,
> -LT



Do you want to go in on a larger order? I think most people would want the ones you sent me a link to and they appeared to be cheap in quantity...

Thanks for mentioning them. I was picturing an oval like () [or like an egg with both axes bowed out rather than two semicircles and straight lines between them] which I was imagining would look stupid as hell, but then I figured you probably wouldn't like those either...

k


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## Lunal_Tic

Hi proFeign,

Here's a link to a guy that's already bought a bunch. Oval Split Rings 

My problem is that he doesn't take Paypal and that's all I have available to me. Perhaps we can work something out.

-LT


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## Darell

If you've got a split ring that fits well, please slip one in there for me. Otherwise, I can find something around here. I'd love to try some of the oval ones though!


----------



## Radio

I'm interested in one of these!!!!


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## proFeign

*
NOTE: Anyone who wants one that's not on the list and will be able to pay for them please e-mail me and you'll go on my list of people that are on the list for however many I end up with finished.
*______________________________________________________________

Hey guys, it's looking like I'll ultimately have more of these finished than I had thought. All of the "rest" have been requested, but I'd like to get one to as many people as possible before I get rid of them all. 

I intend to keep three of them myself (and wasn't including these in the listings so far in terms of what was going to be available). One will be a gift, with tubes, to the associate dean of my engineering school who has helped me tremendously in these past few years when I've been doing really well in school.

Anyway, a guy tonight told me (some random guy) that knowing how to machine things and use machine tools will be a wonderful skill to have for the rest of my life. He said that it will keep me employed if all else fails.  Lucky for me, I have access to all this stuff and use it. Most of the school year the shop is in use full time by classes. Most mechanical engineering students never use the shop and aren't interested in making anything or even using tools at all. Those people are going to make crappy product designers at some point. They suck  They have access to all the stuff I do like the machine shop and just don't care.

Soooo, I won't know the exact number and don't want to put anyone else's name down on the "definitely getting one" list until they're all done, which will be tomorrow if I get to the shop early enough.

I'll post pictures of each of them tomorrow or saturday when they're all set to go. I won't be shipping any of them until I get back into town on thursday or so (I go up to San Jose, CA to work with Pyro Spectaculars on the crew for the city fireworks show there every year).

I'll e-mail those who are getting them pictures of the one for them as well as my paypal e-mail.

Wish me luck getting them all finished tomorrow! Encourage me to get up early with e-mails...

______________________________________________________________
*
NOTE: Anyone who wants one that's not on the list and will be able to pay for them please e-mail me and you'll go on my list of people that are on the list for however many I end up with finished.*


----------



## proFeign

OK guys, I'm glad I didn't order the little oval rings yet, and here's why:

*I don't think people are realizing how small these actually are. * The oval looks like this:






and the length is the long direction and the width is the short dimension.

THE LARGEST ONE THEY MAKE is *LESS* than half an inch in it's LONGEST dimension. That is to say the only way these would fit on the x3 glowring is to have it be around one side. Here's a picture:






This means it would fit like this but if you even got it through successfully it would fit on but it would not be able to clear the top corner to even rotate it around so it was above the glowring! And even if you sanded down the corner and got it on top there wouldn't be enough space to fit a keyring through it between the glowring and the top afterward.

So unfortunately the largest one isn't nearly large enough to be of any use on a keyring.

I think the best solution for attaching to a keyring would be this:

a Jump Ring:






These they make in a size that would work with my rings, all of them and still be a whole lot smaller than the split rings that come on the glowrings already. These are designed to be bent closed and not opened again. There are triangle ones but the largest one there won't accommodate all of my ones that I made and anyway it wouldln't provide enough space for most keychains. Also the triangle ones (though I'm sure people will like the idea, perhaps more) are going to be more prone to failing and causing the glowring to get pulled off of the keychain altogether. Granted this is unlikely but this kind would allow plenty of space but still be really freakin' small.

I'll order 1000 of these if people are interested enough, but I think this is the best solution by far, and it will keep the ring from getting scratched up during split ring installation, though with MY rings it's a lot harder to damage the surface than with the old stock ones.

EDIT: even better, here's a pic of a mock-up of the oval one I made out of a paper clip. This one's about the exact same dimensions as the LARGEST one they make:


----------



## proFeign

Their office for ordering is closed for the week. Those guys are hard to deal with. It's 10:30 AM pacific time.


----------



## Lunal_Tic

Do you have an Arc AAA to try your proto oval in? I'm wondering if it'll fit any of the pocket lights I have.

-LT


----------



## proFeign

Lunal_Tic said:


> Do you have an Arc AAA to try your proto oval in? I'm wondering if it'll fit any of the pocket lights I have.
> 
> -LT



It would work fine but I don't know why you'd want them just for ArcAAAs... I actually got Arc to sell me 20 of the split rings they ship on their lights a while ago because they're so well made. The oval rings wouldn't even fit two schlage or kwikset keys if I had to guess, and if they did it would be tight and that's it for that oval ring.


----------



## Lunal_Tic

OK. I wonder why the made them such an odd size.

-LT


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## KAM

I can get a 13mm split ring through my nite glowrings:


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## proFeign

Lunal_Tic said:


> OK. I wonder why the made them such an odd size.
> 
> -LT



I'm guessing they're essentially fishing tackle or something like that...


----------



## Merkava

I made these...and they are on sale HERE












*~*~Merkava~*~*

Click HERE for Tritium Vials
Click HERE for Nite Tritium Glowrings


----------



## proFeign

Hey guys, I've been stuck at my parents' house this week after doing the fireworks show and my mom's Win98 computer won't copy the images off my camera. I'm working on a workaround. I'll get the pics up today one way or another. 

Merkava's keychains look interesting but I would be somewhat concerned about their long-term durability in a keychain environment. Time will tell, I guess!


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## proFeign

Pictures on the way... I ordered the 1000 size 11 jump rings today; I think they are the best option and are going to not get all permanently bent out of shape like tiny split rings do if you try to open them up really wide. I had to cough up an extra $5 for their "small order surcharge" if I didn't want 2000 of them.


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## proFeign

_*PLEASE E_MAIL ME WHEN YOU SEND PAYPAL; IT'S NOT ALERTING ME...
*__*
NOTE: I'm holding all shipments until I get my jump rings; you'll be happier this way. I hope to get all paid ones out by thursday or friday. I'll keep you all posted. If you don't want a keyring or anything on your keychain just tell me you want it ASAP without the rings I bought specifically for these. I think they're the best solution so I personally would wait if I were ordering from me right now  

I'm shipping USPS so please e-mail me your address when you start PayPal transaction. Please E_MAIL it to me, not just PayPal. Thanks!*_*PAID LIST:

*

*Darrell [SHIPPED 7/15/06]
*
*PumaMan **[SHIPPED** 7/15/06**]*
*InFlux **[SHIPPED** 7/15/06**]*
*Jumpmaster **[SHIPPED** 7/15/06**]*
*NOTE: In the interest of getting some good four hole ones I'm going to go drop $15 on a 1/8" carbide (really) drill bit. I don't think it'll tolerate flexing and it may get snapped if it happens but it'll be the hardest bit available and will be the most inclined to cut straight. Carbide will kill a budget but it's worth a try. Anyway got the .625" rod today and will ship everything I can ASAP also. I'll throw in a coule of extra jump rings with every order so if you don't like the way I closed them you can do it yourself  If you want more than a few extra ones please let me know. I'm charging minimally for them but they're not the smallest things in the world, though they're much smaller than the stock split rings on the nite glowrings.*

Also I'm really glad I held out for stainless st rings; they look like they'll hold up to all kinds of deflection and unwanted force.

Hi guys, here are finished pics (note that flecks on inside are oil and bits of plastic from drilling and lathe; they will be removed before shipping but I ran out of dust off before taking pictures; many of them have nearly optical finish holes in them:rock: ):











I can add lathe grooves to them if you wish, but I personally think they look nicer without them. I originally grooved my glowring (which is shown next to each one for size comparison with tubes installed) because I couldn't get rid of a ridge around the outside, so I hid it by cutting a groove into it. 

Bear in mind that every single one of these is individually hand made on manual machine tooling, so there's a pretty wide degree of variation. This is partially due to people wanting different things, and partially due to the inexact nature of machining a plastic that behaves like polycarbonate. It's too flexy to get entirely repeatable results on a lathe, at least with the tooling available to me.

UPDATE: I was able to get them done easier than I had thought so the normal two holes are a lot less expensive than I had thought they would be  

Here are the stories for each of them:

1 - Bad 4-hole; I had a lot of trouble with something going wrong with two of the three four-hole ones; the third and fourth holes had a bizarre tendency to start guiding the drill bit on an off-angle path. I'm thinking that little space doesn't like having that much drilling and heat and it causes areas of different densities that tend to push the drill bit a little one direction and then everything is screwed after that. This one is not spoken for. I would sell it for $25, but honestly it's not that much to look at.

2 - Skinny and long, quite long enough to put in two set screws. This one, since it was made from a piece of scrap that wasn't long enough to do the OD pass in one step, has a tiny ridge that you can't really see but can feel with your finger about halfway down its length. I can cut it shorter on the lathe also so it's about the size of number 9. 
-this one is not spoken for 
Due to ridge this one would be $25 and can be made shorter

3 - 3 hole, started life as a two hole and then a third hole was drilled. Came out OK, but little drawing shows how holes are arranged all on one side. It looks fine, though, and is otherwise even.
This one may be spoken for, so I'll put $45 and see what kind of interest I get.

4 - Thin, short 2 hole
_***SOLD TO PumaMan_

5 - Larger 2 hole, long enough for two set screws or I would cut it shorter on the lathe.
_*** SOLD TO InFlux_

6 - 4 hole with a slight lean, this one is slated for either Jumpmaster or Lunal_Tic $40

7 - Best overall 4 hole, not totally even, but no angled holes. Pending sale to Jumpmaster - $50

8 - 2 hole, medium dimensions, slightly biased to one side.
$30

9 - Darrell gets this one; it's the smallest one I was able to make.
For Darrell $30

10 - 2 hole, medium dimensions.
Pending sale to Jumpmaster - $30

11 - 2 hole, medium dimensions, slightly biased to one side.
$30

I need to keep two of the $30 two-hole ones so whichever are the last to be picked will be the ones I keep.

I'm sorry the four-hole ones didn't come out reliably, and Jumpmaster and LT get first pick, but because they're not perfect they may not end up getting sold at all.

The ones that DO NOT have people's names by them can be claimed by anyone pretty much. Paypal amount is next to description. The ones that say "for so-and-so" can be claimed only by that person, and if they do not ultimately like them they can choose to pass on them and they will become available to anyone who wants them.

Please E-MAIL (!) (cpf at fouronefive dot com) me which number you are interested in and if you are the first to request it I'll e-mail you back right away that it's available.

My paypal is profeign at hotmail dot com (please do not e-mail this address).

I'll hopefully get the Jump Rings from Worth early next week and I can start shipping them pretty much the same day paypal clears.

Thanks for all the interest, guys!

NOTE: I will be offering a satisfaction guarantee on this. If you aren't happy with the one you picked you can send it back and I'll refund your money less whatever it cost me to ship it initially.


----------



## Jumpmaster

Great work, Sir!

Email sent about #10 and the four-hole ones...

Thanks!

JM-99


----------



## Darell

yay! #9 looks/sounds perfect!


----------



## mcmc

Looks *great* kelly - thanks for all your hard work! I am sure that the guy was right, that this is a skill you can use for the rest of your life. If nothing else, to give you a sense of what it takes to manufacture something - as a manager, engineer, etc., that's a pretty valuable insight, b/c at the end of the day, everything's about either a service, or a piece of hardware shipped out the door...


----------



## InFlux

proFeign said:


> 5 - Larger 2 hole, long enough for two set screws or I would cut it shorter on the lathe.
> For InFlux $30



Cool, they came out fantastic!!! I'll take #5. I'd prefer to have it grooved and shortened a bit. (so it looks like your original  )

Paypal to follow...


----------



## proFeign

InFlux said:


> Cool, they came out fantastic!!! I'll take #5. I'd prefer to have it grooved and shortened a bit. (so it looks like your original  )
> 
> Paypal to follow...



No sweat! I can't jam three grooves up in the top area because there's less empty space on this one. I might do one groove on the top side of the inside holes and also on the far end to obscure the view of the set screws too. So two grooves would be what I would do.


----------



## proFeign

*I have just ordered 5 more feet of 5/8" OD rod to try to make more four hole ones.  I hope I can get them done in a reasonable period of time.

This rod is 1/8" bigger than the .5" OD for all of these. So it's 0.625" OD which means it's going to be a lot more space for four and possibly six holes, but I would bet money six holes wouldn't work on anything smaller than .75" OD and the final product would be really freaking big if it even turned out OK.*


----------



## proFeign

Please check for updates in the big post with the finished pics above; that post will have everything you need to know about your ordering and I'll keep editing it. I may cut/paste into a new message, but for now just check for edits up there.


----------



## proFeign

Please check for updates in the big post with the finished pics above; that post will have everything you need to know about your ordering and I'll keep editing it. I may cut/paste into a new message, but for now just check for edits up there.


----------



## InFlux

:thanks:  for #5

I'm also sending a seperate email as requested.


----------



## proFeign

InFlux said:


> :thanks:  for #5
> 
> I'm also sending a seperate email as requested.



Thanks! I can't wait to get some feedback (hopefully positive) about the new ones... Seriously, though, I wasn't kidding when I said that if you are unhappy about how yours turned out please let me know and I want to make it right however possible. Hopefully this will be a nonissue but I couldn't say for sure since I'm a picky m*f* myself. Very picky. OCD even.

Anyway, I got the jump rings today but I'm really feeling sick or something and I'm going to take a nap so I'll try to ship all paid orders tomorrow.

Also I'm not sure if I ordered enough jump rings; I mean, what was I thinking getting only the minimum order? Seriously, I should have gotten a trillion of them... Just kidding:






Do you think this is enough? I'm not sure... :rolls eyes:


----------



## Jumpmaster

I got mine yesterday and they're REALLY REALLY NICE!!!

THANKS, KELLY!!! Can't wait to put the tubes in!!! Need to get some more tritium though...

BTW, what would be the best way to remove these if I wanted to switch out the colors later?

JM-99


----------



## Pumaman

:goodjob: 
Got mine yesterday and looks great as well. I am waiting on an orange trit to show to join the blue I already have. Will post pics when finished.

Thanks


----------



## proFeign

Jumpmaster said:


> I got mine yesterday and they're REALLY REALLY NICE!!!
> 
> THANKS, KELLY!!! Can't wait to put the tubes in!!! Need to get some more tritium though...
> 
> BTW, what would be the best way to remove these if I wanted to switch out the colors later?
> 
> JM-99



Thanks JM!

I'm pasting below what I wrote to JM in response to his e-mail regarding this. It's pretty basic installation instructions and if you need more help please e-mail me!

Also I'm leaving town and unfortunately my blackberry's e-mail isn't coming through so I'm lagging a bit with responses but I'll do my best. Please let me know if you have any questions ASAP or you might have to wait until Tuesday to get a response. Thanks for all the nice e-mails and posts!

=========================

Just screw the set screws in as best you can as straight in as you can. I recommend doing that first before putting trasers in to get the threads cut but it really doesn't matter. To clean out the holes if anything gets in them a q-tip will fit if you strip off part of the cotton first. The q-tips do a great job of cleaning out the holes. Also if you want the holes to look shiny inside a drop of silicone oil works great, but only a drop, otherwise it'll squish out because of the tight fit of the trasers and then it's a b**** to clean off the threads etc. 

To get the trasers out I bang the glowring, base down, on a table until the traser is flush with the bottom of the glowring and then I bang them on the table at a slant so the tube will come out a little. Be careful on this part, obviously. I have to get them out about 5-8mm before I can pull them out with my fingers, if my fingers slip off then they get pushed back up in and I have to do it over again... It's not too hard but they don't just fall out, which is also a good thing if the set screw comes out, which it should never do. You could use pliers to get the trasers when they're just barely out but it's not that hard to get them all the way without tools of any kind.

The touchy part is getting the set screw down as far as it will go without putting any real pressure on the tube. Extra pads aren't necessarily a good thing unless it's to fill space, but one did it for me. Just to pinch it so there's no "hot spot" for pressure from the (socket tip, instead of pointy, which of course is better this way) set screw to be directly focused on a single tiny area of the traser.

Anyway let me know how your results are and if you're happy with 'em!
Thanks!

Kelly


----------



## proFeign

Pumaman said:


> :goodjob:
> Got mine yesterday and looks great as well. I am waiting on an orange trit to show to join the blue I already have. Will post pics when finished.
> 
> Thanks



If you haven't ordered yet I think yellow and blue is an awesome combination. Also it's many schools' colors.

EDIT: Also yellow is the brightest next to green, according to MB Microtec, the mfg of trasers.


----------



## Pumaman

I came close to getting yellow, but I wanted something different from the tritium color I am putting in my Raw NS on order (Can't wait!)

thanks anyway! :huh: 

ps. what polish would you use to do a little touch-up with a Dremel?


----------



## Jumpmaster

I'm having trouble finding the colors I want in the right size...

I have two purple I don't really want to use...I think the blue/yellow combo would look great, like profeign said...so I need another blue and two yellow...

JM-99


----------



## Pumaman

http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=72038

Merkava has them


----------



## Jumpmaster

Hmmm...I wonder what I have now...they're out of glow-rings I got from someone a while back...3 x 23mm? I'd like some green ones too...I think I'll send him a PM...

JM-99


----------



## greenLED

Pumaman said:


> ps. what polish would you use to do a little touch-up with a Dremel?


I've used Flitz and a soft polishing head to polish acrylic (LED domes) before. Depending on how rough the surface you're working with is, you might want to give it a few passes with increasingly fine sand paper (with 1500 or so being last) before polishing with Flitz.


----------



## proFeign

RE: Polishing

Polycarbonate is WAY harder to make clear than acrylic in my experience, plus these don't have flat sides like the Nite Glowrings. I recommend getting some 900-1200 grit sandpaper and trying to remove any edges or scratches lightly. 1200 is hard to find and it essentially feels like cloth, but you can't do much damage with it, which is pretty much the idea, since this batch turned out really smooth. If you don't want to sand, which is fine too, and it may end up being unnecessary on this batch; I haven't tried polishing one yet, get something like the following:

I use MacGuires Scratch-X (most redeeming quality of this polish: I already owned it :shakehead )which is a super-fine polishing compound for car clearcoat with some really fine abrasives in it. It actually might be better to get something with slightly more abrasive stuff in it but I don't have a crazy budget to play with. There are plastic polishes out there but make sure to not get ones with organic hydrocarbon solvents in them or they'll eat your glowring. I think plastic polishes would be better but I wasn't able to find one that looked appropriate. They sell various ones on the internet but I just used the car polish I had lying around.

Dremel tip: use a tiny bit of water with your polish and a white cotton polishing wheel, but be very careful not to run the dremel too fast or push too hard or stay in one place too long; if it forces all of the polish from the surface you're working on the cotton is going to bind on the plastic and melt a little dimple in it. Bad! You can then sand/polish this back out but you'll be able to tell forever if you look close.

Just light pressure, lots of polish, probably 8,000 rpm dremel speed. Careful also not to slide off the glowring and grind a hole in your glowring with the retaining screw or the dremel shaft! Ouch! I hold it in my hand when I do this, and use as much polish as I can without it sliding out of my fingers.

I wanna hear how this works for people, especially if they find a polish that kicks *** on polycarbonate.


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## reptiles

Anyone know exactly how much radiation these produce?


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## Jumpmaster

reptiles said:


> Anyone know exactly how much radiation these produce?



http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=117967
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=107823
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=100795
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=106922

JM-99


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## proFeign

reptiles said:


> Anyone know exactly how much radiation these produce?



I have grown a third leg since I've carried mine, but it's not so bad. 

To those who now have them: keep posting your thoughts on how these turned out so I'll have suggestions or changes for the next batch which will be made from bigger OD rod stock that maybe will permit a little more freedom with my designs... I can maybe even do flat sides now, but only square or two flat sides and the other two still rounded. Hexagonal would be too hard to get even on manual machinery. But I think a "paddle" style one would be neato, or even just a thin/flat one, but it would have to be small to prevent flexing, and it would also have to be not too thin...


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## Pumaman

top to bottom: Profeign's not yet polished, stock green night glowring, merkeva's homemade, and green night with orange installed.










:goodjob: thanks profeign!


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## proFeign

Pumaman said:


> top to bottom: Profeign's not yet polished, stock green night glowring, merkeva's homemade, and green night with orange installed.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> :goodjob: thanks profeign!



Thank you for your order! If you don't polish it let me know how the "frosted" looking finish holds up. These ones (like the one you have) should be way easier to polish than the one on my keychain, as I said earlier in this thread... This time the finish is consistent and the frostiness in minor and my old run had unwanted grooving all over it and a choppy finish that I had to sand out with 600-1200 grit wet paper before it looked even almost as nice as yours and then an hour plus of polishing. Finishing it cosmetically took probably two-three hours now that I'm thinking about it looking at these. 

I think these should take less than fifteen-thirty minutes to get shiny clear (as close to it as PC can get by hand) and they do take a beating and not change appearance very much. 

Here's a pic of my one on my keychain after eight months of wear on a keychain with NO TOUCHING UP after I got the finish the way I wanted it, which was over seven months ago:






[Note that closeup flash pictures with my camera wash out colors and make every reflection look way harsher. It's sitting on my black leather fine-grain wallet in this pic. Also note that I left it on the old-school split ring because it's working fine and I like to be able to carabiner it to things and my carabiners are geniune load-bearing ones and much bigger than the typical keychain holding little ones everybody has. But the "jump rings" I shipped with my glowrings look way cooler than split rings; I have them on my car key now and will be using them for lots of other things.]
*
PS Thanks Puma for the size comparison pic that's nicer looking than my own!*


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## proFeign

OFFICIAL CHANGE OF NAME FOR MY CUSTOM GLOWRINGS: I need to come up with a name for my handmade glowrings because "glowring" for mine and "Nite Glowring" or "DIY Glowring" or "Merkava's Glowring" all sound too similar and it's kind of confusing, I would imagine. 

*So I'm going to ask the crowd here to submit a "brand name" for my glowrings* (the ones made of polycarbonate that this thread is all about)... Any suggestions? I'll want to pick a name in the next week or two and I've come up with these names:
??? [will edit and add because I'm drawing a blank (aka uninspired) now]


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## Lunal_Tic

Hi, my computer is semi back up and I'll get you the measurements soon. In the mean time how about these for names:

proGlow Tubes
pF Tubes
proTubes

PC tubes (poly carb)
TritTubes
proTrit

-LT


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## proFeign

Thanks LT! Still trying to figure out where I want to go with the names...

Any luck on the polishing?


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## vaism

That is beautiful.. I very much prefer the frosted finish. Great job! :laughing: 

Some thoughts:

1. Beacon
2. (C)PF's Beacon
3. Key Lantern
4. KeyGlo
5. The Module
6. ModuleGlo
7. ModuLight
8. H-Three Module
9. H3 Capsule
10. Pocket Beacon
11. Pocket Lighthouse
12. Molecule
13. Eclipse
14. Light Vase
15. Night iLLum
16. Inspiral
17. The Guiding Light
18. Lumi-Lumi
19. Capsule-K
20. Capsulet
21. Capsulight
22. Amulight (Amulet)
23. GloSafe
24. GLocator
25. GL
26. GloPod
27. Tritness (Tritium Nest)
28. Lumire
29. LastLight
30. LightMate
31. Infini-3 / Infini-T
32. (Pocket) Light-Saber
33. Tritium-On-Ice
34. Iced-T (For the frosted models)
35. ColdGlo
36. K-Beacon
37. FeatherLight
38. GloTex/LightEX
39. VersaLight
40. Light For Granted

I just spent.. too long on this.. :lolsign: 

Next pls.


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## proFeign

Vaism,

Thanks! Those are very helpful...

k


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## Reptilezs

home glows


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## Lunal_Tic

Email sent with measurements.

-LT


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## proFeign

Now to resurrect:

Howdy all! Sorry for the long hiatus but I just finished my mechanical engineering degree, which was really quite time-consuming. I have all summer to do some projects and I think I can make a few more glowrings. I have developed a new method for much more precise hole placement and consistency and can do some cool new stuff like flat sides and flat sides with three trasers side-by-side.

I don't want to promise how many I can make but I think four or five at least, and maybe many more. At this point I'm gaugeing interest so please let me know if you're interested. 

**Hopefully** I'll be able to make ten or more of these and anyone that wants one can pick one up. Please let me know soon if you want one. The two-hole ones like the unpolished one pictured above will be relatively easy to make so those shouldn't be a problem. Anything more complicated (i.e. flat sides, whatever, please post and I'll let you know about feasibility.

Thanks! Pic of new model to come...


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## proFeign

http://www.fouronefive.com/randomimages/1.JPG



















Looks better in person. The little bubble inside is silicone lube that I need to squeeze out. The silicone lube (if there weren't a bubble in it) blends out any scratches inside and makes it look shinier on the inside. I need to find a better lube for this purpose but this stuff works OK and is thick enough that it shouldn't come out. Also the new shock absorber material is silicone tubing, not little foam pads, so that looks a little better too and probably holds it a tad firmer, but not enough that it should matter; it looks a little cleaner to me though.


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## Pumaman

Good to see you back, congrats
count me interested


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## proFeign

Let me know what you'd be interested in. I'm going to try to make them fast before I have to start making parts for other people!




Pumaman said:


> Good to see you back, congrats
> count me interested


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