Unlike many glow-in-the-dark compounds, these would glow all night long and would continue to glow for years on end. ![]() This causes, or at least used to cause, the numbers and hands to glow in the dark. This paint is quite likely made of a phosphorescent compound mixed with radium. Long story short, a well cleaned dial has zero chance of causing you any issue if you aren't taking the watch apart and handling the internals.Many vintage watches, especially military watches, have gold or whitish colored "paint" on the hands or on the numbers on the dial. ![]() An alpha particle can't even penetrate a sheet of paper. Generally, alpha emitters aren't dangerous at all unless you somehow swallow them or they get into your tissues or blood, then they become a problem. That gets into discussion on total radiation dose, and probability of negative effects like cancer. If a dial has been carefully cleaned, there shouldn't be enough radium left to cause you any concern. That determines the half-life of an isotope. As the number of atoms remaining available to decay decreases, fields decrease due to fewer decays happening in any given time period. The reason a larger sample (billions or trillions of atoms) constantly emits, is that radioactive decay happens at random times and you have lots of decays happening all the time. Once it emits a particle, it assumes a more stable form and radio emission stops. It happens once (generally, depending on the isotope, and it's decay path), and then that's it. Radiation isn't constantly emitted by a radionuclide. Well, a single atom only decays once, generally. Smoking is far far far more likely to kill your than that watch. You can’t inhale those when they’re stuck inside the watch behind glass, metal and the winding crown. I think the bit you’re misunderstanding is that the real danger is posed by physical particles. Even in the remote chance that minuscule quantities of lume were somehow knocked off those particles are long gone. Having been opened already doesn’t increase any risk. I service these things all the time and I just make sure to open them outside, use a blower to make sure the lume isn’t crumbling, then stick the dial in a bag till I’m finished servicing the movement itself. For an average 1940s watch that’s in good order there really isn’t any need to worry. To be frank, the only time I can remember hearing conversations about this kind of thing is with expensive pieces which the customer was willing to spend a lot of money on. Something that was easier when plenty of matching dials were freely available. If it was very clearly flaking off he’d advise them to replace the dial entirely. My grandfather would simply advise customers to not tamper with the lume. If you sent it to a professional they’d follow standard safety practices similar to those described- work outside, chuck everything away afterwards. Yes having it scraped and relumed will drastically reduce radioactivity, but it’ll cost you and it could end up destroying the dial. I would therefore recommend leaving it alone and just wearing it as is. As the watch is sealed this is extremely unlikely. ![]() So to recap- the major issue is having physical particles/dust enter your body. If you’re really that concerned you can perhaps get a watchmaker to install a 1mm lead plate inside/outside the back of the case…but I’ve never heard of anyone actually doing this and it would be complete overkill. The latter does not pass through watch materials or skin. Pre early-60s, R-226 was mostly used, post early-60s tritium was introduced. If you wore the watch strapped to your genitals 24 hours a day I’d be concerned. The exact same type of question is regularly asked in art forums about methylated spirit etc.Īs long as you don’t inhale lume particles you’re essentially fine. In the vast majority of cases he would simply advise leaving the dial alone. His only concern was that he never removed or repaired the stuff in an enclosed space, and that anything used in the process was either binned or thoroughly washed. Thousands upon thousands of them for over six decades. Long story short: my grandfather worked on radioactive lumed watches containing radium-226 etc all his life.
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