Is the Lume Still Working on Your Vintage Watch?

micampe · May 24, 2016

Radium here. This is not how it looks in real life, this is a long exposure taken in a very dim environment after charging it with a strong light source. In real life it glows faintly but visibly for a few seconds.

I haven't measured it with a Geiger counter yet but it looks original to me.

Deafboy · May 24, 2016

micampe
Radium here. This is not how it looks in real life, this is a long exposure taken in a very dim environment after charging it with a strong light source. In real life it glows faintly but visibly for a few seconds.

Does it glow like this during a long exposure even without charging it? If the phosphor is good enough to emit light, as evidenced by your picture, then you would think the radium would excite it (though at very low level).

Deafboy · May 24, 2016

I have a 1988 Seamaster Titane with luminous hands and hour markers with, I assume, tritium exciter material. The is no perceivable light emission as is. There is a dim glow when I excite it an external light source but not enough to be useful in any way. I'm going to try a long camera exposure like micampe.

micampe · May 24, 2016

Deafboy
Does it glow like this during a long exposure even without charging it? If the phosphor is good enough to emit light, as evidenced by your picture, then you would think the radium would excite it (though at very low level).

Good observation. No, it does not glow without charging it. I guess we'll see what the Geiger counter says.

Mad Dog · Aug 26, 2016

kingsrider
...Thoughts and pictures?

The lume is dead regarding my 30 year old Seiko 6309-7049 (left)...👎

Good thing I brought my Seiko SRP777K1 (right) as a backup...👍

Foo2rama · Aug 27, 2016

My 1968 Seiko Navigatortimer still glows strong, it's freaky. From my research there are other examples that still do.

Ive hid it from the forum so far it's a heck of an eBay gamble that I've not yet shared.