Reply With Quotedepends upon the hands. Both methods have been and still are being used.Originally Posted by rfrazier
Sorry if this seems a silly question. Is the luminous paint on watch hands painted onto a surface? Or is there a gap in the middle of watch hands, with the luminous paint adhering to the edges of the gap and traversing the gap? Or what?
Best wishes,
Bob
depends upon the hands. Both methods have been and still are being used.
I don't know, to be honest. On some watches, the dial is also illuminated under the hand when it glows - which suggests that it is dangling in the middle. On the other hand, it might just be that the entire hand is dipped in lume. :P Good question though.
Ming
On most older watches (those with decrepit lume) that I have seen, the hands are skeletons with the lume only sticking to the edges of the hands.
Why this is so, I have no idea. A theory might be that since luminosity is dependent on the thickness of the lume, skeleton hands may be a way to use bigger blobs of lume and thereby enhance the lume effect.
Just a wild-ass guess.
Cheers,
Martin ("Crusader")
Where the hands are skeleton hands, the lume is usually applied as a paste: where the hand is not pierced, it is usually applied as a liquid "paint".
Eddie
Whole chunks of my life come under the heading "it seemed like a good idea at the time".
I have a Seiko 5 which definitely uses the "skeleton" approach. The hour hand is quite wide and the lume is slightly translucent - I can just about see through it as it moves over the date window.
I'll try some shots when I have some time.
Steve.
A bit late, I know, but here's my pic of the lume on my Seiko 5:
If you look closely, you can just see how the lume is thinner (ie less luminescent) towards the centre of the hour hand.
Steve.
That suggests some sort of meniscus at work (or poor hand construction) = lume suspended inside hand.
I was thinking though, should white paint be applied to areas to be lumed before the lume goes on for maximum reflectivity and brightness?
Ming
Posting Permissions
