Contact Juggling

Date: 05-23-02 02:50

I agree with you that this is caused by an additive, but the glow is from a catalizing agent.

***START RANT HERE***

You can use this agents that make plastic glow unintentionally with Acrylic, PolyCarb, Acetate, PETG (sp?) and several other plastics. It does not show that the plastic is polycarb. The plastic can be many things besides polycarb and still react the same way under UV.

This is a pet peeve of mine. Somehow everything that glows like this is Polycarb. This is not true. You can not tell from the glow if something is Polycarbonate.

There are several reasons you probably would not want polycarb for a contact juggling ball, but softness is not one of them.

There are also several agents for use in plastics that make the plastic glow like this. I know the complete details of only two of them, but I am aware that there are at least 5 agents that will react like this. According to the paperwork I do have, not all of them weaken the plastic. They each do different things, but they all cause the plastic to react under UV.

Also it is not necessassarly a cheaping factor or a not "good" factor. One additive acts as a release to make the plastic work more easily, Most of the stuff that makes the plastic glow is to protect the plastic from Photo Degrading (it reflects UV instead of absorbing it so it glows, it prevents the plastic from turning yellow and brittle in the sun.). Several are combined products. Materials wize they all cost more than the basic plastic ... which also has additives in it. Actually I am not sure you can get raw material without some sort of additives in it any more. Everything is so specialized. Most acrylic today is dishwasher and microwave safe thanks to an standard additive that I don't think you can even get the plastic without :) not that I would put an acrylic ball in a microwave or a dishwasher.

Hmmmm.. Thats not true. Coming to think of it I have put one in a microwave ... but I'm not sure I would reccomend it.

Let me stress that this is mostly just a personal pet peeve about semantics. You can't judge the plastic by the glow. The glow does not make it or does not ... not make it polycarb.

***END RANT***

On other fronts, I have an idea about an internally lit acrylic ball. Prototypes are about 6 weeks away. I might have something really cool for CJC2002. Thanks to Robin to kick me in the but to start working on this project again. I'm have some limited success, so I am hopefull that this will actually work in production.

-GReg

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