Discharge Tubes at University of Pittsburgh


Hello Lightning Tamers!

I totally forgot to make a post a few weeks ago about my visit with Mrs. Lori Neu, the Scientific Glassblower at University of Pittsburgh. Lori has been a great host to many of my quesitions regarding scientific glass blowing and creating a secure vacuum, and her consulation when it comes to maintaining the manifold I use to vacuum and fill plasma and neon vessels.  As it’s been a while since we last chat, with my new job and her travels to recent Amercian Scientific Glass Symposium, and vacations, We got togetherto catch up on things over coffee and donuts.

She introduced me to her friend and coworker, Josh Jones, Director of Chemisty Stockrooms at University of Pittsburgh, who showed me some of the discharge tubes while briefly explaining about spectra emission. I took some video, and although the audio was crap, It made a nice little music video of the experience. 
When testing the chlorine tube, one of which was damaged, the Tesla coil Lori used produced enough High Frequency electric to mess with my phone, though no damage it made my flash turn on in the video and messed with on screen functions. Kind a cool, huh?

Oh and lastly, I got to take with me the broken discharge tube, which had a leak and is already empty and at atmosphere. 
I wonder what I should do, salvage it for it’s electrodes, or fill it with neon?

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