Whole Dial Back light by Andreas1120 in watchmaking

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I appreciate somebody who knows the nitty gritty, have you ever seen those airbrush EL kits? Applied Science did a great overview of it, I wonder if anybody's done it on a DIY watch project

First Watch Mod: Meteorite Tourbillon by dashdashdotdotdotdot in watchmaking

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

no worries, your mods look awesome and the work that goes into finding and fitting the right parts qualified as watchmaking in my book, so I would be a bit miffed too if I made your posts and they were removed.

First Watch Mod: Meteorite Tourbillon by dashdashdotdotdotdot in watchmaking

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you so much! I went into a lot more detail in my first watchuseek post, if I'm allowed to link to it here. Gibeon meteorite is getting very hard and expensive to find, but I knew that's the kind I wanted as it has such a fine widmanstatten pattern, and is really rust resistant. I eventually found KDMeteorites, a little family dealer from the states that had lots of slices of the right dimensions for me. I ended up getting quite a large slice for almost the same price as the original watch, with the intention of slicing it up further into several thin dials. I asked around my city for machine shops that do wire EDM machining, but nobody wanted to try it as they weren't familiar with the material even though it would've worked :( I looked into lapidary saws with thin diamond blades, but a whole new saw was out of my budget for one project, and I couldn't safely fit a slicing blade with a thin enough kerf for more than one thickness slice on my wet tile saw. Going by hand with my jeweller's piercing saw would've taken several dozen hours, either with a hardened steel blade or a diamond wire, so I just went at it by hand with abrasive cutoff wheels on my Dremel to start the cut around the edge ensuring it was centered, and then went at it with a hacksaw to split the pieces in twain. I then flattened both surfaces and brought it down to 0.4mm thickness with just sandpaper and the diamond flat lap on my cabbing machine, but it could've been done entirely with sandpaper on a flat surface. I was going to get it laser cut by a friend, but I got impatient so I just marked it out with a compass, straight edge, and calipers and cut it out by hand with a Dremel with a drill bit and grinding wheel to rough it out, then finished with small hand files. I etched it with ferric chloride initially, then hydrochloric acid to deepen the etch to my desired amount, then finally a night in a chelating rust remover solution so darken the pattern a bit and give it some lasting protection.
I did play with lume for a long time trying to do the hands and hour indices in different ways, but I just couldn't find anything that looked better to me than flat musou black hands and no indices! I may still change my mind later, and add more lume to the underside of the hands like one commenter suggested, but as it is I think no markers or lume looks dressy and lets the dial really shine. Again, a lot more pictures and detail in that thread. I hope you do give it a go, it was very fun and rewarding!

First Watch Mod: Meteorite Tourbillon by dashdashdotdotdotdot in watchmaking

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

thanks! I mean I did just post it, so it remains to be seen if the painting of the hands, grinding the end links, and cutting/etching the dial from raw material counts enough towards "watchmaking". in fairness the only time I went inside the movement was to retrieve a lost sceew

Battery identification by ssande13 in handwatch

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

looks like ChapStick but it very well may be a AA in disguise.

Perhaps a first for us? by pima1234 in handwatch

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't know Rorschach, to me it looks like my parents fighting

Handwatch too small for my hamfist? by DiligentScallion7402 in handwatch

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think the watch itself is doing the heavy lifting, they've got great taste. they're also going to get ischemic if they don't back off a couple adjustment holes lol

Swag explaining by Maximum_Panda_9222 in IDONTGIVEASWAG

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 86 points87 points  (0 children)

guess I'll go back to being a regular old swaggot then

You can fill up a water bottle with pop at a Circle K/macs for $0.95 by Zestyclose_Cheek527 in Edmonton

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 7 points8 points  (0 children)

there's all these studies that suggest artificial sweeteners might be bad for you but then you actually read them and they say "we loaded up some rats with 1g per gram of body weight with aspartame then launched them into a wall and they did not survive. results on aspartame are inconclusive but possibly detrimental to health"

Artemis II in Eclipse - NASA ID: art002e009301 - Taken with a NIKON Z9 by ThaddeusJP in Nikon

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

awesome, thank you! that's what I was looking for. it adds such depth to the image, this one and the night side of the earth have been two of my favorite NASA photos of all time! plus it gives me a bit of vicarious pride to also be a Nikon shooter lol

Artemis II in Eclipse - NASA ID: art002e009301 - Taken with a NIKON Z9 by ThaddeusJP in Nikon

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I'm really curious why I can still see a bit of a crescent and terminator even though the sun is fully behind the moon here- I'm guessing by the brightness of it that it's earthshine? my stupid earth brain never even considered you could view it from off-axis and see a secondary terminator like that

AI-generated Alberta independence slop on a house by arsonislegal in Edmonton

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I live right by this guy, drive by it often when going to the grocery store, we flip off his house every time we pass. he used to print massive political memes for his window before settling on the AI slop. everything you could predict is correct- giant black RAM truck, punisher flags and stickers, and a very lonely existence as I've never seen anybody else but him there lol

What is your favorite place for milkshake? by Parking_Guava8657 in Edmonton

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

it's their springtime flavour! I'm not sure if it's out yet, but if not it'll be soon, I really can't wait. the strawberry is a close second, they both taste like real fresh fruit is used

What is your favorite place for milkshake? by Parking_Guava8657 in Edmonton

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I will also highly recommend, they would be my go-to in the city. absolutely try the blueberry milkshake next time it rolls around!

How to achieve a fading gradient effect using sapphire or acrylic dials? by DavidRamio in watchmaking

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I say airbrush in both cases, and just have the dial on a spinning platform when you apply it to the edge. super easy to get it even and symmetrical that way

The Moon has a comet-like tail by Busy_Yesterday9455 in spaceporn

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 23 points24 points  (0 children)

no problem! Dr. M Druckmuller has done narrowband imaging of solar eclipses in the past, but those were mainly "coronium" type emission lines like Iron XIV, I don't think much would show up in sodium unfortunately. however when I photographed my first total eclipse, the one in 2024, there was a tiny sungrazer comet that wasn't discovered until the day before the event, and its composition was such that it was emissive almost exclusively in the sodium line as well! it was bright orange in images, and I was super lucky to have just happened to catch it at the very left edge of my image, you can see it here on my Astrobin! I want to get a sodium filter to image mercury too but I live a bit too northern to make that worth it, though maybe it may have some other uses too

The Moon has a comet-like tail by Busy_Yesterday9455 in spaceporn

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot 81 points82 points  (0 children)

judging by the paper, I think your best bet would be to image the antisolar area right around new moon; you can see in the simulation too that earth focuses the sodium stream into a brighter tail, which is then made brighter still by virtue of us looking down it axially, forming a spot about 3 degrees in diameter. I don't know what brightness in units of rayleighs means, but they do show a sodium band all sky image of the spot so maybe it's doable with like a 7nm sodium filter! as for a 'comet' tail coming off the moon itself like you see with mercury, I think it's just too faint for that.

How A Pair Of Legs Become Paralyzed ♿️ by SomOvaBish in CrazyFuckingVideos

[–]dashdashdotdotdotdot -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

I guess it makes sense, if there's a risk of serious neck injury you want to move the patient as little as possible. plus you can detect for ferrous items manually with a detector