Make Your Own Glow Sticks

[lethearen]

I am not totally convinced that this really works... The video skips between the addition of the bleach and the amazing glow. He tilted the bottle forward so you couldn't clearly see the liquid, and the next time the liquid was visible it had turned yellow. Still, awesome video, and too tempting to resist trying this out (but not in a glass jar and not without safety goggles.)

I'd wager this is a hoax, similar to the "Mountain Dew glow sticks". Most likely they had a chemical light glow stick that they'd carefully leaked into the jar beforehand. The H2O2 provided the necessary oxidation to set the reaction in motion, and the other stuff were just red herrings.

The glow was entirely too perfectly "glow stick" green

[cavscout]

There were rumors in my younger years that wool-ite would glow white (like a white t-shirt does) under black lights. We would see people at dance clubs with stuff drawn on them with some kind of paint. When we asked what they had used they told us wool-ite. Never tried it myself and never verified it...for what that is worth.

[ForresterModern]

the process is call chemoluminescense----the generation a specific wavelength of light s part of a chemical reaction. We did this in college chemistry.

Regarding the Woolite and blacklights----most modern laundry detergents have "whiteners" and "brighteners", which actually are fluorescent compounds that make things look whiter under normal indoor or sunlight, but which fluoresce under blacklight. A good reason to never wear white to a disco where they have black lights. A similar phenomenon occurs with xrays and the cassettes the xray film is held in, which is what actually causes the "xray" image to form---xrays strike the cassette which fluoresces then the light given off exposes the film to make the xray image.

This now ends Mr Wizard moment.

[vmac3205]

I tried it. It didn't work, but I'm thinking I may have defective match heads.

[pdcorlis]

You might want to ask these guys about glow sticks...

http://www.pbs.org/kcet/wiredscience...low_stick.html

[Mike in Dayton]

There were rumors in my younger years that wool-ite would glow white (like a white t-shirt does) under black lights. We would see people at dance clubs with stuff drawn on them with some kind of paint. When we asked what they had used they told us wool-ite. Never tried it myself and never verified it...for what that is worth.

Under black light all sorts of stuff shows up....like dog pee. Take black light and walk around shining it on the carpet. If you have a dog you will know where Rover goes during the day when you are not at home.

[pdcorlis]

I don't know about dog pea but I do know tonic water glows under black light.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

[funlvnman]

I don't know about dog pea but I do know tonic water glows under black light.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

I'm all too familliar with dog pee. Using the black lite makes you wonder about your skills as a dog owner. But, OxyClean to the rescue fixes everything.

[TexasMcGregor]

I don't know about dog pea but I do know tonic water glows under black light.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

Not sure, but I think it's the quinine in the tonic water that glows.

[Makeitstop]

Under black light all sorts of stuff shows up....like dog pee. Take black light and walk around shining it on the carpet. If you have a dog you will know where Rover goes during the day when you are not at home.

This summer I was at a camp which had only one mens room that was usable (honestly, I would have been more comfortable using the bushes than the other bathrooms) but unfortunately, the lights were on a timer and obviously the motion sensor couldn't see through the stalls. The good news is that I was carrying a flashlight. The bad news is that the flashlight was ultraviolet. You can't unsee the things I've seen. *shudder*