In reply to 'UV light' by Laura Caradonna (topic 24 of Vol 2, Issue 3): I have used the Reskolux light you linked to extensively, and am not that fond of it. There are three reasons for this: 1. It's incredibly expensive. 2. It has an internal, non-user-replacable battery, which will eventually fail. 3. It has a mediocre UV output. Yes, it does have a fancy lens to evenly spread out the light, but that's its only strong point.
May I instead provide you with a superior alternative: the Tank007 UV-AA02. I am a furniture conservator and use a UV light often for looking at furniture finishes. I did a great deal of online research and tried out a few UV lights from colleagues as well. The reasons I chose the UV-AA02, and that I'm so happy with it now, are: 1. Very reasonable price, at a little over €100, but not too cheap. 2. Appears to be well built and feels very solid. 3. It uses two standard AA batteries! These are always available anywhere, should you run out of power while working on location for example, and they also exist in rechargable form if you prefer that. They're user replacable, so you'll never have to throw your light away because the battery has failed, nor do you need an odd type of charger for it. 4. Low output of visible violet and blue light, which can otherwise make the fluorescence more difficult to see and photograph. A lot of cheaper UV lights 'leak' more visible light and cast a blue light. A perfect UV source should not be visible to us at all. 5. Very high output of 365nm UV. This is by far the most imporant aspect and its strongest point. With fresh batteries you can use it with the lights on. This is not possible with the Reskolux, because it simply doesn't deliver enough UV to make bright enough fluorescence. You need to dim the light or go sit under a blanket with your object to properly see the fluorescence. Its output is much brighter than that of the Reskolux, and also far superior to the output of those small T5 blacklight fluorescent tubes. All in all the UV-AA02 delivers beautiful, colorful and bright fluorescence, especially in the dark, but also in lighter environments, much better than any other UV light I have tried, including the Reskolux. It's more of a spotlight beam with a dimmer surrounding beam, than an evenly spread floodlight such as the Reskolux, but this better focused beam makes it more useful in lighter conditions. Many cheap UV led lights claim to emit 365nm light, but I suspect many of them don't. This light does, I think. I haven't measured it, but the fluorescence looks identical to what you get when you use an array of large 'blacklight' fluorescent lights (which also emit 365nm). A lot of colleagues of mine, mostly paintings conservators, but also others, have now also bought this light and are very happy with it. About health and safety: I wear standard polycarbonate safety glasses when using it, which offer 100% UV protection up to 400nm. It's very easy to test whether something filters the 365nm properly: just put the filter between the light and a material of which you know it fluoresces. If you still see fluorescence, the filter does not work. Try this on your standard photography 'UV filters', and you'll see that 90% of those do not filter UV at all, not even the very expensive ones. Standard plastic safety glasses work very well though, as do plastic prescription glasses. I am in no way affiliated with the makers of this UV light, nor do I profit from this in any other way, but it is simply a great product at a good price, and I like to share this find with my colleagues here. Kind regards, Thomas Michgelsen Independent furniture conservator in Amsterdam ****** Unsubscribe by sending a message to [email protected] Archives through August 2016 at http://cool.conservation-us.org/byform/mailing-lists/cdl/ Archives from September 2016 onward at https://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
