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Mercury Wetted Relays

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Juergen Knoop

Juergen Knoop

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Joined 2007
#1
dived into my parts bin and found something. I don't know, if the large relay is a mercury wetted one too. Those beauties will go for the best offer. Paypal accepted. Please contact me per pm.
Regards
 

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#5
There could be two reasons for the lacking mass orders.
a) Since some years it's 'hip' to reject mercury.
b) They are old and mercury does vaporize in normal room conditions. Slowly, but it does. Are you sure that the construction is so perfectly sealed that the contacts are still Hg-wetted after ...- after how many years?
 
#7
ChocoHolic said:
b) They are old and mercury does vaporize in normal room conditions. Slowly, but it does. Are you sure that the construction is so perfectly sealed that the contacts are still Hg-wetted after ...- after how many years?
Click to expand...

Unless they've been dropped and the glass envelopes cracked, there is no way for the mercury to evaporate. The mercury is sealed in completely airtight glass, much like a vacuum tube.

I see these things are still made & sold, but at $40 each, they are not going to be everybody's first choice for an audio switch (that's $80 for a stereo switch, multiply that by the number of inputs you want and it's an expensive pre-amp).

Since I have them already, I think it will be an interesting experiment in going totally overboard!
 
#8
Also high grade components are designed for a certain life time. That's why I am asking for the age.
If they are designed like reed relays with a perfectly sealed glas tube, then I could easily imagine that they are not degrading even after decades.

You could offer a technical course with detailed informations about these relays. Many people here are technical enthusiasts and might start to become interested in these parts.
 
#9
Steerpike said:
Unless they've been dropped and the glass envelopes cracked, there is no way for the mercury to evaporate. The mercury is sealed in completely airtight glass, much like a vacuum tube.
Click to expand...

...seeing this after sending my last post...
If this construction is ensured, I would expect extremly long life time.
Furtheron I would guess a low risk.
May be comparable to the low risk of a fluorescent tube?
 
#11
I could be interested, however I would like to know the coil resistance and voltage on and dropout voltage. Or a link to a datasheet if you can find one.

Its very hard to damage this type of relay and they last almost forever. The biggest challenge is to mount them as per the arrow. That makes them a hard retrofit.
 
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