AMRAD at Hamvention

[Phil]

Absolutely right. You guys were sensibly stockpiling it until your good President Obama sold it off to pay some bills.

It is somewhat renewable - all helium on planet Earth arises as a result of alpha particle emissions, so it is being replaced - it's just that we can't do anything to influence the rate of production, and it's not that fast.

Bottled hydrogen is a rather better option, in spite of its flammability. In the pioneering days of ballooning, those intrepid folks generated their hydrogen at the airfield with ingots of magnesium and barrels of sulphuric acid. More pioneering ballonists died on the ground generating hydrogen than ever fell out of the sky.

Okay, something to discuss at Skip's.

Phil M1GWZ




On 11 May 2012, at 21:32, Frank Eliot wrote:

> Helium is in very short supply, and is not renewable. When it is gone, it is gone. It should never be used for party balloons or larger. H is more buoyant and doesn't leak through rubber rapidly as does He. One just has to be careful with it.
> 
> Frank, W3WAG
> 
> On May 11, 2012, at 3:46 06PM, Phil wrote:
> 

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