Newsgroups: rec.arts.bodyart
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 13:58:30 -0500 
From: "Alan S. Ferrency" <af1x+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: should niobium rings fade?
	<1992Nov12.224042.25663@nevada.edu>

>"Alan S. Ferrency" <af1x+@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>>I colored my own rings, so I have a little bit of experience (although
>>not much) with how the colors go through.
>
>Please describe the coloring process.  I have a fading
>magenta niobium ring that I'd like to re-colorize.

Well... here's what I did...
I made myself a power supply because I didn't happen to have one here. 
The one I made isn't very good quality, but it does work.  It goes from
maybe 0 to 80 or 90 vdc (totally unrectified).
Anyway, you need a power supply.  You also need some water and some TSP-
trisodium phosphate.  It's sold as a cleaning supply, probably at
hardware stores.  It's also used in making tie-dyed t-shirts or other
dyed cloths.
Anyway, I never really bothered finding out exactly how much TSP to put
in the water, I just put some in and it was enough.
Since I made the rings myself, I polished and cleaned them myself first.
 If your rings are scratched or anything, polish them before you color
them.  Then wash them with soap or something to take the oil off (from
your skin).
Next, attach the ring to the positive (I _think_... this is all off the
top of my head...) end of the power supply (which is off, of course). 
Put the negative end in the TSP solution, and the part of the ring which
needs to be recolored into the TSP solution as well.
Then turn the power on, low voltage, and then increase it until your
ring is the right color.  Basically what happens is, by passing the
electricity through the solution, a thin layer of niobium oxide is
deposited on the surface of the ring.  After a while, that layer gets so
thick that the electricity you're pumping in can't go through it (it's
an insulator).  That's why changing the voltage changes the thickness of
the layer.  The thickness of the layer determines what color the metal
looks like.

A few warnings: don't let the ring touch both electrodes, or don't let
the electrodes touch each other.  I've totally destroyed a 14ga niobium
ring doing that.  You don't touch the metal things either cuz you might
get shocked.  Don't let the + end get in the water, only let the ring go
in.  If you do, it won't react and you might overload the power supply. 
This means you really can't color the whole ring at the same time, you
have to do it in sections.  If you want to make one section a different
color, that's fine.  You can get some neat rainbow effects...
The color of the ring is a little bit different when the ring is under
water or wet compared to when it's dry.  
Once you go too far, past the color you want, you can't go back unless
you polish the color off and start over, so be careful.  I bought a
bunch of niobium wire and made my own rings, so I had spare wire and
rings to practice on.  It's not a bad idea to practice a bit before you
ruin the real thing...

I hope I'm not being too wordy for the simplicity of the procedure... I
guess I just have no idea what kind of person I'm talking to.  There's a
big difference between "I invented electrolysis" and "what's a power
supply?"

Good luck.  If you have any questions, feel free to ask.
Also: I'm not saying how it _should_ be done, I'm describing how I did
it  (and it worked for me... :)

-me
Newsgroups: rec.arts.bodyart