[time-nuts] beryllium oxide

[Mark Sims]

Three other places one may encounter beryllium are:

1)  Beryllium copper springs and contacts,  usually around 2-3% beryllium.  Not likely to cause a problem unless  you get your jollies grinding up springy metal and snorting the powder.

2)  Beryllium tools!  Tools (particularly screwdrivers and pliers) can be made out of pure beryllium metal.  They are not magnetic,  very strong,  very light.  They were used a lot in aerospace and military applications.  One thing that used to appear on the surplus market was an EOD toolkit used by bomb disposal techs.  Even had a beryllium hammer.  These were wonderful tools which you might just find when clearing out old uncle Bob's estate...

3)  Nuclear reactors and weapons.   Be careful when disassembling that surplus nuke you picked up on your last trip to eastern Europe...

Beryllium was originally called glucinium becuase it and its salts tasted very sweet.  In fact,   tasting used to be a diagnostic test for the presence of beryllium.
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