Is Brass Safe?

Seriously?!?

This issue has been put to rest. Do your homework.

i've followed the issue more than average. and i think by following the issue, one is left with more questions and concerns than answers. i have an old zap that was not made with ROHS compliant brass so my concerns are probably double!

No, I dont think he is seriously serious. It would appear that he is serious about trying to restir some shit up around here again. MCL - You DO remember how your last visit here ended correct? Well, I do.

Please (Im asking you nicely) Please dont stir the pot. Come in here and have intelligent (and relevant) discussion if you would please.

I dont want to jump to conclusions and throw out the "T" word, but seriously dude... You know exactly what you are doing here. Im asking that you please dont.

Thank you for putting it so nicely AG.

To the topic, I do not believe their is any issue using the zap.

Additionally, wasn't their some drama or some kind of games going on with this guy in the past.

Yea, one can review his posts and see the reindeer games some people play. Nothing to see here but some crappy cheap ditch weed behavior on a forum hoping to stir up a want to be soap opera.

Beezleb said:

Additionally, wasn't their some drama or some kind of games going on with this guy in the past.

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Yup. Soon as I saw the screen name, I went uh oh. Here we go again.

To any newbies reading this thread, it is a good read, but.............ALL of these issues has been discussed here and there isn't anything to add without just rehashing old shit, so like others have said, even though some old, previously banned members come back from the dead, let's leave this dead horse of a thread to rest in piece.

i think i was one of the first to praise the zap here, i love the zap. i thought the concern was valid, i know its all been gone over already, i was just making a small comment on how it worried me when i use my zap and takes some of the enjoyment away.

but im not going to post about it anymore! thank you for holding your tongue and not lashing me super hard, though i dont know why some people are so aggressive in the first place!

*one last note: i was disappointed my "piece of art: myrtlezap" thread got locked, that was a good one and i wanted to post more pictures of my zap! and i found a perfect lighting for my zap where i can see the thick wisps of vapor clouds from the zap and it makes vapor for like 8 puffs-10 puffs or more sometimes its awesome

this is an interesting article about lead,

"LEAD AND ITS NATURAL DISTRIBUTION ON EARTH
Lead is the heaviest of the non-radioactive metals (atomic number 82; atomic weight 207) that naturally occur in substantial quantities in the earth's surface. Lead is present in all soils, rivers, lakes, and seawater. Despite its weight, lead is also in the air, a component of dust and of sea spray. Lead is present in the proportion of 16 parts per million (ppm) in igneous rocks, the most common ancient rock on the surface, and at an average of about 10 ppm in common soils that are far from sites of contamination; natural soils usually have less than 50 ppm of lead but are never lead free.

In controlled drinking water, the level of lead is currently limited in the U.S. to 0.015 ppm (0.01 in California), which is still slightly above the naturally occurring levels; that is, there is still contamination from human activities. The adult human body contains lead equivalent to about 2 ppm (range: 1.4-5.7 ppm) for the entire body weight, with about 90% of it concentrated in the mineralized portion of the body, the bones, at 20-40 ppm. Lead enters the body from the air during breathing, but most of it is taken in orally, where it is a component of food, beverages, drugs, supplements, and almost anything else that is ingested. A total daily lead exposure (inhaled and consumed lead) of 0.5 mg per day of lead appears normal in a relatively clean environment today. "
Lead Content of Soil, Plants, Foods, Air,
and Chinese Herb Formulas

by Subhuti Dharmananda, Ph.D., Director, Institute for Traditional Medicine, Portland, Oregon

Brass contains lead in small proportions, and shouldn't be focused concern as the lead atoms tend to be fixed within the micro structure of the alloy. The brass melting point compared with the vaporization temp suggests it is a safe for this use.

Hey Lithe, make a post in the vaporizer-specific thread about your vaporizer! Introduce yourself, put up some photos, make some customers!

Do you know about fluoridation - fluoridation of our water, Mandrake?

Peace On Earth, Purity Of Essence! Ripper was right about the fluoride though . . . It all comes from smoke stack scrubbers from phosphate plants and aluminum smelters.

t-dub

So, Lithe-Vapes, while I appreciate your re-opening this thread and letting us know that brass is safe, I question if this is the reason? Would this be your product (which is made with brass)?

http://www.amazon.com/Lithe-wooden-Portable-Herbal-Vaporizer/dp/B00578WYHC

I have gone over lost document,including answers from raw material suppliers, and found brass to be RoSH compliant if lead falls below 4%.

An statement from another thread gave some doubts. So wanted to look around, and share.

owin said:

Why use brass in the first place? If there are safer materials out there why not use them?

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Some people are incredibly cheap, even when it comes to their health. :/

My question is, WHY go brass? In what way, shape or form is it superior to stainless steel, or even aluminum? It can't be much less expensive to go brass given the small amount of it.

Would you happen to know the alloy number of the brass you are using?

maybe it's easier to work with?
my neighboor works for the city as mechanic and he once said stainless steel is hard to work with

The thing that makes brass easier to work with is it's lead content, which makes it softer and more pliable.

The less lead content in the brass, the harder it is.

I smoked out of a brass Proto-Pipe for years. I won't go into my health concerns regarding lead for THAT has already been beaten to death already, but another concern other than health is taste. Brass adds a funky taste that I would just as soon do without.

It's amazing how many times this thread gets re-animated, eh?

ok let bump it up for the zenpen project. the heating element which gonna endure multiple temp cycle so corrosive environment to me. do not know the specific alloy used. brass is never food grade to me in those specific conditions. i skipped the old statement that smoke is far worst than lead.

I think concerns towards ZenPen's brass are exaggerated, and I think they did a good job of putting into perspective why in the reply they made to you in their thread. The link they provided to their alloy shows that it can contain only trace amounts of lead.

We have to keep perspective in mind here. Yes, we are putting the vapor inside of us. But we also put water inside of us, no? Most developed countries still allow up to 8% lead in plumbing alloys, so shouldn't that be a much more severe concern than 0.2% in a vaporizer?

VaporBrothers made a great post about the perspective of concern in relation to heating elements in their dabbler thread:

vaporbrothers said:

...when something is insignificant but sounds bad and blows up: People are smart but often they don't have the time to learn perspective. For example, back when our vape's 30 Watt heater was made of metal, people were afraid of metal ions. There were a few ions coming out- not quite detectable, but they are there. The same people fire up their 1500W space heater, 3000W stove, and breathe the smell of metal year in year out. It was really hard to train people that huge difference within a sentence or two. that YES a metal heating element vaporizer exposes you to ions, and NO, you don't need to worry about a tiny heater while you gorge on ions all day. A lifetime of sucking on your vaporizer might very well be safer than spending a day in the same room as your space heater. Depends on the vaporizer though... we see horrible things going on in the vaporizers we take apart, but that should be in another thread.

Once we moved from metal to porcelainite (the mineral in our heater) the question became about silica... we did a load of testing and found nothing to worry about, even if you took a vapor hit that lasted the rest of your life. Keep in mind, the dust from the outdoors is swirling around your feet... Silica is 80% of the earth's crust... short of wearing a dust mask every day you might close the window and breathe the laser printer instead.

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Also, I'm not entirely sure corrosion will be an issue either. Heat does not have much of an effect on the electrochemical oxidation reaction that causes corrosion, rather prolonged exposure to the air or another oxidant. A vaporizer bowl is not generally sitting open for long periods of time, especially one that is designed to be capped and put in a pocket like the ZenPen.

here's a data point: i used to use Nichrome 60 as my heater coil (all i could find at first) and that stuff definitely had corrosion after a year of regular heat cycles. Then i switched to nichrome 80 and there is no corrosion after 3 years.

i have well water and plastic pipes. it's always a tradeoff, i agree.

As a teenager in the 1960's I worked in a chemical plant for 10 years mixing various chemicals. We'd dump 80 lb bags of pure, fine lead powder into 55 gallon drums with other chemicals and the lead powder would fly in the air all over the entire plant. Then as we mixed it with a huge propeller, it threw the lead powder all over us. We wore paint paper masks but, during the summer we'd sweat and the masks never fit right. Every 3 months a medical technician drew our blood to check for lead content. We never knew what the level of lead was in our blood but we did know when it was too high because we were taken out of the plant and placed on the loading dock for a couple of weeks until the level dropped back to normal. I am 73 years old and have no medical problems. I see my doctor every 3 months with a clean bill of health. Based on all of the above, I personally have no problem using brass. I've smoked reefer for 60 years and began vaping 2 years ago. I don't vape for medical reasons. I vape because I enjoy a nice long session without having to constantly light a match or Bic. Also it feels so good to suck in a nice long toke without scorching the back of my throat. Another plus is I use half as much reefer now... And I love the ritual itself.

There is lead in brass. Different percentages in different alloys. The softer the alloy the more lead in some cases.

I worked as a welder and other manufacturing processes. Had thevsickness from flame cutting galvanized materials a few times; breathed in so much welding fumes from welding aluminum the cough-up was white; wore cotton gloves that I rinsed out with toulenol when they were too oily; breathed in dust from sanding and grinding most metals and at 65 doing pretty good healthwise. Go figure.

"... - been chewin' on solder since I was seven and huffin' the resin is a treat. I figure'd this is the reason for my dag-burn pleasant disposition. Now get the fuck outta here!"