Talk:Mercury-in-glass thermometer

Accuracy

There is no mention of how accurate mercury thermometers are compared to alternatives, seems relevant. 58.168.96.165 (talk) 07:39, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

With

With reference to: "When Celsius decided to use his own temperature scale, he chose to set the boiling point of pure water at 100 °C (212 °F) and the freezing point at 0 °C (32 °F). One year later Frenchman Jean Pierre Cristin proposed an inverted version of the scale with the freezing point at 0 °C (32 °F) and the boiling point at 100 °C (212 °F). He named it Centigrade [1]."

• This doesn't make sense. Both describe boiling at 100, freezing at 0. But the text says that Cristin's version is inverted. Which is correct?

Campaign against mercury thermometers

There is a campaign against mercury thermometers, which claims mercury is "unsafe" even when used in oral thermometers for medical purposes. What is Wikipedia's take on this? Do we endorse their view, or remain neutral? --Uncle Ed 17:20, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

WikiPedia has a Neutral Point of View policy (NPOV). In my opinion, if the mercury stays in the thermometer, it can't do much harm, but the potential for breakage exists, and mercury boils at room temperature, fumes get inhaled, etc. The porosity of glass is another issue, and I have not examined that. Intersofia 02:42, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

NPOV rules! Wikipedia has articles about land mines and rape and lots of religions. We say what they are, not if they are good or bad. It may be appropriate to have a factual section on the NIH or other campaigns to reduce the use of mercury thermometers. Chemical Engineer (talk) 17:31, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

I've heard that the EU has banned mercury thermometers. This is unconfirmed data, and I was hoping to learn some more about that in this article. Anybody know anything for sure? Mátyás (talk) 09:47, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Fond sources: [1] for the EU ban and [2] for the US ban. There are a lot of sources out there, this data could really go into the article. I, unfortunately, haven't the time, so if someone would write it up, that would be just great. Mátyás (talk) 13:05, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Poison or hazard

Cut from article:

mercury is highly and permanently toxic to the nervous system and

Due to the possibility of mercury poisoning

What does this have to do with mercury thermometers? Has anyone been poisoned by such a small amount? Or is it more that doctors are law-abiding and will comply with a ban?

In other words, is the ban-mercury campaign starting with the least hazard but easiest group to get compliance from? Or are mercury thermometers really the biggest source of poison hazard?

What about science class, where they used to let you hold a big drop of mercury in your palm? How much hazard is there from 5 minutes of class play? Mostly from the fumes, right? Well how much hazard? I read all three ref's on my talk page and they were not specific. Yes, the ban is definitely in effect; but, no, it doesn't say how much danger there is from a broken mercury thermometer. --Uncle Ed 01:55, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Need a source that indicates countries have banned. And yeah we all played with it in science class. I lost the one link that indicated that the hazard would be greater based on room size and lack of air exchange. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 16:57, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

re:mercury, vaccines, and autism--i've tagged for cite. please source or delete--it sounds like nonsense to me. Adavies42 22:41, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the sentence as it has nothing to do with thermometers. Plus the AAP says there is no link]. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 23:39, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

The acute health risk from a mercury thermometer comes from swallowing or injection. Breaking an oral thermometer will relase mercury into the stomach leading to diahorrea but not usually long-term illness. The classic laboratory thermometer accident occurred when someone was forcing on through a cork or rubber bung: the glass broke and they rammed broken glass and mercury into their hand or forearm. Even from the glass, this could be a very nasty injury, and health monitoring was required until body mercury levels subsided.

The chronic risk comes from mercury vapour from broken thermometers or manometers since (despite what anyone tells you about zinc or sulfur) you will never pick up or render harmful all the drops which spread around. Many older laboratories and some schools had unacceptable levels of mercury vapour. I have seen documents relating to a laboratory technician who had to retire early due to ill-health from mercury vapour in his lab - his writing became shakier over the years. Pregnant women and their unborn children may be at greater risk.

I say don't panic, but let us not use mercury thermometers or manometers since there are better instruments available for measuring temperature and pressure. Chemical Engineer (talk) 17:45, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Isaac Vs Jessica

I have just chatted to my daughter about replacing Isaac Newton's Name with her own. I am reasonably sure it won't happen again. I'll leave things as they are so that I don't stuff things up anymore —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.173.29.23 (talk • contribs)

Thanks William M. Connolley 08:25, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

More on the technology of memory (or medical) mercury thermometers

The main article on mercury thermometers mentions that the space above the column of mercury in the capillary tube may be filled either with nitrogen or with "vacuum" (mercury vapor at equilibrium with liquid mercury).

In the discussion of the memory thermometer, or the medical thermometer (actually two separate Wikipedia articles, I think) there is a mention and a photograph of the mercury column separating just at or below a restriction in the capillary tube when the temperature falls, thus retaining the position of the mercury in the tube above the restriction.

I don't have reference to any authority, but I believe that for this principle to work, the space above the mercury column in these memory thermometers must necessarily be of the "vacuum" variety. In that way, the mercury is on the verge of turning from liquid to vapor everywhere, and even just a little resistance to flow (in the "restriction") is sufficient to cause this vaporization to happen exactly where the designer wants it to happen.

These instruments really are remarkable feats. How did the manufacturers get such consistency of dimenstions for the three (or four) different zones of the assembled glass tube? How did they introduce exactly the right amount of mercury? How did they seal the tube without overheating the mercury and making the whole thing explode? And they did all this with no computers and no lasers!

Jay.sinnett (talk) 00:31, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

The oceanographic (ballistic) thermometer needs to be mentioned. As at 2016, they are only manufactured in Japan. They are attached to MBT cables (or CTD instruments) and lowered to a particular depth. The thermometer is upside down at the time of firing. Upon firing the instrument rotates on a pivot to the upright position. The mercury column breaks at a reproducible point that it entirely governed by temperature. The recorded temp is reproducible to +-0.004 degree C. The temp reading is locked and the instrument may be retrieved and the deep water temp calculated. These days, such thermometers are only used only to check the functioning of electronic thermocouples that measure to better than 0.001C. If it is required for temps to be measured at the same instant, an array of ballistic thermos are attache to an MBT cable, and a lead drop or messenger triggers the thermos in a matter of 1 or 2 minutes.210.185.78.76 (talk) 02:12, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

Claim or Discovery?

Celsius claimed that the level of the mercury in boiling water is proportional to the height of the barometer.

The article doesn't explain the point of Celsius' claim of proportionality, so why include this? Also, if it was a "claim," don't we know by now whether he was right, and if so, isn't really a discovery or deduction? Ileanadu (talk) 13:02, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Image

The image of the wall thermometer is clearly an alcohol type thermometer and is not suitable for this article.Lumos3 (talk) 11:38, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

An earth material

Under the heading "History" in the main article, we are told: "At the moment that he removed the thermometer from the vapour, the mercury (an earth material) level climbed slightly". The words in parentheses are undoubtedly true, but I fail to see how they are relevant here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.192.231.208 (talk) 13:22, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Phasing out

As of now there is quite a long section with great detail on exactly how mercury thermometers are being phased out in different countries. Some text on one country:

"By the Philippines Department of Health’s Administrative Order 2008-0221, all mercury equipment from hospitals, including mercury-in-glass thermometers, will be phased out in the Philippines by September 28, 2010. Even before the order was released, 50 hospitals have already banned mercury from their establishments. Among these fifty hospitals, the Philippine Heart Center was the first one to do so. San Juan de Dios Hospital, Philippine Children’s Medical Center, San Lazaro Hospital, Ospital ng Muntinlupa, Lung Center of the Philippines, the National Kidney and Transplant Institute, Manila Adventist Medical Center and Las Piñas Hospital also made steps to ban the toxic chemical. The country was the first one to make a step to ban mercury from its health care system in Southeast Asia."

This is far too much detail; if a similar section is added for each country the article will become ridiculous. I deleted this, replacing it by text simply listing, countries, with references, but this has been objected to and reverted.

Does anybody have any opinions on whether this detail should be retained and added to as more countries are added, or dropped? In the meantime I have added an alphabetical subsection "List of countries with regulations on mercury thermometers".

Pol098 (talk) 00:37, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

The phase-out is relevant, as it shows a steady decline in the usage of mercury-in-glass thermometers. Country-specific details of the phase-out are relevant, as they vary dramatically from one country to the other. If the data is too much to include here, it can always be branched into a new article. Such thermometers are much used by the general populace, and people will want to know what is going on, so it only makes sense that we include the data here.--... there's more than what can be linked. 08:25, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

Map with coloured countries.

No comment about the countries coloured in black ? What is this colour for ?

--AXRL (talk) 17:21, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

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"to this day"

The application of mercury (1714) and Fahrenheit scale (1724) for liquid-in-glass thermometers ushered in a new era of accuracy and precision in thermometry, and is still to this day (as of 1966) regarded as one of the most accurate thermometers available.[1]

Should this be updated? I'm not sure that citing a book from 1966 can tell us about the state of the art.

Sanyides (talk) 14:16, 20 April 2020 (UTC)