Tuesday, November 19, 2013

The Properties And Uses Of Copper Screws

By Bonnie Contreras


Not a lot of people know this, but copper screws are the simplest form of linear actuator, a motor, in fact. Traditional electric or gasoline motors generate rotary motion, linear actuators take that circular motion and turn it into linear, or straight motion. When you turn the head of a screw clockwise or counterclockwise, it drives the shaft of the screw forward along its linear axis.

The shaft, or pointy end of a screw, has a helical thread, while the head is either flat or slightly rounded. In some cases, the external threads of a screw are made to fit into an internally threaded nut. The basic function of a screw once it has performed its motoring function is to hold things together.

A little-known use for a copper screw is as a contact screw in a tattoo machine. You can easily make these yourself in your garage or workshop because the metal is very soft. What you need is a length of thick wire, a die with the appropriate internal thread, a set of pliers, fine sandpaper that you get in a hobby shop, a vise and a small bottle of acidic gun bluing solution. The bluing solution, when used with iron metal, protects it from rust and corrosion. Here, it just makes your screw look pretty.

The soft, malleable reddish metal, roughly the same the color as an Irish Setter, has an atomic number of 29 and the chemical symbol, Cu. It readily conducts both heat and electricity. For this reason, it is used for the bottoms of sauce pans and frying pans and as the main constituent of electrical wiring. It is highly ductile, which makes it easy to shape in to whatever you want to make it.

In Roman times, Cu was mainly obtained from Cyprus, hence, it was called cyprium. Cyprium was eventually contracted to the word cuprum, which led to the chemical symbol, Cu. In the human body, it is necessary in small amounts. It sits in its cationic form in an enzyme called cytochrome. In molluscs and crustaceans, it forms part of the respiratory pigment, hemocyanin, which is blue. Humans use the iron-based pigment, hemoglobin.

Cuprum is mainly found in human muscle, liver and bone. Cupric compounds are bacteriocidal, i. E., they kill germs. This is why it is used in wood preservatives and in fungicides. It is also sometimes used as a liner for laboratory incubators used for tissue and cell culture.

A copper screw is used in a tattoo machine. They are pretty little machines that are very good for screwing into wood, particularly if it is likely to be exposed to the elements, where iron or steel would turn to rust. Cuprum is also used to coat steel. Sometimes zinc, nickel, brass or cadmium is used instead.

So, that is what pretty copper screws to. It can kill germs and look ornamental. As soft as it is, you have to choose carefully when to use it. They would be pretty terrible at holding sheets of metal together that are used in commercial airplanes.




About the Author:



No comments:

Post a Comment