Light for UV-hardening resin?

[John K Jordan]

Anyone know a good source for a high quality UV light source to use with UV-hardening resins? I don't want a cheap one, I prefer one like the dentist uses but I'd prefer not to spend $300.

I want to do some reconstructive dental work on a rooster. Somehow the tip of his lower beak has broken making it impossible to pick up individual bits of food such as scratch feed spread on the ground or crawling insects. I feed him with a dish with a deep enough layer of feed into which he can plunge his beak.

I'd like to try building up his lower beak to restore the normal function. Besides, the UV-hardening resins and glues should be useful for a variety of other things.

JKJ

[Frank Pratt]

That's an unusual project. I've seen lots of ads for UV cured adhesives lately, but have no experience. You gonna post a build thread for this?

[Mark Daily]

I just saw this recently. Don’t know anything about it but it was invented by a dentist and is available on Amazon.

https://getbondic.io/offer-01/

There are a variety of LED black lights available but I don’t know what wavelength is best for curing resin- any idea?

I bought this one for locating pet urine and scorpions and it is fantastic:

Alonefire SV003 10W 365nm UV Flashlight Portable Rechargeable Blacklight Flashlight Scorpion for Pet Urine Detector Mineral with Aluminum Case, Charger, 18650 Battery Included https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07SWW5FHB..._SqAoEb5C3GC2T

[John K Jordan]

There are a variety of LED black lights available but I don’t know what wavelength is best for curing resin- any idea?

From one article I read the 365nm wavelength is too short for many UV hardening epoxies and resins today since it won't penetrate sufficiently. Some of the expensive lights I've looked at were well over 400 and less than 500nm. another issue is power, preferably concentrated in a small area.

I saw the Bondic but wondered if it was too cheap to be any good although the reviews are positive and it's not much of an investment risk. I looked at this one too: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0755C9H82

I'm still in the research phase. Repairing the beak will be major stress for the bird so I want to find the right resin and all the first time. (So far my bird doctoring has been successful 4 out of 5 times, three foot injuries and two hawk attacks. One was simply injured too badly to heal.

BTW, I have several good 365nm lights I use for wood ID, poultry egg freshness check, educating kids, and other things. I've found some bad cheap ones and one that were quite good, but when I reordered it I got something that was not useful, closer to 400nm I think. This Nitecore is my current favorite: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IZTTI5G The Eagle Tac is my second favorite: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014AYMBMQ

JKJ

[Roger Feeley]

My dad would have been totally on board with the rooster thing. He was a dentist and loved weird projects like this.

Dentists are a pretty cool bunch. You could ask around.

[Frank Pratt]

Is there such a thing as a rooster tranquilizer? Maybe hotbox him with a little reefer first. Lessening his stress would be much easier on both of you.

[Tom M King]

You can find them used, or cheap from China, on ebay.

[Tony Zona]

John,

I’d love to have one of those lights you cited.

What would I use it for?

If the cool kids have them, they must be good.

[John K Jordan]

Is there such a thing as a rooster tranquilizer? Maybe hotbox him with a little reefer first. Lessening his stress would be much easier on both of you.

We use something called Rescue Remedy when shearing llamas to calm them. Three drops from an eyedropper for a llama.
If you hold a chicken upside down by the legs it seems to go to sleep in a few seconds. But I have no idea what a long time inversion would do to it. For peacocks I put my hand or a cloth over their eyes, or a little cloth bag like a hood for a bird of prey. It seems to help calm a big bird if I wrap it's wings close to the body with a towel and keep a grip on it's legs. No struggles that way, and man can those things inflict injury if they are flapping and clawing!!

Fortunately, I have multiple vet resources for advice.

JKJ

[John K Jordan]

John,
I’d love to have one of those lights you cited.
What would I use it for?

I use mine to verify certain types of wood. For example, look at what 365nm light does to Redheart and Black Locust:

UV_3_redheart_locust.jpg

The uv light will easily distinguish black locust from some lookalikes such as mulberry and osage orange. Other woods fluoresce too, such as afzalia.
This article may be interesting: https://www.wood-database.com/wood-a...dentification/
The fluorescence doesn't take the place of end grain examination for wood ID but is useful at times.

Eggs: While walking through the woods near my barn one night with a UV light (some of the things that fluoresce are incredible) noticed something bright red under some brush. Turned out to be a hidden guinea's nest. Some eggs were bright red and some were paler, some barely glowed. With further investigation I found that the freshest eggs from chickens, guineas, and peacocks all did this. When robbing a nest to incubate the eggs I use it to leave some of the oldest eggs - if you take all the eggs the birds will quit laying and find another hidden spot.

The UV light is entertaining to shine around the shop, house, barn, and the woods. Great experience for kids.
You can spot these crawlies from 25' away since they glow brilliant green: https://bugguide.net/node/view/1000797/bgimage

The light Mark referenced (Alonefire) is a lot cheaper and should be fine. It uses readily a available battery which should last a LONG time. I'm going to order one to see and if it's good give it to a friend. The Nitecore is handy since it not only has UV but red, green, blue, and white lights. However, it's fairly large and doesn't carry as well in the pocket.

JKJ

[Bruce Wrenn]

Having debeaked (shortened) THOUSANDS of chickens as a teenager, could you just shorten the upper potion of his beak? We debeaked and vaccinated a house full in one night. Typical house contained 5-7 thousand broilers, with two of us debeaking. That meant by morning each had handled 2500 -3500 chickens. Rest assured we didn't stop at KFC on the way home! You could shorten his upper beak using a soldiering iron. Let me warn you it smells just like burning hair. A pair of clippers for dogs nails would also probably work.

[Tom M King]

Search on ebay for "caulk the max curing light".

[John K Jordan]

Having debeaked (shortened) THOUSANDS of chickens as a teenager, could you just shorten the upper potion of his beak? We debeaked and vaccinated a house full in one night. Typical house contained 5-7 thousand broilers, with two of us debeaking. That meant by morning each had handled 2500 -3500 chickens. Rest assured we didn't stop at KFC on the way home! You could shorten his upper beak using a soldiering iron. Let me warn you it smells just like burning hair. A pair of clippers for dogs nails would also probably work.

Wow, I never thought of that, never even heard of it. You are a genius! Sounds like it's like dehorning a goat - same smell but accompanied by a lot of little goat screaming. They were calmer for the castrations...

The beak-ectomy would be a LOT easier and cheaper. (But now I really want that resin curing capability!)

The big question: How much beak did you or is it possible to take off safely? I'll have to catch the bird and get some pictures and measurements. I'll also look around the area for someone with experience.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Hens were debeaked to stop them from pecking one another till they drew blood, then it was over for bloody hen!

[John K Jordan]

Hens were debeaked to stop them from pecking one another till they drew blood, then it was over for bloody hen!

Do you remember how much of the beak you removed. Was cauterizing needed to stop bleeding? (I have zero knowledge of beak anatomy.)