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About 25 years ago I found a small light strip at a surplus shop which appeared to contain NE-2 neon bulbs, but they light green. The glass is clear so it is not a fluorescence effect or something. I have never seen anything like them anywhere else. They began to flicker and degrade much more quickly than NE-2s, so eventually I threw it away. Any idea what they are, or what gas they use? I would like to find more, but it would be like finding Nixie digits.

  • Per Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_lamp#Colour, neon lamps can be made mixed with Krypton to give a green glow, without phosphors. I believe I've seen lamps similar to what you've seen, but it's been a long time. – DoxyLover Oct 17 '14 at 19:40

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I`ve seen green neons however they had a violet discharge and used a phosphor (white when off) to create a dim green glow. The ends of the tube were clear, but they only allowed the violet discharge to show, the green light was from the phosphor. They were not very exciting, certainly not compared to a 10mW DPSS green laser module. You could go in search of magic eye tubes.

Okay, they still seem to be available, at least from some sources. These ones don`t look quite as the Japanese ones I remember (but it was a very long time ago).

http://www.allspectrum.com/store/product_thumb.php?img=images/lamp-green2.jpg&w=85&h=80

Spehro Pefhany
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  • Wow. If they were widely available, and still are, I wonder why I have never seen them used in a product? –  Oct 17 '14 at 11:54
  • @nocomprende Probably because you have not seen the products they were used in- which were few- industrial products are the ones I've seen. The performance was rather underwhelming. Still available these days just means someone found a dusty box of them for next to nothing and is selling them off. Check out all the ex-Soviet parts that are still available (that's almost a generation ago). – Spehro Pefhany Oct 17 '14 at 12:03
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    Da, Pefhanovic. Hev many tubes, good ez new. Steel in box ven fell off truck on vay to Novosibirsk. Eez good. Send money, vee ship soon. – Olin Lathrop Oct 17 '14 at 13:22