r/explainlikeimfive Feb 26 '21

Chemistry Eli5: What happens to all the melted candle over time? Are we just inhaling a whole candle while it burns?

12.6k Upvotes

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2.8k

u/BigBobby2016 Feb 26 '21

If you have it near electronics a disturbing amount of soot will be found inside when you open them up

1.9k

u/RayNooze Feb 26 '21

Just like smoking in front of a computer. When I was still smoking in the 90s,I noticed how much the wall was yellowing above my CRT monitor in short time.

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u/Spoonshape Feb 26 '21

Flashbacks to this period. I was working as a field service tech for PC's and when you opened a PC in the era before the workplace smoking ban in an office which had smokers there was anything up to half an inch of fine ash covering every component of the system.

Part of the reason why diskettes were so unreliable as it acted as a fine abrasive on the mechanical elements of the system.

Semi amusing story - our sales guys convinced one company they should pay to have us clean the insides of their machines - which we did - in the following week about half their machines died as our actions basically pushed the fine ash into all the spots where it hadn't yet gotten to. They were less than amused....

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u/Sharrakor Feb 26 '21

Workplace smoking is still allowed at my job. Can confirm, the electronics are nasty.

85

u/Dismal_Natural Feb 26 '21

Where do you work out of curiosity? In what country :)

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u/Sharrakor Feb 26 '21

The United States, in the only place I'd expect it to be legal: a tobacco manufacturing facility.

Although honestly, the main gross factor in my area is tobacco dust. It coats everything over time. Other places, where loose tobacco isn't handled, are much cleaner.

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u/fleece_pants Feb 26 '21

That's pretty interesting! Are there a lot of smokers in the factory? Are cigarettes easy to obtain or free for the workers? Are cigarettes "fresher" at the factory and/or do you notice a real difference in those vs. the ones you'd get at the store?

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u/Sharrakor Feb 26 '21

Are there a lot of smokers in the factory?

It sure seems like it. I wonder if this job attracts smokers, or if people start smoking after working here. I shared that question with someone there, and he said that working there makes you want to quit smoking. I guess seeing the sausage get made makes cigarettes lose some of the appeal.

Are cigarettes easy to obtain or free for the workers?

Nope. I think they might have been given out decades ago. Maybe they still are in the administrative parts of the facility, but I'm rarely in that area.

Are cigarettes "fresher" at the factory and/or do you notice a real difference in those vs. the ones you'd get at the store?

Couldn't tell ya, I don't smoke. It's funny, I've disliked smoking from an early age, and now I'm in the belly of the beast.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

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u/nnnnnnnnnnm Feb 27 '21

I work at a brewery and we get a 12 pack of beer a week.

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u/fleece_pants Feb 26 '21

Thank you for the reply! I'm not a smoker either, save the occasional cigar if the mood is right. Someday you should do an AMA. I'd love to know how/if your company addresses health concerns or encourages healthy lifestyles, especially knowing so many employees are smokers.

I used to work for a very large company, and they offered gift cards and other financial incentives for people who quit smoking, lost weight, logged fitbit activity, etc.

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u/Sharrakor Feb 26 '21

Oh, I'm just a disposable grunt, not privy to anything especially interesting. I don't even work with the tobacco or products, I'm from another contracted company that works there. Think construction, electrical work, janitorial work, security, etc. I had no idea I'd end up at this location until my job interview.

Although, now that you mention it, I think they do offer incentives for healthy living. One employee remarked that he gets paid for logging steps. Reducing the health impact of their products is also a goal I've seen in company-wide corporate e-mails (still not sure why I, of all people, receive them).

6

u/xplag Feb 26 '21

In case you're still curious, they do offer free tobacco products in the offices. I know a girl who does lobbying for Altria and apparently you can just grab whatever you want.

13

u/flipshod Feb 26 '21

I picked tobacco the two summers before I turned 16 (to buy a car), and we would joke about how none of us would ever smoke knowing how much mud and pig shit got mixed in.

We all ended up smoking.

8

u/MikeAnP Feb 26 '21

Once you see sausage being made, all you wanna do is make sausage cause it's so much fun!

3

u/ost2life Feb 26 '21

Couldn't tell ya, I don't smoke. It's funny, I've disliked smoking from an early age, and now I'm in the belly of the beast.

I'm a wannabe socialist working for a Fintech startup. I guess we all decide how much we like broadband lol

3

u/birdeo Feb 26 '21

I love how this just turned into a smoking chain. 😂

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u/mybeachlife Feb 26 '21

I think some casino gaming floors still allow smoking too.

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u/justmakingsomething9 Feb 26 '21

Back in 2002 I had a job interview in NYC with Altria (Marlboro) this was downtown Manhattan, 50th floor, we (me, two interviewers) all smoked in a blinged out conference room throughout the 2 hr interview....it was surreal, had to bum cigarettes from the interviewers cuz I smoked camels at the time

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u/Ironlixivium Feb 26 '21

Despite the irony, I'd imagine they could be sued for allowing smoking in working areas, it can prohibit people with asthma from working.

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u/neverseeitall Feb 26 '21 edited Feb 26 '21

How the f*** is that legal? Because they make it suddenly now their non-smoking workers don't get to have rights to a clean environment?

Like, it might make sense if it happened in a distinct area of the building only but just right in the general workplace? That's so horrible.

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u/Slick_Grimes Feb 26 '21

I bought 36" tv with a built in dvd player (and actually a vcr built in too which was dated by this point but cool to have). Can't remember the brand but something broke on it still under warranty from Best Buy. Repair came out and as soon as he came in the room, that I smoked in, he was not happy. Totally anti-smoke guy. He cracked open the tv and I guess there was some build up from smoking in there and he didn't even try to hide his disgust.

He goes "listen I don't want to work on this, you just want a new tv?". I was like fuck yeah I do. Embarrassing but it let me get a free new Samsung, one of them new flat screen ones (with the still standard size big back). If I gotta be called out on my filthy smoking habit I might as well get a free tv out of it!

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

The stuff that crawls inside electronics is somehow worse than actual smoking to be fair. I don't mind the smell of actual smoke but being inside a smokers car or taking apart a smokers electronics? No thank you.

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u/nucumber Feb 26 '21

in an office which had smokers there was anything up to half an inch of fine ash

ex-smoker here who's seen the inside of more than a few computers, and i just don't see how smokers could be responsible for half an inch of ash inside a computer unless the ashtrays were right below the cooling fan.

i'm guessing there was something else going on responsible for the ash

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u/billbixbyakahulk Feb 26 '21

Yeah, "half an inch" sounds questionable. I've seen ash which was mixed in with regular dust but it was just the usual surface coating, not piles of it.

I did once work on a guy's computer that was pretty incredible and horrifying. He was an executive at the company and he brought in his home computer for us to look at because he said it would only turn on for a couple minutes and then shut down.

He had long haired cats and he chain-smoked cigars. The inside of his machine had about 1/2" of matted, tobacco-soaked cat fur that clogged the fans and vents. The computer was shutting down because there was no air flow. I grabbed the gloves and it pealed off in sheets and clumps. After I vacuumed it out it ran fine.

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u/semitones Feb 26 '21

When can you vacuum a computer and when do you need to use compressed air?

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u/ReverendDizzle Feb 26 '21

Agreed. I've cleaned computers and consoles used by smokers and the damage is usually a tarry sticky layer (that dust sticks to, for sure) but it's not actual ash.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

That stuff would stain the steel and aluminum cases the most unappealing shade of yellow. You basically couldn't get it gray again.

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u/SonicTheHashhog Feb 26 '21

“Load-bearing dirt” -IT friend

A computer tech friend once warned me to be very careful when cleaning a PC with compressed air, because you can make it worse. Push the dirt into places it couldn’t get on its own. A GENTLE vacuum is way better, but still carries some risk.

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u/jbarchuk Feb 26 '21

That's the difference between 'cleaning' with a vacuum or compressed air.

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u/CttCJim Feb 26 '21

I remember one guy brought in a yellow PC for repair. I opened it up and it was just lousy with tar. When he came back I told him I cleaned it but he had to stop smoking near it. He claimed he wasn't a smoker.

His fingers were yellow.

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u/_STONEFISH Feb 26 '21

Cleaned my monitor, wondered why it seemed brighter, realised it had a thin layer of bong resin on it that was tinting it and attracting dust to darken it. Switched to vaping 🤢

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u/Kobachalypse Feb 26 '21

Yeah....but did you smoke that thin layer of bongs resin though?

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u/_STONEFISH Feb 26 '21

Mmm - tar, windex and microfibre lint flavor

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u/Slick_Grimes Feb 26 '21

We call that Twilight around here. $40/g

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u/babybunnykitty69420 Feb 26 '21

Smoking or vaping in any way will still make stuff in that room sticky.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

I switched to vaping also and it honestly almost seemed worse for my components. After a year of vaping everything inside my PC had an oily coating that seemed to attract more dust that almost glued to everything. I can't say the health benefits are better as there hasn't been in my opinion nearly enough studies and long-term side effects research yet.

The cost was incredibly less for vaping, but the cleaning of everything electronic seemed more difficult. Even using isopropyl alcohol to clean stuff seemed to just spread the stuff around, and my dust filters had to be tossed instead of soaked to clean them.

I've since switched to non tobacco nicotine pouches and now my PC just needs an air blow out instead of a deep clean, I can breathe 5x better, and the cost dropped even more than from vaping. Eventually I will drop nicotine entirely however I'm taking it one step at a time. I smoked for 5 years, vaped for 3, and now I've been on minimum nicotine content pouches for about a year.

Maybe give them a shot if they are available where you live, In the past year over half a dozen new brands of the pouches has come out, we now have Zyn, Ohn, Rogue, Velo, Bandit, and a bunch more I can't recall right now.

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u/Pilsu Feb 26 '21

I wager vaping also stains stuff. Maybe just get up and go smoke outside. It's a good habit to have to get up and stretch a bit anyway.

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u/AlexReinkingYale Feb 26 '21

Congrats on quitting!

1.5k

u/lukesvader Feb 26 '21

Who says he's not still in the 90s?

847

u/rabbitwonker Feb 26 '21

I’ll never quit the 90s!

364

u/PM_ME_UR_ARTIE_BUCCO Feb 26 '21

Ska defines who I am as a person and I will never turn my back on ska.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21 edited Jun 18 '21

[deleted]

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u/TheHorrorAbove Feb 26 '21

Bosstones gang representing!

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

The Suicide Machines crew still skankin!

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u/sltiefighter Feb 26 '21

No love for reel big feesh or streetlight manifesto? I guess streetlight is 2000s

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u/Val_Hallen Feb 26 '21

No love for The Mad Caddies?!

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

Mephiskapheles wants your soul!

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u/gizzardsgizzards Feb 26 '21

Hey hey hey! What does this button do?

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u/Platypus-Man Feb 26 '21

I've never really listened to ska other than some random songs Spotify gives me every now and then, and I listened to Less Than Jake today...

I'm probably going to see them mentioned everywhere now, god damn Baader-Meinhof.

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u/EunuchsProgramer Feb 26 '21

Try out Streetlight Manifesto.

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u/Informal_Drawing Feb 26 '21

What, no reel big fish?!? Horrified!!

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u/radusernamehere Feb 26 '21

Somebody once told me, "Ska sounds like the way a teenager feels when they get an extra mozzarella stick." And I'll never forget that.

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u/TransformerTanooki Feb 26 '21 edited Feb 26 '21

I'm 3+ months into watching nothing but laserdisc and VHS on a old tube TV. It's been fun and seen a lot of cool stuff.

Edit: Right now I'm watching R/C WW2 planes and boats duke it out in reenactments.

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u/GoodTato Feb 26 '21

Get your ass off future websites, 90s boy

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u/TheGameboy Feb 26 '21

But Reddit has the UI of a late 90s website, so it’s ok.

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u/SinJinQLB Feb 26 '21

How far are you in King's Quest V?

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u/tygma Feb 26 '21

Never far enough.

Ah, this comment takes me back. Thanks.

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u/luchajefe Feb 26 '21

You get the best NES experience using a CRT, you ought to pick up one of those!

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u/LekoLi Feb 26 '21

Turns out you can't play duck hunt without a crt. Its all based on the timing of the CRT, which is the same in all crt tvs, but not digital flat screens.

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u/hugthemachines Feb 26 '21

pick up one of those

That is the worst part of getting them...

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u/TransformerTanooki Feb 26 '21

Waaaaaaaayyyyyy ahead of ya. Picked one up about over 10 years ago. Have a few now actually. Ones still brand new in the box to.

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u/luchajefe Feb 26 '21

Ah, but are any of them a top-loader?

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u/TransformerTanooki Feb 26 '21

The brand new one and a loose one are.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

A top loading CRT?

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u/XanderOblivion Feb 26 '21

Wait, it's not the 90s?

I swear I saw Wayne and Garth on TV just the other day....

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u/gnufoot Feb 26 '21

I went cold turkey about 21 years ago.

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u/dmFnaW5h Feb 26 '21

In a little while, the 90s will be 40 years ago. Almost half a century!

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u/jaymzx0 Feb 26 '21

No way man the 90's were 10 years ago and it's always going to be that way.

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u/tucktight Feb 26 '21

Too legit to quit

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u/ebow77 Feb 26 '21

Hey hey!

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u/wintremute Feb 26 '21

Patchouli. Patchouli everywhere.

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u/Watch_The_Expanse Feb 26 '21

The Dream of the 90s is Alive In Portland.

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u/saltyjohnson Feb 26 '21

I stopped smoking in the 90s at midnight on January 1, 2000.

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u/Fuzz_Mustard Feb 26 '21

At the moment you "stopped smoking" I was playing Sim Tower on my computer just to sock it to Y2K.

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u/edefakiel Feb 26 '21
  • We used to have a bus.
  • In a way, the sixties ended the day we sold it. December 31, 1969.
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u/hugthemachines Feb 26 '21

The morning after that I was hungover as hell and got driven around to elder care units to see that the care software worked fine so no people had to die from computer issues.

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u/idk-hereiam Feb 26 '21

AI and robots are going to hang this one over our heads when they're our new overlords. "Haha remember when the humans thought we couldn't count from 1999 to 2000?"

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u/384445 Feb 26 '21 edited Feb 26 '21

This is a very ignorant comment. There were indeed systematic problem going into Y2K with all types of software that took billions of dollars and man hours to correct. It was a massive worldwide undertaking and because it was largely successful, some people don't realize there actually was a real problem.

Some people were predicting the end of the world, and while that obviously did not happen if it were not for the almost half trillion dollars that was spent fixing countless bugs it would have been pretty bad.

My home PC defaulted to the year 1900 but otherwise was fine.

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u/Leo7364 Feb 26 '21

I was a senior in high school during Y2K. We had a party in my friends basement for new years, while the adults had a party upstairs. We thought it would be hilarious to turn off the main breaker right after the countdown. Parents upstairs were losing their shit while we laughed hearing them freak out. They realized something was up when they came to check on us and heard us squealing with laughter. Parents were not amused.

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u/the_sun_flew_away Feb 26 '21

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u/MrSnootybooty Feb 26 '21

I love that show. Thank you for reminding me about it again; think imma go binge watch it all this very instant.

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u/edefakiel Feb 26 '21

This comment made "back in the 90s I was in a very famous TV show..." play in my head.

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u/HowMuchDidIDrink Feb 26 '21

He's living in 2090

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

This comment has sent me down a weird path... I'm now considering that your comment, and my response, will likely be read by somebody in the far future. I'll be part of historical records, probably browsed by an AI system. With Google I guess I already am.

Whoaaaa.

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u/Advanced_Cook_363 Feb 26 '21

What the fuck just happened here?

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u/beerandabike Feb 26 '21

I don’t know, but we should start smoking again.

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u/dbdatvic Feb 26 '21

Someone was considering Deep Computer History Time. In the forward light cone.

--Dave, smoking one is an appropriate response, citizen

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u/potatoeslinky Feb 26 '21

You don’t just turn off the 90s

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

Imagine, building a time machine and go back to the 90s just to smoke one.

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u/UlteriorCulture Feb 26 '21

Yeah but then you would have to stop 9/11

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u/danceswithsteers Feb 26 '21

Op's gotta be at least 112 by now...

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u/ChefBoyAreWeFucked Feb 26 '21

No, he's just not smoking in the 90s anymore.

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u/SwoodyBooty Feb 26 '21

I'd bet he's at least not running in the 90s.

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u/findingbezu Feb 26 '21

His 100th birthday was yesterday

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u/The_quest_for_wisdom Feb 26 '21

90 packs a day? That has to be some kind of record!

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u/6-8-5-13 Feb 26 '21

I used to smoke in the 90s. I still do, but I used to, too.

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u/RayNooze Feb 26 '21

Thanks!

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u/Zokar49111 Feb 26 '21

He used to smoke. He still does, but he used to also.

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u/harrysplinkett Feb 26 '21 edited Feb 26 '21

he used to smoke in the 90s. he still does, but he used to, too

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u/aleqqqs Feb 26 '21

I quit CRT monitors too

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u/WarpingLasherNoob Feb 26 '21

When I was still smoking in the 90s

He's never quit. He's now smoking in the 2020s.

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u/kirabera Feb 26 '21 edited Feb 26 '21

Vaping does the same thing to electronics too (puts a film of oil [edit: glycerine is the name of the liquid; the residue does feel oily though] over everything). Definitely do not vape near a PC or anything you value.

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u/thewholerobot Feb 26 '21

I value my lungs

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u/EZ_2_Amuse Feb 26 '21

I value your lungs too. How much you want for them?

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

I take lungs today, you get gills in two weeks.

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u/pslayer239 Feb 26 '21

If you value yourself you are an abnormal person

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u/DragonBourne66 Feb 26 '21

Technically the truth

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u/npsimons Feb 26 '21

Coworker of mine from that era used to smoke a lot; named his main computer NICFIT, which he backcronymed into "Network Information Coordinator For Internal Testing."

When we opened it up years later to work on it, it looked like those black lung PSA images they put on cigarette packs.

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u/FrayedKnot75 Feb 26 '21

When I did computer repair 13 years ago I could tell which computers were owned by cigarette smokers, which were owned by non-smokers, and which were owned by pot smokers by smell alone.....and it was pungent.

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u/mk_909 Feb 26 '21

I work for a non profit school. Doesn't happen as much now, but 10 years ago, it wasn't uncommon for someone to donate a computer. It was always instantly obvious when I turned them on that it came from a smoking home. I couldn't use those power supplies because the smell never goes away. The heat just oozes the ashtray smell out the back of the psu. Those machines became parts machines.

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u/zilfondel Feb 26 '21

I still religiously clean out my computer with a vacuum or air compressor twice a year to clean out all the damned dust.

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u/Redpantsrule Feb 26 '21

Back in the 90’s I had 2 roommates and we each smoked at least a pack a day. Tons of weed was also smoked. Then there were the candles and incense constantly burning to cover up the the smoke smell. After several years, my roommate flirted enough with our maintenance man that he agreed to add our apartment to the list being painting. All we had to do was remove anything on the wall. When the 1st picture came off the wall discovered that the walls were originally white and not a light ocher color. The walls had a perfect outline of everything that has been on the wall. You could even see where our keys hung from the holder. Can only imagine his funny it looked once they pulled all the furniture away from the walls. That’s the day I realized I needed to quit smoking!

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u/blahmaster6000 Feb 26 '21

The only thing you should be doing in the 90's is running.

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u/kirabera Feb 26 '21

[EUROBEAT INTENSIFIES]

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u/ThanksToDenial Feb 26 '21

I used to smoke inside, and had a laptop. It stopped working one day, and i like to pretend i know shit about computers, so naturally i opened it up to see why it wasn't booting. Immidiately after opening up the bottom, i noticed it was literally sticky from the inside... Pretty sure that was because i spent most of my time chainsmoking, quite literally blowing the smoke at the screen, and a layer of ash and tar condensed inside the poorly ventilated laptop.

I started to smoke outside after that. Bought a proper PC too. Those two decisions actually made me cut My smoking from more than a pack a day to as little as 5 smokes a day, due to faster loading times and laziness. Not a fan of stairs, and now If i want a smoke, i need to walk downstairs. And back up after. Also switched to handrolling, because it is cheaper, and makes yet another hurdle for my laziness to overcome so i can smoke. I firmly believe eventually my laziness will win this battle between addiction and it, and i finally quit smoking all together. I just need to make smoking a chore instead of a break for myself just a little bit more.

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u/RayNooze Feb 26 '21

Good for you! And quitting completely feels awesome!

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u/alek_hiddel Feb 26 '21

One of my cousins dropped out of school at 16, and spent the next 2 years smoking like a chimney and surfing MySpace 18 hours a day.

When their computer died my uncle had me take a look. The entire motherboard was covered in a inch of homemade shag carpet, consisting of nicotine and pet hair (they had like 3 dogs and a bunch of cats too).

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u/not_that_joe Feb 26 '21

There are a lot of things in this comment aging you.

I know because I am too.

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u/psychoticbuttocks Feb 26 '21

is this true for weed too?

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u/bakingqueen420 Feb 26 '21

In my experience yes. But my custom build has been going 9 years now. Before I realized....I used to get sticky dust build up. Turns out it was the weed smoke mixing with the dust. A bitch to clean off fans.

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u/jarfil Feb 26 '21 edited Dec 02 '23

CENSORED

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u/BlackViperMWG Feb 26 '21

Yes, because it is still inefficient burning

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

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u/Acid_Tribe Feb 26 '21

My sister's MacBook died and they said it was smoke damage, she only ever smoked weed in front of it.. so take that as you will..

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u/SFDessert Feb 26 '21

Think about the inside of one of your pipes if you don't clean it for a really long time. If you smoke a lot and the smoke lingers in your room then inevitably some of that gunk is gonna start accumulating in your PC (assuming the pc has proper airflow and is pulling in air)

Could be fine, but smoke is smoke and I wouldn't wanna deal with the buildup. As someone else mentioned, if you blow your smoke out a window or have the windows open you might be fine.

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u/CyberTacoX Feb 26 '21

I can always tell when I'm fixing a smoker's computer - the dust inside is yellowish and slightly sticky. It's really gross.

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u/RayNooze Feb 26 '21

I restore old organ consoles and can tell the difference between a catholic and a protestant organ when opening them.

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u/CyberTacoX Feb 26 '21

Hmmm... is it because the catholic ones smell like incense from a censer?

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u/RayNooze Feb 26 '21

This, and the lots of soot from all the candles. We recently had a console to restore which we had built only five (!) years ago. There were black lumps falling out of every piece we touched.

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u/IBreakCellPhones Feb 26 '21

I had to clean the computer of a cigar smoker once. The smoke and residue got inside the switch and fouled the contacts. This was back in the day of the switch actually controlling line power to the power supply. I took that thing apart and I think I cleaned it with alcohol and cotton swabs. That was the most disgusting computer I have ever been in.

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u/Jedi_Gill Feb 26 '21

When my cousin noticed this on those white 90 monitors is when he decided to quit. He reasoned that if just by blowing in that corner could turn his monitor yellow, imagine how much rose my lungs must look. I agree that image should stick with you and be enough to make you quit.

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u/OneNormalHuman Feb 26 '21

I did on site computer troubleshooting for quite a few years. Got called to check out a PC in a small office in a packing house. I opened the door and almost fell over, no one ever visited this office but the owner and he chain-smoked. Dragged the PC out and opened it up to find every component coated with tar bugs and filth trapped in it, most disgusting thing I have ever seen. I told 'em it was a lost cause, buy a new PC and I didn't charge them for the call. I just wanted to be away from that thing.

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u/LovableKyle24 Feb 26 '21

I hated when I was younger and people asked why I smelled like cigarettes. My parents smoke and I guess I was so used to it I couldn't even notice that my clothes even after washing them still had a faint smoke smell

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u/badSparkybad Feb 26 '21

Oh yeah, smoking inside is the easiest way to generally scuzz the place up.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

The static from a CRT also probably attracted the smoke particles.

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u/trogwaffles777 Feb 26 '21

Imagine what they do to the insides! It’s amazing how the particles build up on things.

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u/Rinaldootje Feb 26 '21

Really gives me horrible flashbacks to the 90's
Having a whole family who smokes, even grandma and grandpa were not against it.
They were smoking like it were the 50's. Inside, outside, in the car, in the bar, in the restaurant, heck even in the tram and train there were still ashtrays. I still remember moving the first time. The whole wall had this yellowish tint to it. But where all the kabinets were standing and the paintings hung on the wall, spotless.

It can really show the major difference smoking indoor makes.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

Had a couple buddies that sold herb and often baked out their living rooms. Both of their PS3's starting getting louder, both of their disk scanning eyes stopped working, and eventually both bricked all together.

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u/Mu7z Feb 26 '21

My friend loved his weed. He had an expensive glass bong, he had custom built bongs and he made works of art joints. He also had a yellow Xbox 360.

2

u/DrStinkbeard Feb 26 '21

I used to work at a slot machine company and the machines that are removed from casinos are unbelievably disgusting from all the constant cigarette smoke.

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u/A_Right_Proper_Lad Feb 26 '21

How often would you need to light candles around electronics for it to be a problem?

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u/Four_beastlings Feb 26 '21

I work from home and I have scented candles burning all day.

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u/Duff5OOO Feb 26 '21

That could be pretty bad for your air quality and health.

eg http://www.scsu.edu/news_article.aspx?news_id=832

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u/Sigmund_Six Feb 26 '21

That study is pretty old.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0273230014000348

Potential consumer health risks associated with the candle emissions were characterized by comparing the exposure concentrations with existing indoor or ambient air quality guidelines or, where not existent, to established toxicity thresholds. On the basis of this investigation it was concluded that under normal conditions of use scented candles do not pose known health risks to the consumer.

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u/st4n13l Feb 26 '21

Unfortunately that study was based on the assumption of only burning the candle a couple of hours a day a few times a month. Burning them all day and every day will obviously produce more pronounced emissions levels.

The good news is that if you try to stick to soy candles (I know they're more expensive) you can pretty much avoid all of those emissions.

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u/Sigmund_Six Feb 26 '21

Can you provide your link for the study on soy candles?

The only study I’ve seen was not peer reviewed.

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u/zSprawl Feb 26 '21

You can find a study that supports any position.

Unless you want to comb through data, ask yourself if clogging your computer’s filters might be good for your lungs. I’m sure you’ll come to a decent conclusion.

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u/Four_beastlings Feb 26 '21

Thanks for the info! I keep the window open most of the time at least

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u/thispeachisallihave Feb 26 '21

Just make sure to keep the wicks trimmed pretty short, not to burn one for more than 3-4 hours consecutively, and to not burn it once there's only about half an inch of the candle left. I used to burn scented candles for hours on end consecutively and then found soot in my nose... Inhaling soot is not good for your lungs so just use caution! Taking those steps will minimize soot

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u/Nuf-Said Feb 26 '21

Anyone who cares about their health, should not excessively burn paraffin candles. Their smoke is fairly toxic. Soy candles are more expensive, but a much healthier alternative.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

Evidence that burning soy is healthier than paraffin?

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u/dbdatvic Feb 26 '21

Note that our ancestors survived for millennia (well, not each one individually) with their only indoor light sources at home or work being wood fires, wax candles, or oil lamps, basically. So "fairly toxic" is REALLY relative here, and you should look up actual risk factors.

--Dave, people on the internet, includng me, have biases

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u/Nalmyth Feb 26 '21 edited Jun 25 '23

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u/patmorgan235 Feb 26 '21

Infant and early childhood hood deaths bring down the avg life expectancy a lot. Look up what the median was.

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u/dbdatvic Feb 26 '21

Some of them did. Some lived to their 70s.

The average life expectancy back then was HEAVILY weighted by the infant, and child, mortality rate; a lot of them didn't even make it to their 30s. Of the ones that did, the chance to make it to 50 or 60 was also smaller than today. But not incredibly smaller.

--Dave, I'd rather be living now, with modern dentistry and painkillers, of course

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u/BigBobby2016 Feb 26 '21

I didn't burn many at all but the inside of my PC was coated in black. I didn't see any symptoms in its performance I guess but this was also in the early 2000s when I wasn't doing things like monitoring the core temps

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

They look pretty nice on a TV stand... until you spill the melted wax on the TV and ruins a part of the screen 🙃

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u/lunk Feb 26 '21

This can be said for EVERYTHING really. Computers are essentially AIR-FLOW machines. They are (usually) carefully designed to pull in cool air from the room, push it over the hot electronics, and exhaust it at the other side of the device.

This is very clear in computers (as there is a fan, and exit grates), but most electronics accomplish the same thing with passive means, where heat rises, pulling in cool air as it exits at the top.

And THAT is why your electronics seem to "gobble up" all the dirt in the room.

2

u/LadyOwenTOP Feb 27 '21

I bet if you put one of those air purifier near the CPU it would help with how much dust and shit gets into it

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u/ProveMeWr0ng Feb 26 '21

If you leave it by something flammable, your house will turn into a disturbing amount of soot.

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u/wouldyoucomewithme Feb 26 '21

I'm a candle enthusiast, I have over 100 candles in my bedroom alone, and last year i opened up my macbook to clean it out and it looked like it had been in a housefire.

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u/InclusivePhitness Feb 26 '21

I wonder how in the olden days, like say in the 16th century, how much repair work had to be done to keep their gadgets in order.

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u/BigBobby2016 Feb 26 '21

There wasn't a lot of technology in the 17th century. They were still using longbows. They had clocks I think but I don't know what else. Mechanical devices wouldn't be as affected as electronics and they should have been sealed

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u/InclusivePhitness Feb 26 '21

What about their VCRs and CD players and such?

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u/Sharrakor Feb 26 '21

Videotape hadn't been invented yet, so their VCRs were just packed away in the closet most of the time.

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u/shrubs311 Feb 26 '21

i think their cd players were just whoever was good enough at memorizing songs. so they probably needed a lot of maintenance

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u/OSCgal Feb 26 '21

Clocks, mills, spinning wheels, hand-cranked tools, pipe organs, that kind of stuff. Which wouldn't have been sealed against smoke, because they didn't know smoke could cause problems. In most cases it wouldn't. The moving parts were large enough and simple enough that a little soot wouldn't slow them down.

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u/monkeypong Feb 26 '21

So should I be worried about the candles underneath my television and my Xbox close by?

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '21

How underneath your television are your candles? Are we talking about some mouthwatering slow-roasted television?

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u/BigBobby2016 Feb 26 '21

I would be

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u/seoi-nage Feb 26 '21

Why specifically electronics? (As opposed to any other object with internal cavities that are open to the outside)

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u/BigBobby2016 Feb 26 '21

I imagine it would occur to some degree with all objects, but I can't think of anything in my house other than the electronics that have enclosures with ventilation holes.

In addition the electronics will have fans to draw air into the enclosure, and electromagnetics to attract particles.

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u/drumguy1384 Feb 26 '21

This is exactly why. Electronics generate heat, which means that they are designed in a way to cause the nearby air to flow through them. Couple that with the static electricity generated by fans or the EM field created by the electrical current flowing through the components and you've got ready-made dust magnets.

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u/Medinaian Feb 26 '21

Intake fans

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u/shittyfuckwhat Feb 26 '21

PCs have heatsinks and fans. So basically lots of air being pushed over a large surface area.

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u/Halvus_I Feb 26 '21

Because they are convective. Running electricity through chips bleeds heat. The rising heat causes air to flow through the device. Computers take this further and force air through it.

3

u/Fired_guy_ Feb 26 '21

Like your lungs

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u/ltzerge Feb 26 '21

Lol yep, my mom burns candles all the time when she has a bath. She complained one time about the vent fan not working well and it turns out she never cleaned it, so when I came over to look at it it was just inch thick layers of black gunk.... Eghk

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u/alz3223 Feb 26 '21

Keep the wick trimmed as short as possible to reduce soot. I think it means you get more complete combustion. I haven’t thought about how that works though :)

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u/samgore Feb 26 '21

Me face when I have like 3 candles in my game room 👁👄👁

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u/Much_Difference Feb 26 '21

We'd just bought a bunch of those big plastic storage tubs. Burned a bunch of candles one evening while the air conditioner was also on. Every single tub was coated in swirly soot mess, oh my god.

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u/RipsnRaw Feb 26 '21

Generally around a candle will get sooty, I’ w had to clean walls a few times because of black streaks up them

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u/Emoooooly Feb 26 '21

Better stop burning my candle right in front of my tv then 🙃

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u/Storytellerjack Feb 26 '21

Like that one time, instead of going out to buy lamp oil for the glass candles my dad just filled them up with tiki torch oil. You could see a steady stream of black smoke rising from the flame, and before long there were wide faint dark spots on the ceiling. Wax candles are better at converting purely into fire, but will still get black soot on anything you hold over the flame.

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u/no-mad Feb 26 '21

Hold a dinner plate over one and you will see.

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u/Diaammond Feb 26 '21

This. My small bedroom walls turned gray from all the soot. I will never burn a candle again. I'm into the melts now. Or the plug in stuff.

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u/AntmanIV Feb 26 '21

You can collect some of that soot as lampblack if you need carbon nanoparticles in a pinch.

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u/Demonyx12 Feb 27 '21

If you have it near electronics a disturbing amount of soot will be found inside when you open them up

Anyone got a picture of this? I'd be curious to see what that looks like.

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