2 weeks of wearing the NFCRings.
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Hi all, it's been a couple of weeks since I started wearing the Alpha and Normal rings constantly and I've wanted to give them a good workout to see how they do in my day to day life.
Please note that while I haven't taken a hacksaw or a blowtorch to them I have been a little rougher than I would normally be simply to see how much they can take, and this is not how you should treat yours!
There are some usage and care warnings in the pamphlet that you receive with your ring and you really should take heed - they're there so that your ring can last and the experience can be a good one!To start off I normally wear 4 rings, two on each hand on the index and middle fingers. My normal rings are titanium on the middle fingers and stainless steel spinners on the index fingers. These haven't been taken off for about 8 years for the longest-running one. They're fairly standard widths and were fairly easy to get used to although the steel ones did cause a reaction in the beginning.
I'm now wearing the Alpha and Normal rings in place of the two stainless steel ones and the difference is significant - even the irritation that I had gotten used to has passed on and wearing them is about as comfortable as it gets!
The Alpha is perfect for a large-width ring and is more comfortable than the old normal-width steel ring by a long shot. It's comfortable even on my stubby little fingers, and a lot of the time I forget I'm wearing it until it 'clinks' against something. Or triggers the N9 I've been using by accident.
The Normal ring is square-edged just the same as the old stainless steel ring but is again far more comfortable and is not causing any irritation at all. I'm more aware of it than the Alpha but by comparison to the old ring I wore on that finger it is far far easier to wear.Because they sit next to other rings I am getting a lot of fine scratch and scuff marks on the sides that are closest and making contact occasionally. It's not horrible though, and I have been able to polish them up a bit and make them shiny again. The inlay covers respond a little more readily to a good hand polish with a microfibre cloth with most of the little marks disappearing relatively easily.
I've worn these rings now in bushfire weather, in torrential rain (yeah really, I'm not exaggerating! Insane bushfire causing temperatures followed the next day by 4 and a quarter inches of rain), while working on radio equipment, on the car, doing dishes and in the bath and they are still going strong.
Trying to use the rings to trigger NFC events while standing in an RF saturated area (too many kilowatts!) is the only time I have had real issues and they were resolved once I and my minor headache left the area.All told I'm extremely pleased and impressed with what John and his team have produced!
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I've found rolling helps if I have my otterbox defender case on my phone. Without the case, my ring only needs to be close to the sweet spot.
I'm actually not a huge fan of shiny rings, so I find the slowly developing burnished look of my titanium ring quite nice. I do nothing to protect it, and wear it on the index finger of my dominant hand. It has so far survived steel wool (washing dishes), bitter cold (left it in the car overnight), an impact with brick, and one curious parrot who is known for making wood chips out of 2x4s.
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As an interesting side note, I've found that on some phones I get a better read with the normal ring if I place it in the sweet spot and then roll from one end of the inlay to the other. That seems to do the trick every time for me, rather than just tapping the center of the inlay on the sweet spot.
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Ah, nice one mate. I'm glad someone else has noticed the rolling read helping!
I played autoelectrician today in what I suspect is the dirtiest most horrible truck in the world. In the process of getting to the wiring my Alpha ring encountered many things including some lengths of very rusty chain which have definitely added to the burnished look (after I polished off the rust spots). This was followed by an encounter with a live 25 volt feed and the chassis of the vehicle from hell which has left a couple of spots on the sides of the ring. Still kicking along though!Just a note to anyone who reads all this: I am being Very Mean to my ring and do not expect any form of warranty on this whatsoever. When it dies, I will suck it up and purchase another.
The warranty terms require that you be Nice to the ring, as Nice as possible and not try to hurt it or it's feelings. -
Good suggestion on the "rolling read"; made it much easier and quicker to get a read on my phone.
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+1 for the rolling. Do the same here..
And after using a normal black coated ring for about 2 weeks I can notice if i focus reallly close see some of the shiny metal underneath it but i Reallly have to "zoom" in to see it.
But as Lokki has done. I am giving it as ruff treatment as I can to see what it can withstand and if it breaks i will buy a new one as I do NOT assume it will be covered by ANY form of warranty..
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Ah cool - I was wondering how the coloured metal would go. You just wear the one ring with none adjacent?
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I was curious, I've accumulated a few rings over the years and having titanium right next to titanium does a bit of a number on the flat surfaces of the NFC Ring. I plan to wear my stealth bomber on a little finger so hopefully that saves it a bit, with no ring next to it.
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Ah cool - I was wondering how the coloured metal would go. You just wear the one ring with none adjacent?
Jupp, just the one ring on my right hand, so no other rings rubbing on it.
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Well, yesterday the private inlay of my Normal ring failed.
The hell of it is that I can't point to any one incident and say 'oh yeah, like totally never hang upside down from a lamp post while eating peanut butter and being threatened by escaped rhesus monkeys because that'll make your ring stop working.'
I'm pretty sure you shouldn't do that though, it may be illegal in your state/province.I was at the point where I was flat-out amazed at how tough these rings are and very impressed that they have taken so much pain without blinking. My usual rings do, but they're just pieces of solid titanium without any of the hidden artistry.
Then, after a quiet work day, I was at home with an arduino reader unit and tried to read the private side of the normal ring (it's the easiest one to get to because I can just wave my hand over the reader) and nothing. Tried again, nothing. Tried the other ring inlays and bam, instant read.So at some point after functioning flawlessly through everything that has been handed to it, probably while I was driving home it's gone and ducked up to the shop for a pack of smokes never to be seen again.
I'm sad and have some slight abandonment issues now, but I'll get past that in time.Meanwhile I'm still seriously impressed. The sheer amount of things that happen to/around your hands and the ring took it all like an absolute champ.
And when it did get sick of my crap only one half stopped working. I see that as 'win' all the way - I'm never going to store anything sensitive/important on the ring or any other rfid/nfc card for that matter so I'll never 'lose' anything that I can't re-write to another. If I'd had my door lock installed then I'd have simply used the other inlay to enter or gone for the backup pin code. You ARE going to program in both inlays from your rings on your door locks, aren't you all? And have a backup method?
If I'd had my car entry/start kludge completed then I'd have done the same thing, simply used the other inlay or the backup method.Thoughts, questions, recriminations, commiserations or suggestions for ice cream flavour?
*edit: As a further thought, [b:19etrj66]don't make a single inlay the only place you put your bitcoin wallet key[/b:19etrj66]. That could be embarassing.
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3 Months of wearing the NFC ring - The metal on both rings was pretty well scratched and beaten but a good careful buff of the metal with a dremel on slow made everything nice and shiny again and even removed the lingering scorch mark on one side of the Alpha ring.
Do not dremel the inlays! It's very easy to take off the shiny top coat - I tested this on my Alpha private inlay, which is black and had a large gouge mark in it anyway. I managed to remove the worst of the gouge but the finish is not as nice as it once was!
Something else of possible interest is that the public side of my Alpha failed. It was a complete failure but came good after a very careful prolonged application of hot air on the back of the inlay while pressing the entire ring against a solid object. I would say that the solder managed to break between the IC and the antenna. It failed again a week after the heat treatment and I'm not sure I want to try that process again!
