Heart Hand Warmer to use again and again

It’s the time of year where, if you spend a lot of time outside doing outdoor activities (or if you have to watch someone else do those outdoor activities) it’s pretty likely that your hands will get cold. Those chemical hand warmer packets are nice, but you only get one use out of them.

The Heart Hand Warmer is a red, heart-shaped chemical hand warmer that can be used over and over again to keep your hands nice and toasty. On the inside, there is a small metal disc that when moved back and forth a few times in the clearish gel will turn the gel opaque. The opaque gel is what warms up the hand warmer using some nifty chemical reactions. ThinkGeek explains it as such:

[T]he pretty red gel is a supersaturated solution. Bending the disc starts an exothermic crystallization of the gel (i.e. it goes opaque and gets hot). And when it loses its warmth, all you have to do is wrap it in a towel and throw it into boiling water for about 15-20 minutes and the Heart Hand Warmer resets itself. Once it cools off from its boiling bath, it is ready to be used again.

As an extra added bonus, you can chill the Heart Hand Warmer in the fridge for a few hours to use as an ice pack of sorts. No boiling required to reset the hand warmer to it’s ready state. Pick one up for $5.99.

Dimensions: approx 3.75″ wide.

[ThinkGeek]

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5 Comments on “Heart Hand Warmer to use again and again”

Phrogg Says:

Sounds like the ones i used to use about 10 years ago, though the ones i had were colorless, rather than red. Same principle, though. This isn’t anything necessarily new, but they work really well and are definitely cool just for the geek-factor of being able to watch a chemical reaction over and over again.

Latest Gadget Gallery Matrix » Coolest Gadgets Says:

[...] Heart Hand Warmer to use again and again [...]

Ashley Says:

I recently bought a pair of these from EBay - they’re wonderful!

Push the little button inside and the sodium acetate inside the button sets off a chemical reaction in the gel that solidifies it and heats it up. Perfect for slipping into your gloves or back pocket. The heat lasts up to an hour and they’re easy to re-use again and again. Just stick them in hot water, melt the insides down, and use them again! I highly recommend these!

Suresh Says:

How does button trigger the chemical reaction?

Kitsune Says:

Suresh-

Inside the warmer is concentrated sodium acetate. Snapping the button makes all the little molecules inside (whatever you want to call them) freak out and crystallize by creating a nucleation center.

The easiest way to explain it would be to picture a football field of nerds. They’re happy, doing their thing, discussing D&D and whatnot. Then throw a jock into the field. Provoke the jock. He turns around and punches a nerd. The rest of the nerds freak out in response to that single nerd being punched and all the nerds falls over.

Simple, chemical chain reactions :3

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