--------------------------------------------------------Original Message-----
From: David Ricketts [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2003 5:02 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [TN] Brominated Hydrocarbons and Mountain Dew (NTC-sort of)It wasn't opium, it was coca, as in the source of cocaine. It is rumored that they still use flavoring derived from the coca plant!David
-----Original Message-----
From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Charlie Pitarys
Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2003 1:05 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [TN] Brominated Hydrocarbons and Mountain Dew (NTC-sort of)And they thought the opium extract in COCA-COLA , way back in the "good ole days" was bad!
[Charlie Pitarys]From: Steve Gregory [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2003 12:25 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [TN] Brominated Hydrocarbons and Mountain Dew (NTC-sort of)Hi Mike!
Found the information below about Brominated Vegetable Oil, it's keep the other flavor oils from separating in your Dew...
-Steve Gregory-
Brominated Vegetable Oil For those who care about their body...
A little health information from ForEverWorld Books. Today is a sad day in Erin's gaming life, for I have come to realize that Mt. Dew is too questionable for my health. I ran out to purchase the Code Red Mountain Dew, drank it, loved it and then read the label. At the bottom were the ingredients Brominated Vegetable Oil. Being curious, I checked it out on the web. Starting with Atomic/GuruNet, I found that Brominated means 'to combine a substance with bromine or a bromine compound'. Then I looked up Bromine. It's defined as:
A heavy, volatile, corrosive, reddish-brown, nonmetallic liquid element, having a
highly irritating vapor. It is used in producing gasoline antiknock mixtures, fumigants,
dyes, and photographic chemicals. Atomic weight 79.904; atomic number 35;
melting point 7.2°C; boiling point 58.78°C; valence 1, 3, 5, 7.
YUCK!! I thought that poisons at the gaming table were supposed to be a fictional thing!So I checked out the FDA pages, which state that BVO has been allowed in our foods since 1977, but remains in the top 2000 toxicity additives and must be re-examined every 6 months. The additive cannot exceed 15 parts per million (just one ounce must be diluted into 520 gallons of Mountain Dew to stay under the toxicity level - or 5546 (12) oz cans).
It is also illegal to put BVO in anything without declaring it first. Coca-Cola found this out with a batch of Minute Maid Grape that had to be recalled for not declaring BVO on it's label.
Like PCBs, BVO leaves traces in the fat cells of your body. Nothing like being dyed from the inside out with your favorite citric soda, eh? Yes, unfortunately BVO is in many citric-based soft drinks besides Mt. Dew - it's purpose is to make the flavoring oils the same density as water. This keeps the flavor oil from separating in your soda.
But don't take my word for it. Check out the research for yourself on Google or the FDA homepage.
This posting has no relevance to circuit boards or assemblies, but given the amount of discussion on this forum on the drive to eliminate brominated flame retardants in PWB materials and the fondness of some regulars for the Dew, I think it's relevant.
The other day, I noticed one of my co-workers drinking a liquid that was unnaturally bright red. I queried him on exactly what this liquid was. He replied Mountain Dew Code Red. This led to a discussion of what exactly was Code Red. A scan of the ingredients revealed the expected red dye but surprisingly, it also contained brominated vegetable oil. I immediately asked why the makers of this product felt it necessary to add an apparent flame retardant to their product. My co-worker (incidentally a chemist who really should no better but claims that he somehow manages to compartmentalize all this stuff) had no idea.
I just thought this whole thing is very ironic. Most of us work in an industry that is spending millions of dollars trying to remove bromine from one of the constituents while at the same time you have a "food" product to which intentionally is added a brominated hydrocarbon. Does anybody know what purpose the brominated vegetable oil serves? It also turns out the some component is in regular Dew as well as diet red dew but not diet regular Dew.
Now back to our regularly scheduled programming....
Mike McMaster
RF Product Engineer
Merix Corporation
503-992-4263
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