Opening hcm beads?

[CigarNut]

Originally Posted by pektel

The advice given here has convinced me to not mess with them. Since I don't have them in hand yet, I was unaware of how small the beads are. I was thinking they were like peppercorn sized.

The beads are small. Very small. Closer to grains of salt than peppercorns. They average about .03 inches in size (1 mm is .39 inches.)

Attached is a picture of an HCM bead under an electron microscope:


You can see how porous (spongy-looking) the surface of the beads are -- which is why they are so effective as a humidification device.