[hackerspaces] Geiger counters

[Marc Juul]

On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 9:18 PM, Chris Hardee <shazzner at gmail.com> wrote:
> You'll need something like this, I think:
> http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8875
> Not an easy part to source, I'm afraid.

Couldn't an old-fashioned smoke-detector be used as a cheap radiation
detector. Since it detects when the emitted alpha-particles are being
absorbed (by smoke), I assume you could put it in a bag, fill it up
with smoke (or something even better at absorbing) and when it stops
beeping, there is a radiation source more powerful than the built-in
alpha source. It would, of course, need calibration (and you might
want to invert when the beep is emitted).

I don't know enough to say if this is really feasible. Just an idea.

-- 
Marc Juul