Radiation Detection

Hi folks, This is my second attempt with a Trinitite sample. I got a second sample from United Nuclear, knowing that I am doing gamma spectroscopy the people from UN selected a nice glassy sample for me. You typically have two kinds of Trinitite sample: sand-like and glass-like. The glassy ones supp...

Hi Massimo, that's great fun. I'm feeling much better by laughing. and so you stay young and do not age. Why limiting yourself to stop aging when you can reverse it? :D I remember having a good laugh at a "quantum pendant" ad once. The first thing was that "Chi-Ki-Bio" energy (which in my language ...

Hello Folks, And now for something completely different… Some time ago a person in my friendlist shared this object on FB. Another case of pseudoscience nonsense. I decided not to comment but I went and checked it out online. The amount of nonsense is breathtaking. This pendant, which in other versi...

Nice.
Pretty much matches what I got out of Tuff, they all have U238 and Th232 progeny + K40 unsurprisingly.
I have granite on my list too, but the next one will be something pretty different!

Massimo

I find with my tiny CsI/Na detector that I can see the lowest energies very well for Am241. Visible when the right voltage setting ~1310V for the smaller tube, shows the lower energy 13.92KeV, 17.8KeV and 26.5KeV gamma peaks quite well.. I am however unable to see those energies below 20KeV well wi...

pilgrim wrote: ↑

30 Jun 2019, 19:03

I don't know but I think it is due to the detector efficiency at low energies...

Of course. I wonder if it's all due to the size of the detector.

Hi Massimo, for such low level samples you need a very good lead shield, at least 5cm all around the detector IMHO ,for inside chamber dimensions bigger is better for reducing backscatter. I've made a modular lead shield made by rings that could take inside a standard 5-600cc Marinelli for 3"x3" de...

Hi Massimo, good work as always. If it helps, this is my spectra recorded with the same source using a Victoreen LEG with a 1,5 x 0,5" NaI(Tl) crystal. c-Am241-Victoreen-10000s.jpg The peaks are 13.9, 17.7, 23.5 (sum peak of 20.8 e 26.4) and 59.6 keV Interesting that you have a few low energy peaks...

Hi guys, Today I tested a smoke alarm containing 0.9 microcurie of Am241 so unsurprisingly Am241 is what I found. The smoke alarm was bought on Ebay and the package clearly says what's inside. The radioactive material is inside the little ionisation chamber so among the interactions registered by th...

Massimo, If you look at the diagram I posted above, it seems reasonable that you can correct for the absorption error simply by adding a constant to the distance between source and crystal (radius). Say in the above example you simply add 10 mm, this suggests that the crystal is 10 mm further away ...