ARGH! Toys and more toys!
Be aware that the ex-cold war meters are designed to detect and measure the fallout from nuclear bombs, this is somewhat hotter than natural background radiation. They might not be sensitive enough, see text of the PDRM 82. The PDRM 82 is a bit of well made, tough as old boots, kit.
The Smartphone plugin looks intriguing but the blurb isn't that convincing about background radiation.
I suspect most people acquire the odd one or two and they are remarkably useful receptacles for oddments.
They aren't very nice to look at, can't you find something else for that purpose?
Doesn't the text reader only process the part which any other browser has already determined is text? So the only additional work his computer is doing over mine, is to read out the text I can see, same as if it were in notepad or Word.
I particularly like the look of the Double Diamond one I have.
The pots Stilton come in are also very useful.
The CD V-700 looks a lot like a counter I recall from a stand at something like the Ideal Home Exhibition, probably in the 1950s. Anybody with a luminous watch (like me) was asked to put it near the sensor. The clicks were fed through a speaker, so you could hear them increase rapidly as the watch got near.
They say that nothing on the site should be used for safety critical purposes.
Gilbert maintained that nothing in the set could possibly ever be dangerous. Not sure whether he included the toxicity of Polonium in that consideration though.
Trimfones used a fair amount of tritium. I believe during the cleanup of Harwell (it might have been another government site) a rather active hole in the ground was discovered where, it turns out, a significant number of these phones had been dumped.
Sealed tritium sources are safe enough, you can still buy them as small long-lasting light sources used by extreme campers / sailors etc, but not in the UK.
If you find the chinese/english manual (one sheet pamplet) or reviews for the smartphone plugin you may find that you wouldn't want to waste your money. It seems to pick up physical (slight) vibration to the sensor more than it picks up radiation.
Many of the cheap devices only seem to be sensitive enough to pick up (gamma) radiation levels that may be hazardous to health. They were/are intended for nuclear war use so you could avoid the hot spots.
It of course depends on the amounts of the substances in the toy, and how they're used. When I was at high school we did radiation experiments. The material was kept in lead boxes, and the radiation came out directionally from the container through a hole. A teacher once told me that all the safety measures we were taking were just for educational purposes, and the amount of stuff we were handling would probably only remotely harm us if we actually ate it.
Can you link to an example of it?
Like these?
Does it still work wonders?
I have a wonderful ashtray that bears the legend "Watneys Red Barrel, It's the same wherever you are.' I use it to hold used teabags.
Bill
Having looked through pictures of several Watneys ashtrays, I can't see one I'd like. Can't find yours though.
Google granite ashtrays pictures and see.
It's not luminous, it's phosphorescent.
No radioactivity invloved
Oddly enough, the one I have, which is in the form of two interlinked Ds, giving two tray areas, doesn't seem to feature in any of the images I can find of Double Diamond ashtrays.
Far too fancy. Mine are more like brown stoneware ramekins.
I can remember there used to be a Maplins kit to build a Geiger counter, the type that ticks and shows a reading on a needle, but i noticed it disappeared from their catalogue probably 10 or more years ago,
Ah. Although they aways say luminous on the product. I guess it's a more commonly known word.
Phosphorescence to me makes me think of fluorescent tubes.
Luminous covers all of the above; it's more general.
Fluorescent - when a substance absorbs a photon of UV or X-ray and emits it at a longer (e.g. visible) wavelength.
Phosphorescent - light emitted by a substance without combustion or perceptible heat e.g. glowworms or fireflies.
Luminous just means something is brighter than you'd expect given the ambient light. It tells you nothing about how the object is producing the extra light.
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