[aprssig] APRS Radiation sensor

[Stephen H. Smith]

On 3/23/2011 2:52 PM, Bob Bruninga wrote:
>
>
> But is there a cheap alternative?
>
> All we need is a large set of parallel plates and a means to detect a
> passing particle causing a momentary change in conduction.  Crazy thought
> here, but would a large capacitor work?  It has the large surface area and
> ionizing radiation would surely cause a momentary pulse..
>
> OH.. shucks.  But then what you have is the other 99.9999999% of the
> parallel plates acting like a HUGE filter capacitor ACROSS the output...
> thus completely swamping the pulse.  Sheesh... nevermind.
>
> The Geiger tube has very low capacitance.  Hence very easy to detect.
>
> Maybe just for grins one could try the physically largest (High voltage) and
> lowest value capacitor they have in their junkbox, biased, and hooked to a
> high gain audio amp?
> Bob, Wb4APR
>

I thought a Geiger tube worked by conducting ionized trails being created 
between two electrodes in a low-pressure gas.     Could a bunch of NE2 neon 
lamps connected in parallel work?  Or perhaps the FL illuminator from a laptop 
panel or flat monitor? (The now-old style with flourescent lamps rather than 
white LEDs.)

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Stephen H. Smith    wa8lmf (at) aol.com
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