Safecast Logging Geiger Counter Kickstarter

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Hi hackers,

I’ve been looking at this Kickstarter: Safecast bGeigie Raku

For a logging Geiger based off an Arduino, $800 USD seems really expensive.

They’ve open sourced their bGeigieNanoKit: GitHub - Safecast/bGeigieNanoKit: bGeigieNano is a kit version of the bGeigie mobile survey geiger counter designed to fit into a Pelican Micro Case 1010. and they sell the kits for $550 USD https://shop.kithub.cc/products/safecast-bgeigie-nano

Any thoughts on really costs for building this? Would this make a good VHS project?

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I think this is great idea for a VHS project.

I enjoyed Luka Mustafa talk which covered his hardware contributions to SafeCast

Mark

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Twenty years ago, I built a Geiger counter from a kit that I got from Electronic Goldmine.
Cost me around $50.00 US. Looks like they still sell kits in that price range ( $79.95), ok, that’s taking two decades of price inflation into account… You can buy raw Geiger tubes for as little as $15.00, so, if you are willing to build your own 400V DC power supply from junk box parts, it’s possible to build a Geiger counter complete with Arduino clone, for under $75 US.

http://www.goldmine-elec-products.com/products.asp?dept=1473

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“For a logging Geiger based off an Arduino, $800 USD seems really expensive.”

You are right. Even $550 is too much for a kit. And that’s US$…

Look up the Brogan kit and its evolution. Good history, good documentation, plenty of users (make sure to take a look at the enclosure gallery!) all over the planet.

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This popped up on Hackaday today.

Also

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Geiger counter is kind of not very useful, boring thing. A kind of toy you got bored with in 1 hour.
$800 can get you a usable gamma spectrometer so that you can see what a you are looking at - Radium, Uranium, Cesium, and so on …
Some links:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Portable-NaI-Tl-30x40-Well-Scintillator-Gamma-Spectrometer-for-iPad-iPhone-PC-/322508725962?hash=item4b17049eca:g:LOEAAOSwONBZD4yy

and this dude’s channel where he have fun with his spectrometer which is I think a scintillator connected to ENERGY spectrum analyzer (don’t confuse with RF one): https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnAhUiJynSNpHLNVa4nZfoQ

Someone is selling “SEI Inspector EXP” on ebay for $2300, last time I looked there were several for around $870.

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I guess it sort of depends on your intended purpose… If your equipping a fallout shelter or mineral prospecting.

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You are right.
Speaking of fallout shelter. I have heard that by looking at spectrum from you can even find out what hits you - Indian nuke, American, Russian, Chinese or it was just a garbage from Homer Sipson’s garage etc. Cannot find examples of charts that can be used as examples. Perhaps looking at samples from respectful test sites would make it clear.

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This set of tools looks pretty awesome as well:

I especially like the City model with the Air Quality sensing:
https://www.uradmonitor.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/comp_model_CITY.jpg

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