Domestic sources of alpha particles - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 06:12:47 pm
content: Seen once a DIY alpha-particles detector made out of a conductive wire (serpentine or mesh) kept in free air, at high voltage and very close above a metal plate, so to produce a very intense electric field. The idea was that an eventual alpha particle entering in the high E field will produce a spark between the thin wire and the plate, spark that can be detected/counted. It was sensitive enough to detect even a single alpha particle. There was also a video (now gone) testing the DIY detector with Americium from a consumer smoke detector.That alpha particles detector is one of the fun-to-make projects I would like to try.The problem is that I don't have any Am smoke alarm, and I don't know what else I could use instead, for testing the detector in case I build one. Are there any other accessible items/materials/ways to produce alpha particles at home?

author: Andy Watson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 06:33:08 pm
content: Thiorated tungsten TIG welding electrodes ?Gas mantles?There's also radon, although, if you have that in your house you should probably thinking about moving out!

author: SteveThackery
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 06:52:39 pm
content: The older Alladin lamp mantles were radioactive, although I don't know what type of radiation. They make my Geiger counter go nuts.

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 07:16:35 pm
content: We never have had commercially available gas mantles here (same for Americium based smoke detectors), but there are plenty of thoriated tungsten TIG welding electrodes, thanks for the idea.

author: Gyro
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 07:20:49 pm
content: An old Radium dial wristwatch? They are quite common in antique / second hand shops - they will be the ones that no longer glow. You'll get Gamma rays as well as Alpha particles, but they won't affect a spark detector. DO NOT open, Radium painted on paper dials is far too toxic and will do you lots of Alpha emitting cell damage if ingested and will accumulate in your bones, be warned!

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 12, 2025, 07:39:00 pm
content: Specifically, alpha particles aren’t too dangerous, unless you inhale or otherwise ingest the emitter.Their range in tissue is very short, and they won’t penetrate the skin.

author: eliocor
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 13, 2025, 04:27:46 am
content: search on aliexpress for "NAP-07" or "HIS-07" or "Ion Chamber Smoke Sensor":

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 13, 2025, 04:38:35 am
content: Chinese quantum energy health stickers and similar garbage from aliexpress filled with thorium.

author: Smokey
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 13, 2025, 04:43:52 am
content: Doesn't uranium just emit alpha particles? Maybe some uranium glass or fiestaware?

author: Wallace Gasiewicz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 13, 2025, 05:10:44 pm
content: Alpha particles can be stopped by a piece of paper BUT if you get a heavy metal in your body that emits alpha, the heavy metal is sequestered in your bone marrow and can hit dividing cells with alpha. Very bad. This is the mechanism for Polonium Poisoning.So do not ingest any source of alpha....

author: Haenk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 07:59:49 am
content: https://www.epa.gov/radtown/radioactivity-tobaccoHowever I assume the level of radiation is way too low for a DIY detector.Another option ishttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uraninitewhich might be available from collectors.I'd just go for uranium glazed ceramics, mybe even found in a thrift store. And certainly available on ebay.

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 09:45:12 am
content: Meanwhile I've read the small neon light bulbs might contain radioactive elements, too.https://techlib.com/science/ion.html#Neon%20as%20ResistorThis is done to lower the breakdown voltage, so to make the neon bulb start glowing from a lower voltage. I have a few neon light bulbs leftovers, they were used as mains voltage indicators in mechanical on/off mains switches.

author: 5U4GB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 01:38:36 pm
content: Quote from: Andy Watson on April 12, 2025, 06:33:08 pm"Scalar energy sources" from China. They're woo-woo, but the "scalar energy" is from thorium mixed in with whatever sintered composition they're made of, and a reasonably safe alpha source as long as you don't scrape or scratch them.If you really want to get serious, you can buy all sorts of sources mail-order fromUnited Nuclear.

author: 5U4GB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 01:43:42 pm
content: Quote from: Haenk on April 15, 2025, 07:59:49 amThat's getting harder to find, particularly on sites like eBay which have banned it after a panic over someone doing something they shouldn't have with it. You can still find it but it's sold under codewords, at one point it was "Chinese green crystals" for torbernite, which is however -ing expensive.If you're in the US it's a lot easier, there's several minerals places that sell ore sourced from Utah and other locations in the US.

author: eliocor
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 03:20:25 pm
content: The "safest" and cheapest source of alpha particles is using the active part of ionization chambers for smoke detectors (as in my previous message) made with241Am (Americium).See:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americium-241https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoke_detector

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 15, 2025, 04:56:24 pm
content: Quote from: eliocor on April 15, 2025, 03:20:25 pmShitty Chinese stickers are cheaper and they really do like to put Thorium-232 in that junk.

author: 5U4GB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 16, 2025, 04:40:08 am
content: From the video those are very weak sources. The "scalar energy" pendants I bought a few years ago to check with a spectrometer are far more substantial and therefore show a lot more activity, but they seem to have vanished from the site. Or they may be still there under the appropriate magic search term, you just need to know what it is.I noticed the OP is in Romania which excludes readily-available minerals from US sources, but try a seller likerad_supplyin Germany who sells uranium glass test sources on eBay.

author: srb1954
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 16, 2025, 04:48:40 am
content: Quote from: RoGeorge on April 15, 2025, 09:45:12 amIn low ambient light conditions there is less residual ionisation from impinging light and so it is very much more difficult to start a discharge through the neon. The radioactive element provides some residual free ions, which facilitates the starting of the main discharge. Such neons are known as "dark effect" neons because they can still strike even in total darkness.

author: Haenk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 16, 2025, 05:02:20 am
content: Quote from: 5U4GB on April 15, 2025, 01:43:42 pmFound this nice overview:https://www.mineralienatlas.de/lexikon/index.php/MineralData?mineral=Uraninit

author: 5U4GB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 16, 2025, 08:23:39 am
content: For more on the "scalar energy" pendants, here's one by bionerd, who despite her name is a nuclear physicist, looking at one:In particular note the meatball constellation embossed on it, this is a sign that you're getting genuine woo-woo in your pendant.

author: richard.cs
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 22, 2025, 12:17:21 pm
content: Quote from: RoGeorge on April 12, 2025, 06:12:47 pmSo it's functionally the same as a Geiger–Müller tube, just operating with plain air at atmospheric pressure, which means the voltage has to come right up. I guess it eliminates the need for a thin alpha-transparent window, but the uncontrolled pressure and humidity might be a problem. Sounds like a fun project anyway.

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 22, 2025, 12:59:41 pm
content: Yes, something like that. The one I've seen built was made by user 'Selena' from a Romanian EE forum, elforum.roMeanwhile that forum lost all its attachment pics and files, and the YouTube video showing the working alpha detector is no longer available. I still have some brief notes I've made, and that's why the curiosity. Hope these might be enough to try to reproduce Selena's detector:Code:- the detector is a thin steel wire suspended at 1.5mm above a metal plate (inox or Al), in free air- about 3.5kV DC between the thin wire(+) and the plate(-)- 1Mohm series to charge an 100pF HV capacitor (DIY from a plastic tube for pills, and some Al food-wrapping foil)- RC = 100us- the applied 3.5kVdc should produce a continuous hissing, with a blue glowing Corona discharge visible in the dark- this detector is sensitive to alpha particles only (only they can produce strong enough ionisation in 1-2mm)- ionizing particles (i.e. alpha particles coming from an Am-241 smoke detector, 2 protons and 2 neutrons bound together, identical to a \$^4 _2 \textrm{He} ^{2+}\$ nucleus, so a +2 charge) that might enter in the very strong electric field between the plate and the thin wire of the sensor (>2.3MV/m) will be accelerated and will produce a spark- can detect even a single alpha particle, might spark once in a while from cosmic rays, too- induction-only spark-detector antenna (the grey wire NOT connected to the 3.5kV thin wire) to capture the spark pulses for a counter/audio detector- an AM or SW radio might work as well as a detector

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 22, 2025, 01:16:49 pm
content: While digging for details to post the above specs, found out that the original topic about that detector was ported to the new domain and the new format of the Ro EE forum:https://www.elforum.info/topic/36070-detectia-radiatiilor-alfa-beta-si-gamma-homemade/#entry345951Nice, will give it a re-read.(first post is from June 2010)

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 22, 2025, 02:34:40 pm
content: Quote from: richard.cs on April 22, 2025, 12:17:21 pmI believe spark chambers like these usually operate as “proportional counters”, not as Geiger-Mueller counters (which avalanche and need quenching). The difference usually is the magnitude of DC field applied to the gas.

author: joeqsmith
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 22, 2025, 06:42:18 pm
content: Not sure why YT recommended this. Never seen her channel. Interesting story about using yellow cake to make paint and problems with uneducated viewers going after her...

author: joeqsmith
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 23, 2025, 12:32:30 pm
content: This supplier seems to offer small samples.https://unitednuclear.com/misc-nuclear-items-c-2_8/