... ask if they could give you one if they have one. Then use that in your experiment to detect xrays as it will glow when exposed to xrays, and ONLY to xrays.
You need to find a flouroscope screen. They use a special fosfor that will glow ONLY in x-rays (will be unresponsive to UV blacklight and even shortwave UV). These have of course been replaced by digital cameras sensitive to xrays in hospitals but if you want succh a screen you'll need to go to your local hospital if they have an xray facility and just walk in and ask to speak to a radioligest. Then ask if they have any "vintage" xray equipment like fluorescent xray screens and...
@BankaiIchigo12345 the x-ray flux which produces a slight visible glow on a fluoroscope screen will produce so many clicks on a geiger counter that it sounds like a roaring noise. If your GM counter only gives a few extra clicks, that's far too little x-rays to produce visible flashes.
GM tubes can pick up background radiation, and since they depend on ionized gas (which can also occur from strong RF signal like from a tesla coil, or a high voltage discharge source due to the inductive-capacitive effects of the wiring creating an RF oscillator with the spark to complete the circuit) you will have no way of knowing what's triggering the GM tube. Only something SPECIFICALLY xray sensitive (like a fluorescent xray plate) will tell you if you are making xrays.
@BankaiIchigo12345 Not quite true. Just test your particular GM counter by waving the end of your active HV coil near various parts. The Ludlum ignores this, but another older counter at work is poorly shielded and does give high artifact counts if the HV AC comes anywhere near its probe coil cord. Solution for the skeptical: good EM shielding. Wrap entire counter+probe in a single foil faraday shield. Or use a small kit-built GM counter inside a diecast Al box.
Another test if if your bulb is fluorescing, but it's a WHOLE LOT harder to get uncoated glass to fluoresce than it is to get an xray fluorescent plate to fluoresce, so if your uncoated glass bulb is fluorescing you are generating a HUGE ammount of xrays. That's not safe. I'd depend on a fluorescent xray plate (a.k.a. fluoroscope plate) to tell me if I'm generating xrays.
@BankaiIchigo12345 Maybe this changes with tiny bulbs, and w/spark coils down below 20KV? I had an uncoated high-vac "exit sign bulb" flash green glass fluorescece, powered w/Vacuum-Tester type tesla coil, yet no visible output from lanex cartridge intensifier screen, and my large-window Ludlum pancake probe gave only 100s CPM at inches distance. Compare to dental tube run 15KV reg. DC gave slight visible flicker of lanex screen, gives GM count of many 1000s CPM.
That's odd. You'd think glass would emit less light from xray exposure than a dedicated fluorescent screen. Maybe the light bulb fluorescence is actually from electron bombardment, not from xray exposure. Then the next question is, does your dental xray tube have glass fluorescing too, or just the light bulb? By the way where can I buy a lanex or other fluorescent xray screen?
@BankaiIchigo12345 w/incandescent bulbs, the fluorescence (green or blue, depending glass type) all comes from electron bombardment. X-ray flux is also from the glass. Don't know if filament emits much if any x-rays. 6BC-1, 6VS-1 tube glass does glow. Dental tube glass doesn't glow at uA drive, but I've never run it full blast (several mA.) Ebay has has kodak lanex x-ray intensifier cassettes, also called "green-screen" or "rare-earth." Try for under $25
these ARENT X RAYS!! you cant produce xrays this way ; your geiger counter is only showing radio waves created by the HV discharge ; if you dont believe me try to take an X ray photo with some dental radio-film and you will see ; or u can also use a piece of an old radioscopic screen (I did it too)..
@totoff92 I don't have the resources to know for sure, but did you read my comment to phikre? Why would I get a reading with some bulbs and not others and no reading with an open air discharge? I welcome an explanation since I'm here to learn. What's your "buzz?"
@helixwinder i think 30 keV or more is needed for energies to produce x-rays, i remember this from my study of high energy physics long ago. X rays accrue in two short bursts (at the spark gap), one near the time of the peak voltage and one during the time that the voltage collapsed in the gap.
That green glow on the inner surface of the glass is a positive indication that he is bombarding the glass with a lot of free electrons. As long as the voltage can reach a minimum of 20 KVP, there will be X-ray photons in the space outside the tube. I am an X-ray equipment engineer. I'm not guessing. I know what I'm talking about. I have 32 years of hands on exp. Please be careful guy. Low energy X-ray is actually more dangerous than high energy because the body absorbs 100% of it.
You can definitely get X-rays like this. I have tried with HF current from a Violet Ray machine and got a reaction from a Geiger counter.To discount the possibility of RF interference I then tried with a 1920s hand held fluoroscope and saw a glow on the screen from the X-rays.
@totoff92 Yes they're x-rays. Soft x-rays well under 100KV. Any use of high voltage with high vacuum is always a safety issue for "Crookes-type" x-ray production. Rule of thumb: if you see no glow discharge, yet the glass is fluorescing, then you'd better turn the darned thing off, since you're producing KeV electrons and creating an x-ray hazard
Also: a GM counter needs an alpha window in order to detect soft x-rays, since they're easily blocked by steel foil or aluminum plates.
@totoff92 Geiger counters cant detect radiowaves.. You would need special equipment for that. Geiger counters only Detect (a) Alpha (b) Beta (y) Gamma
@totoff92 those are xrays my friend, theres not reason they shouldnt be. granted the meter will pick up some noise, that glass in fluorescing green, which is a sign of xrays. plus some bulbs have a vacuum in the to protect the filament
That green glow is a give away that x-rays are being made. Its known as scintillation. Its how Radium clocks glow, the Radium is that radioactive, if combined with special paint, it releases visible light photons. You can build ignition coils, or buy a hand held device, Model BD-10A its called that you plug right into mains, its like a hand held Tesla Coil, outputs up to 50KV. Anything more than like 30KV in a vacuum can make x-rays. Rectifier tubes I heard can produce stronger x-rays.
That green glow on the inner surface of the glass is a positive indication that he is bombarding the glass with a lot of free electrons. As long as the voltage can reach a minimum of 20 KVP, there will be X-ray photons in the space outside the tube. Please be careful.
Are you sure you're getting rays? That geiger counter also detects beta (high energy electrons.) It seems that some of those clicks are probably electrons escaping and flying into the counter's tube. You could test this by putting a few sheets of paper between the light and the counter. If the count goes down it is beta (electrons), if it remains the same then you are probably getting xrays.
I tried kind of the same setup and the ticks i got from my geigercounter just were caused by the electromagnetic disturbances of the sparks and the oscillator circuit.
The fact that X-rays can only be produced by DC current confirms my objection.
@phikre I'm pretty sure that I'm getting soft x-rays. I didn't show it, but I ran the circuit without the bulb and didn't get any reading with and without the hv sparking. I also tried other similar bulbs, even the same brand, that did not produce any reading either--it depends if the bulb has a relatively high vacuum and many do not. The one I used had a green fluorescence. You can get x-rays from AC, if fact the first x-ray tubes used Tesla coils or induction coils. DC is much better though.
@helixwinder alpha-window GM tube? For low-energy x-rays, a big pancake-style alpha-window tube is best. Most normal geiger counters have too thick an envelope to allow 5 or 10 or 20KeV x-rays through.
@phikreThe DC source is rapidly disconnected from the pri, & the mag. field rapidly collapses, this is like a generator with a very fast rotor. A HV DC pulse is induced in the large sec. winding. The rise time of the pulse constitutes RF that flows through the 100pF capacitor he made with foil on the outside of the bulb. The tube will self-rectify because of the differential in surface area of the "electrodes". His electron flux is causing the glass to fluoresce. This bulb has high vacuum.
Pretty nice set-up, I love the DIY circuits people come up with over my easier abusing pre-made electronics lol. What voltage is the circuit, and also were you able to rule out EMF fields causing the counter to click? If you can put the meter inside of a steel box to filter out EMFs and still get clicks or if it obeys the inverse square law and drops off gradually instead of suddenly to 0 at a certain distance, that'll be good sign that you've been victorious. ^_^
@AScannerClearly The spark distance is about 1/2" so I think it's about 25 kv, any more voltage and it will spark over. An open air spark gives a click every 2 seconds or so when about 1 foot or less away. With the bulb in place, I get decreasing readings at up to about 5 or 6 feet and there is some directionality but I haven't determined what the angle(s) is as yet. Eight thicknesses of Al foil don't seem to have much of an effect but a 1/32" Al or steel plate does.
I knew that x-rays could be produced with high voltages and high vacuum but I wasn't aware it could be done with such a crude setup. I am not familiar with the units of measurement of radiation. About how much is being produced? A couple dozen times ambient radiation? Enough to expose an x-ray image in less than a minute? Enough to make something fluoresce opposite a sheet of aluminum foil? Interesting video, thanks for posting.
@npaltmp I wish that I knew the answer to your questions too. You should be able to read the meter scale showing a peak of 1 mR/hr so you know as much as I do. It is higher than background-notice that when I remove the power from the coil the meter goes to zero. I did this experiment only hours ago, and its purpose was to determine if any x-rays were produced at all. Eventually I'll probably get a vacuum tube which will have enough output to expose film with an intensifying screen.
Very nice!
Roobert33 1 month ago
... ask if they could give you one if they have one. Then use that in your experiment to detect xrays as it will glow when exposed to xrays, and ONLY to xrays.
BankaiIchigo12345 4 months ago
You need to find a flouroscope screen. They use a special fosfor that will glow ONLY in x-rays (will be unresponsive to UV blacklight and even shortwave UV). These have of course been replaced by digital cameras sensitive to xrays in hospitals but if you want succh a screen you'll need to go to your local hospital if they have an xray facility and just walk in and ask to speak to a radioligest. Then ask if they have any "vintage" xray equipment like fluorescent xray screens and...
BankaiIchigo12345 4 months ago
@BankaiIchigo12345 the x-ray flux which produces a slight visible glow on a fluoroscope screen will produce so many clicks on a geiger counter that it sounds like a roaring noise. If your GM counter only gives a few extra clicks, that's far too little x-rays to produce visible flashes.
wbeaty 1 month ago
@wbeaty
GM tubes can pick up background radiation, and since they depend on ionized gas (which can also occur from strong RF signal like from a tesla coil, or a high voltage discharge source due to the inductive-capacitive effects of the wiring creating an RF oscillator with the spark to complete the circuit) you will have no way of knowing what's triggering the GM tube. Only something SPECIFICALLY xray sensitive (like a fluorescent xray plate) will tell you if you are making xrays.
BankaiIchigo12345 1 month ago
@BankaiIchigo12345 Not quite true. Just test your particular GM counter by waving the end of your active HV coil near various parts. The Ludlum ignores this, but another older counter at work is poorly shielded and does give high artifact counts if the HV AC comes anywhere near its probe coil cord. Solution for the skeptical: good EM shielding. Wrap entire counter+probe in a single foil faraday shield. Or use a small kit-built GM counter inside a diecast Al box.
wbeaty 1 month ago
@wbeaty
Another test if if your bulb is fluorescing, but it's a WHOLE LOT harder to get uncoated glass to fluoresce than it is to get an xray fluorescent plate to fluoresce, so if your uncoated glass bulb is fluorescing you are generating a HUGE ammount of xrays. That's not safe. I'd depend on a fluorescent xray plate (a.k.a. fluoroscope plate) to tell me if I'm generating xrays.
BankaiIchigo12345 1 month ago
@BankaiIchigo12345 Maybe this changes with tiny bulbs, and w/spark coils down below 20KV? I had an uncoated high-vac "exit sign bulb" flash green glass fluorescece, powered w/Vacuum-Tester type tesla coil, yet no visible output from lanex cartridge intensifier screen, and my large-window Ludlum pancake probe gave only 100s CPM at inches distance. Compare to dental tube run 15KV reg. DC gave slight visible flicker of lanex screen, gives GM count of many 1000s CPM.
wbeaty 1 month ago
@wbeaty
That's odd. You'd think glass would emit less light from xray exposure than a dedicated fluorescent screen. Maybe the light bulb fluorescence is actually from electron bombardment, not from xray exposure. Then the next question is, does your dental xray tube have glass fluorescing too, or just the light bulb? By the way where can I buy a lanex or other fluorescent xray screen?
BankaiIchigo12345 1 month ago
@BankaiIchigo12345 w/incandescent bulbs, the fluorescence (green or blue, depending glass type) all comes from electron bombardment. X-ray flux is also from the glass. Don't know if filament emits much if any x-rays. 6BC-1, 6VS-1 tube glass does glow. Dental tube glass doesn't glow at uA drive, but I've never run it full blast (several mA.) Ebay has has kodak lanex x-ray intensifier cassettes, also called "green-screen" or "rare-earth." Try for under $25
wbeaty 1 month ago
Comment removed
AlastairWright 5 months ago
Comment removed
AlastairWright 5 months ago
these ARENT X RAYS!! you cant produce xrays this way ; your geiger counter is only showing radio waves created by the HV discharge ; if you dont believe me try to take an X ray photo with some dental radio-film and you will see ; or u can also use a piece of an old radioscopic screen (I did it too)..
sorry to dissapoint you.
totoff92 6 months ago
@totoff92 I don't have the resources to know for sure, but did you read my comment to phikre? Why would I get a reading with some bulbs and not others and no reading with an open air discharge? I welcome an explanation since I'm here to learn. What's your "buzz?"
helixwinder 6 months ago
@helixwinder i think 30 keV or more is needed for energies to produce x-rays, i remember this from my study of high energy physics long ago. X rays accrue in two short bursts (at the spark gap), one near the time of the peak voltage and one during the time that the voltage collapsed in the gap.
mechanicalbu11 1 month ago
Comment removed
joesitter20101 6 months ago
That green glow on the inner surface of the glass is a positive indication that he is bombarding the glass with a lot of free electrons. As long as the voltage can reach a minimum of 20 KVP, there will be X-ray photons in the space outside the tube. I am an X-ray equipment engineer. I'm not guessing. I know what I'm talking about. I have 32 years of hands on exp. Please be careful guy. Low energy X-ray is actually more dangerous than high energy because the body absorbs 100% of it.
joesitter20101 6 months ago
@totoff92
You can definitely get X-rays like this. I have tried with HF current from a Violet Ray machine and got a reaction from a Geiger counter.To discount the possibility of RF interference I then tried with a 1920s hand held fluoroscope and saw a glow on the screen from the X-rays.
AlastairWright 5 months ago
@totoff92 Yes they're x-rays. Soft x-rays well under 100KV. Any use of high voltage with high vacuum is always a safety issue for "Crookes-type" x-ray production. Rule of thumb: if you see no glow discharge, yet the glass is fluorescing, then you'd better turn the darned thing off, since you're producing KeV electrons and creating an x-ray hazard
Also: a GM counter needs an alpha window in order to detect soft x-rays, since they're easily blocked by steel foil or aluminum plates.
wbeaty 1 month ago
@totoff92 Geiger counters cant detect radiowaves.. You would need special equipment for that. Geiger counters only Detect (a) Alpha (b) Beta (y) Gamma
Huffdev 2 weeks ago
@totoff92 those are xrays my friend, theres not reason they shouldnt be. granted the meter will pick up some noise, that glass in fluorescing green, which is a sign of xrays. plus some bulbs have a vacuum in the to protect the filament
jeffddow 2 weeks ago
That green glow is a give away that x-rays are being made. Its known as scintillation. Its how Radium clocks glow, the Radium is that radioactive, if combined with special paint, it releases visible light photons. You can build ignition coils, or buy a hand held device, Model BD-10A its called that you plug right into mains, its like a hand held Tesla Coil, outputs up to 50KV. Anything more than like 30KV in a vacuum can make x-rays. Rectifier tubes I heard can produce stronger x-rays.
forwardbias 7 months ago
That green glow on the inner surface of the glass is a positive indication that he is bombarding the glass with a lot of free electrons. As long as the voltage can reach a minimum of 20 KVP, there will be X-ray photons in the space outside the tube. Please be careful.
joesitter20101 7 months ago
Are you sure you're getting rays? That geiger counter also detects beta (high energy electrons.) It seems that some of those clicks are probably electrons escaping and flying into the counter's tube. You could test this by putting a few sheets of paper between the light and the counter. If the count goes down it is beta (electrons), if it remains the same then you are probably getting xrays.
AluminumStudios 9 months ago
Are you sure that you produced X-rays?
I tried kind of the same setup and the ticks i got from my geigercounter just were caused by the electromagnetic disturbances of the sparks and the oscillator circuit.
The fact that X-rays can only be produced by DC current confirms my objection.
phikre 9 months ago
@phikre I'm pretty sure that I'm getting soft x-rays. I didn't show it, but I ran the circuit without the bulb and didn't get any reading with and without the hv sparking. I also tried other similar bulbs, even the same brand, that did not produce any reading either--it depends if the bulb has a relatively high vacuum and many do not. The one I used had a green fluorescence. You can get x-rays from AC, if fact the first x-ray tubes used Tesla coils or induction coils. DC is much better though.
helixwinder 9 months ago
@helixwinder alpha-window GM tube? For low-energy x-rays, a big pancake-style alpha-window tube is best. Most normal geiger counters have too thick an envelope to allow 5 or 10 or 20KeV x-rays through.
wbeaty 1 month ago
@phikreThe DC source is rapidly disconnected from the pri, & the mag. field rapidly collapses, this is like a generator with a very fast rotor. A HV DC pulse is induced in the large sec. winding. The rise time of the pulse constitutes RF that flows through the 100pF capacitor he made with foil on the outside of the bulb. The tube will self-rectify because of the differential in surface area of the "electrodes". His electron flux is causing the glass to fluoresce. This bulb has high vacuum.
joesitter20101 6 months ago
Pretty nice set-up, I love the DIY circuits people come up with over my easier abusing pre-made electronics lol. What voltage is the circuit, and also were you able to rule out EMF fields causing the counter to click? If you can put the meter inside of a steel box to filter out EMFs and still get clicks or if it obeys the inverse square law and drops off gradually instead of suddenly to 0 at a certain distance, that'll be good sign that you've been victorious. ^_^
AScannerClearly 1 year ago
@AScannerClearly The spark distance is about 1/2" so I think it's about 25 kv, any more voltage and it will spark over. An open air spark gives a click every 2 seconds or so when about 1 foot or less away. With the bulb in place, I get decreasing readings at up to about 5 or 6 feet and there is some directionality but I haven't determined what the angle(s) is as yet. Eight thicknesses of Al foil don't seem to have much of an effect but a 1/32" Al or steel plate does.
helixwinder 1 year ago
I knew that x-rays could be produced with high voltages and high vacuum but I wasn't aware it could be done with such a crude setup. I am not familiar with the units of measurement of radiation. About how much is being produced? A couple dozen times ambient radiation? Enough to expose an x-ray image in less than a minute? Enough to make something fluoresce opposite a sheet of aluminum foil? Interesting video, thanks for posting.
npaltmp 1 year ago
@npaltmp I wish that I knew the answer to your questions too. You should be able to read the meter scale showing a peak of 1 mR/hr so you know as much as I do. It is higher than background-notice that when I remove the power from the coil the meter goes to zero. I did this experiment only hours ago, and its purpose was to determine if any x-rays were produced at all. Eventually I'll probably get a vacuum tube which will have enough output to expose film with an intensifying screen.
helixwinder 1 year ago