Build Your Own X-Ray Machine

Mr. Roboto writes "This web site has information on how to build your own X-ray machine from common household parts, inculding a vacuum tube, a few thousand feet of copper and a few other parts. There are also X-rays made of wood, fish and steel. I need to dig out my stash of vacuum tubes now." Unfortunately, I don't count "vacuum tubes" among common household parts, but this would be a great science fair project.

Comments

source for cheap film badges?

[green pizza]

Reading that made me wonder... where can one buy some film badges (the sort that radiology techs wear to alert them of excessive exposure) ? Anyone happen to know?

This is very dangerous

[qpt]

X-Rays have been proven to cause cancer even when used by professional physicians. Putting them in the hands of every-day individuals is highly irresponsible.

Our urban environments are already wrought with dangers in the form of guns and drugs. Do we really need gangs roving the streets with high-powered x-ray devices? I think the answer is obviously no, we do not.

The privacy implications are also troubling. Now, with complete lack of regard to my safety or rights, people can install x-ray machines anywhere - in parks, streets, or their homes.

I hope the government moves quickly and bans these devices, before their proliferation leads to certain harm.

- qpt

Re:This is very dangerous

[dair]

Do we really need gangs roving the streets with high-powered x-ray devices?

I think you'll be fairly safe - they also have to strap a large photographic plate to your back, then wait a couple of hours to have it developed. You'll probably notice.

-dair

think of the usefulness

[unformed]

if i can make it small enough, i can stick it in my eye and look through guys' pants!

Vaccum Tubes are *VERY* common yet.

[mr]

Unless you took your Linux IPO millions and bought a LCD monitor, or live your life out of a lap top, most of the rest of us mortals sit in front of a vaccum tube based CRT and bathe in (reduced) radiation all day long.

Monitors have lead in them for a reason. And its the same reason if you plan on building an x-ray machine, you had better be damn careful...radiation is harmful. Hopefully the fact you can't just D/L this and run it will keep it out of the hands of irresponsible boobs we'll call xray kiddies.

Re:Vaccum Tubes are *VERY* common yet.

[Detritus]

When color TV was becoming popular, there was concern about x-ray emissions from the picture tubes, which operated at a higher voltage than that of monochrome picture tubes. There was even a home x-ray measurement kit, that consisted of a piece of photographic film in a plastic holder. You were supposed to attach it to the front of the picture tube. After a specified amount of time, you were supposed to remove it and mail it to the manufacturer for development and evaluation. There was and is a concern that the high voltage regulation in the TV could fail, allowing the voltage to increase to a level that would result in significant emission of x-rays.

Classic Slashdot

[shambler snack]

Is this another example of it doesn't matter (or even exist) unless it's on the web? Note at the bottom of the page where this was take from:

The preceding was taken in full from
Section IX. Optics, Heat, and Electronics;
Chapter 3. An Inexpensive X-ray Machine
The Scientific American Book of Projects for The Amateur Scientist
Library of Congress Card Catalog Number: 60-14286
© Copyright 1960 by C. L. Strong

My father got me this book in middle school (for me, the mid-60's), and I used a number of the projects as starting points for my own hardware hacks. The most notable was the simple wind tunnel that used burning cones of incense to create streamers of smoke in the tunnel chamber. It was powered by a vacuum cleaner. I spent a fair amount of time making sure that air entering the chamber was even across the plenum. Another Scientific American experiment I started with was the construction of an electrostatic motor. I built a large one from plexiglass (12 inch diameter rotor, 18 inches long). I was into electrical and electronic hobbies, and this book was great just to read what others had done. My father never let me build the X-ray machine because he was afraid I'd irradiate myself and get cancer.

I'm happy somebody found it on the Web. But the book is far better.

This is fscking dangerous. Don't mess with X-Rays!

[mattr]

I was hoping against hope that the article would be about something cool like integrating an X-Ray exposure over time from plain old sunlight, perhaps with a cooled ccd and nifty software. (That's what I've been thinking about doing with starlight for a year anyway..)

Listen folks, you don't want to screw around with X-Rays unless you are heavily trained, okay? The lightest thing I can say is the article is irresponsible in light of modern technology and culture.

My grandfather (God rest his soul) always wore bandaids around his fingers. They were always coming off or getting soggy and wearing out, his fingernails were a mess (I think he missed them on one or two fingers completely), and it looked pretty painful. You see he was a dentist, I guess around when the article was written. Unfortunately they didn't know that your body is a pretty good integrator of radiation too.. so it was standard operating procedure to hold the film in a patient's mouth while beaming the X-rays into it and spraying it around his own fingers at the same time. They didn't think, 'lead aprons are for wooses', they just didn't know. Seems dumb and tragic now.

If you want to do something much more interesting than the proposed project, and maybe make a ton of money at the same time, why not work on integrating ambient radiation, whether sonic, electromagnetic, or nuclear. There was a good novel called Hollywood Dreamtime which talked about it a lot. The last thing we all need is for a young smart person excited by open source, hacking, and network effects, to start screwing around with unshielded spark coils. Odds are someone is going to get electrocuted or permanently damaged (maybe with malevolent intent).

On a lighter note, you could also learn to build a fucking powerful microwave oven with an oil drum and similar parts. That's what the Om cultists did in Japan a couple years ago, to turn their victims into ash. I'd say that's safer than building X-Ray generators and maybe leaving them plugged in over night by mistake.. X-Rays are great and 100% natural but they are too energetic to fuck around with for a household hobby.

This is very, very old news

[localroger]

I originally saw this project in a book of amateur science projects which was already quite old in the 70's when I was in high school. (I don't remember the title, but I think it might have been issued by Scientific American.) I actually did a few of the projects in this book, like the "mouse" that could learn to run a maze based on relay logic. The fact that the tube of choice was an 01A should tell you something.

I do have a 01A and briefly considered building the X-ray machine, but fortunately came to my senses before trying it. The trend in professional X-ray machines has been toward lower and lower emission with more sensitive film and detectors. Long-term exposure to X-rays is quite dangerous even at low levels.

SCIENCE FAIR PROJECT???!!!

[JoeGee]

"Johnny is sterile, but he got an A. We're proud of him, but of course we're sad about the grandkids."

Lots of other readers have commented on the effects of x-rays, so I'll spare everyone the regurgitated diatribe. Just please be more conscientious in regards to the cutesy comments editors add when they post these stories.

A better (if not safer) science project might be "The Darwinian Effect of Do-It-Yourself X-ray Kits on Budding Geniuses Who Spend too Much Time on Slashdot".