Slightly radioactive flashlight, or?

[brightarc]

Hi.
I recently bought two Romisen RC-N3 flashlights and I suspect that they are very slightly radioactive.

I have a geiger counter set up to monitor the background radiation in my bedroom. It usually reads about 0.14 µSv/h so I'll use that figure as a baseline.

When I place either one of the flashlights beside the geiger counter the frequency of wich it registers counts increases from about 0.14 µSv/h to 0.25 µSv/h.

That is an increase of 0.11 µSv/h or about 79% in radiation from the baseline.

I am just a novice when it comes to the field of radiology, but I suspect that the flashlight's are slightly radioactive.

If anyone with a little bit more insight and experience could clear this up a little bit for me would be much appreciated!

 

[MrGman]

could be the phosphor of the phosphor coating over the LED.

 

[brightarc]

Good idea, but I don't believe that the led is the source of the radiation.
My other flashlights, also cree ones, does not raise the radiation readout on the counter.

 

[gOhAsE]

There have always been rumors that contaminated steel could get into production processes.

Contaminated steel has already been found on several scrapyards in Europe (where at least some scans for such material are made) and even some products from china did contain contaminated steel.

I always wanted to check my chinese lights if they contain contaminated materials.

Here is an automatic translation of an German article about this problem:

http://translate.google.de/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.heise.de%2Ftp%2Fr4%2Fartikel%2F28%2F28546%2F1.html&sl=de&tl=en&hl=de&ie=UTF-8

 

[Marduke]

There have always been rumors that contaminated steel could get into production processes.

Contaminated steel has already been found on several scrapyards in Europe (where at least some scans for such material are made) and even some products from china did contain contaminated steel.

I always wanted to check my chinese lights if they contain contaminated materials.

Here is an automatic translation of an German article about this problem:

http://translate.google.de/translat...el/28/28546/1.html&sl=de&tl=en&hl=de&ie=UTF-8

But contaminated aluminum??

Guess that's one reason to not hold your flashlight in our mouth.... or in too deep of pockets

 

[brightarc]

So my flashlights could be made out of contaminated materials?
If so it is only a very minor contamination, but still a bit frightening.

Maybe I should check more of my stuff with the "made in china" tag for radiation contamination before I use them?

:sick2:

 

[hank]

You could ask -- they'd probably like to buy one from the same supplier and check it.

http://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/regulatory/allegations/safety-concern.html

Non-Emergency

Including any concern involving ... radioactive materials.

You may send an e-mail to Allegations.
[email protected]
However, because e-mail transmission may not be completely secure, if you are concerned about protecting your identity it is preferable that you contact us by phone or in person. You may contact any NRC employee (including a resident inspector) or call:

NRC's Toll-Free Safety Hotline:
(800) 695-7403

Note: Calls to this number are not recorded between the hours of 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time. However, calls received outside these hours are answered by the Incident Response Operations Center on a recorded line.
(more info at the link, this was a brief excerpt)

----
Have you tried putting your counter at different distances?
Are you counting gamma or do you have a mica-window to count beta?
Heck, call them, they'll know the right questions.

Might be more important to find out if whatever's causing the counts can come off on your hands and be ingested -- now _that_ would be a concern, if it were in the paint or dust.

 

[jojobos]

Can you take the flashlight apart and measure each section(head, tail, body and battery)?

 

[brightarc]

Have you tried putting your counter at different distances?
Are you counting gamma or do you have a mica-window to count beta?
Heck, call them, they'll know the right questions.

Might be more important to find out if whatever's causing the counts can come off on your hands and be ingested -- now _that_ would be a concern, if it were in the paint or dust.

I have a geiger conter with a mica window.
So that would be beta and gamma radiation.
Thanks for the tip, I live in Sweden though.
I believe I found the source of the radiation.

Can you take the flashlight apart and measure each section(head, tail, body and battery)?

The radiation appears to be comming from the clip (will attach photo when I figure out how to do that)

 

[Patriot]

This is strange but interesting. :thinking:

 

[Marduke]

The radiation appears to be comming from the clip (will attach photo when I figure out how to do that)

That would be contaminated steel then. I wouldn't worry too much, the increase from ambient is very small.

To attach a photo, you upload it to an online sharing site like imageshack or photobucket. There is a "insert photo" icon when you post a reply, and you paste a link to the picture there.

 

[brightarc]

This is what it looks like:

And this is the baseline without the clip present:

 

[Marduke]

I'd be interested what level your smoke detector reads.

 

[brightarc]

It doesn't affect the gm counter, I have an optic smoke detector.

The radioactive variety doesn't register either as the Americium-241 in them mostly produce alpha particles as it decays.
The alpha particles are easily trapped inside a shielded housing in the smoke detector.

 

[Illum]

it could be from other sources...like potassium decay for example...

I'm sure by now you've noticed bananas register pretty well on Geiger counters

 

[hyperloop]

Hi.
I have a geiger counter set up to monitor the background radiation in my bedroom.

My question is: why do you have a geiger counter in the bedroom?????

 

[Tekno_Cowboy]

I wouldn't mind knowing why myself.

 

[hank]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article4995999.ece

October 23, 2008
Your finger could be on a nuclear button in the lift

... Otis acted after the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) found that 20 workers who had handled the Indian-made buttons, had been exposed to excessive doses of radiation. This came from traces of Cobalt-60 which the ASN classified as Level two on the seven-step International Nuclear Event Scale.

The buttons were supplied to Otis by Mafelec, a southeastern France company which said that it had shipped the same parts to Otis in Britain, Italy, Spain and other countries in Europe. A shipment to the United States had been detected as radioactive as it was passing through Paris airport to the United States on October 10. ...
...
"These items have virtually nothing toxic," said Gilles Heinrich, the chief executive of Mafelec. "There is no justification for this panic... I am sure that many businesses receive parts such as this but never detect them," he told The Times.

Steel items imported from India to Sweden have also recently been reported to show faint traces of radioactivity. The levels of Cobalt 60 were considered harmless and the components had not been recalled, the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority said yesterday.

The French ASN said it believed that several Indian companies had exported products contaminated with Cobalt 60 to a number of countries. It named them as Bunts, Laxmi, SKM Steels, Vipras Castings, and Pradeep Metals. It is in contact with Indian authorities.

Experts said the cobalt could have come from a variety of possible sources which supply scrap metal to Indian firms for recycling. These included parts from decommissioned nuclear reactors, hospital radiation equipment or the hulls of Russian or American nuclear submarines.

------

Edited to add:
http://abintrapress.netfirms.com/articles/radmetal.htm

"... 5.5 million pounds of radioactive steel scrap was shipped to China and Taiwan from Louisiana and Texas between 1993 and 1996. There's no telling how much of it has come back to us as knives, eating and cooking utensils, toys, or other goods.
Some of the radioactive metal shipped to China emitted up to 2,000 microrems per hour of radiation, which is about 400 times the normal background radiation level...."

 

[orcinus]

My question is: why do you have a geiger counter in the bedroom?????

He hates waking up in the middle of the night wondering if a tac nuke just went off few blocks away. Sheesh. Some people really ask the dumbest of questions... :laughing:

 

[Bradlee]

My question is: why do you have a geiger counter in the bedroom?????

Why wouldn't you? I wish I did, but