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K64-CI180G_LND712 HIRO+plusGeiger Counterby Atomic.dave
[email protected]
This is a one of a kind custom hand-made Geiger Counter built by
Atomic.Dave. It is based on a kit designed by John
Giametti (username: Brohogan) I have been building his DIY
Geiger counters for over two years having built and sold
round 70 of them. All information for this kit is available at
the developers website. As I have said before, this is more of
a
t for someone who knows a little bit about electronics but
doesnt have the time or patience to build it, or would rather
omeone else do all the dirty work. Having been built by me, of
course there will be some imperfections, although as mini-
mal as possible. This particular one is a culmination of all of
its predecessors. It is certainly one of my more advanced kits
aving more options then all accept the Cadillac, and I will do
my best to explain how to use it. Once you have used it a
ouple times, it will be a piece of cake.
OPERATION
our Triple Pole switches- ALL OFF IN CENTER POSITION.
SELECT POWER LIGHT ALARM SOUND NULL
UP ALARM ON ON/ON ON/ON TONE TONE
CENTER SCALER OFF/USB OFF OFF OFF RESET
DOWN CHARGE ON/OFF ON/OFF CLICK
. SELECT switch does 2 things. When you first power on the unit,
you will see first
Atomic.Dave K64HIRO+plus V10.1
This customized first welcome window can easily be changed if
you want, by doing a little programming in Arduino.
Refer to the DIY site for directions at the SOFTWARE section.
But the default is now set to my name, Kit 64, and the sec-
nd line is the Geiger Counter name, and the version of software
that the AT328 chip is running V10.1.
The second window will show this:
300 CPM=1 uSv/hRunning at 5.24V
The first line refers to the conversion rate of CPM to uSv/hr
for the internal tube (300) this can be changed in the pro-
ram sketch, with Arduino. The second line refers to the current
voltage that your system is running at. This is a 5 volt sys-
em. The 3000mAh 3.7v lipo battery is boosted to 5v with a pololu
booster. Everytime you start up your GC (geiger
ounter) it will show you this so you will always know your
current voltage.
The third window will show something like this:
Alarm Set ?Now at 200 CPM
At this point, you can hit the Select button to incrementally
change the Alarm threshold number. Once you stop hitting
he button and wait, it will be set to the current number shown
on the screen and will stay there until you change it either
gain restarting and waiting for this part. You can also chose
from units of measurement such as CPM or uSv/h for the Alarm.
. POWER switch controls the power and charging of the unit. Up
turns on the unit, Middle turns if off, and Down is for
when you charge the unit. When the unit is charging, the RED LED
on the lower left side will remain constant RED while
harging, and when charging is complete, it will turn off. If you
wish to power the unit with the USB in, and bypass the bat-
eries for extended periods. Switch this power button to the
middle position, and flip up the switch next to the USB port.his
will allow you to power the unit with the USB power and bypass the
battery for long periods I suggest using this power
ource. But you might just find that using the internal battery
is enough.
C. LIGHT switch controls the Event LED (BLUE) and the LCD
Backlight. Up turns on both, Middle turns both off, and
Down turns the LED on, and the Backlight off.
D. ALARM switch controls the Alarm LED and Piezo. Up for both
on, Middle for both off, and Down for LED only on. This
makes for a silent visual alarm.
. SOUND switch controls the Event speaker. Up for tone mode,
Middle for mute, and Down for Standard Click Mode.
More on Tone Mode later.
NULL This button is used when running the sound in Tone mode.
Its basically like a distance sensitive mode where the
oser you get to the radiation source, the higher the pitch of
the beep will be. Then once you are at a chosen distance,
hen you can push this button to reset the distance back to zero,
and it will then restart a its lowest tone and as it gets
oser, again it will raise in pitch.
EDS
t startup, you will hear the beeping of the piezo as your 2
SI-29BG GM tubes picks up radiation events. There are threeEDs
below the LCD. The Left one is GREEN and is a system status light
which comes on when starting up, and when
ending data back and forth to your PC. Its basically a system OK
light. If the green light ever freezes up, just restart the
GC, and it will reset itself. The middle is BLUE which is for
radiation events and coincides with the beeping piezo which
an be muted with the mute switch. The Right one is RED for the
Alarm which will only light up when a set alarm threshold
s reached.
OTHER SWITCHES, BUTTONS, PORTS, DIALS
EW- Added 1 new switch to the right side of the unit next to the
USB port. LEAVE THIS OFF (DOWN) WHEN NOT
SING USB power to run the unit and this MUST be off in order to
charge the battery. Flip this up to turn it on.
Down when not powering the unit with the USB.
A. Starting on the left side top of the GC is the LCD contrast
dial. As the LCD is used, it might get to a point for you to
eadjust the contrast for it. Not a big deal, while the backlight
is on, gently take a small flathead screwdriver and turn it to
he left or right until it appears to have the best contrast.
B. Below the contrast pot on the same side is the output
multi-port used for Geiger Bot (with the included G-Bot
able), and for Geiger Graph and RAD OSX (with the optional
USB/FTDI cable) Just plug in the Geiger Bot cable into thiswith the
3 conductor plug, and the 4 conductor into your iphone or ipad. Or
plug the optional 3.5mm to USB cable into the
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ort, and into a USB on your mac or PC, then follow instructions
to run those programs. It also serves as an mono audio
utput for silent listening with headphones, or with the included
3 conductor to 3 conductor M-M audio cable, you can run
ound based data logging software.
C. On the right side of the GC is the Mini USB FTDI output/input
for programming in Arduino. This also is used to
harge the internal Lithium Ion battery (with the power switch in
the bottom position.) Or it can be used to power the GC
or extended periods, however when you power it this way, I would
advise to turn off the LCD backlight. But its ok to turn it
n once in a while, but I wouldnt leave it on for extended
periods.
D. EXT and INT? this refers to the geiger tubes. EXT is for the
probe that plugs into the BNC connector and INT is for
he internal tube (CI-180G). When going from EXT to INT, please
turn off the unit before toggling between the two. The tog-
le not only changes the anode connection from one tube to the
other, but also changes the system uSv to CPM conver-
on rate. I have set the EXT conversion to 100. So you wont have
to do any programming. Please remember that the
nternal tube is Beta Gamma sensing only, but the EXT is full
range or Alpha, beta, gamma, xray.
DISPLAY BAR GRAPH:The display has a new bar graph style with
placeholders and is much more responsive. It now updates 20 times
per
second. The tone is also updated at this rate when used.
Auto-precision - decimals are dropped from the displayed dose
rate as it gets larger.
Beginning with v10.1 the LOG PERIOD can now be set to intervals
of less than 1 minute. Valid settings are OFF, 2s, 3s,
4s, 5s, 6s, 10s, 12s, 15s, 20s, 30s, and 1 minute intervals up
to 720 minutes.
ABOUT DOSE UNITS:
The menu allows you select the name of the dose unit that
appears on the display. However, to be clear, there is no
uilt in conversion between them. Instead the CPM->[DOSE]
RATIO is adjusted depending on the name of the DOSE
NIT selected. For example, 175.43 is the default set for the
SBM-20 with uSv as the dose unit. Suppose you pick "mR"
s the dose unit name, and want to measure in milirems. ("mR"
more correctly abbreviates as milliroentgens but is used to
ave display space.) The rem is defined as .01 seivert.
Therefore, to use the same ratio that was designed for the
tube,
ou would multiply that ratio by 10. You would enter a
CPM->[DOSE] RATIO as 175.43 x 10 or 1754.3. Likewise if you
wanted microrems ("uR") you would divide the ratio by 10 and
enter 17.54.
If you do want to use roentgens (used in older instruments) this
source states that they are .96 rem in soft tissue. So
he CPM->[DOSE] RATIO for actual mR would be 175.43 x 10 x .96
or 1684.1. (for uR it would be 16.84)
LEASE REFER TO THE DIY GEIGER COUNTER DEVELOPERS WEBSITE FOR
FURTHER INFORMATION:
http://www.sites.google.com/site/diygeigercounter/ARDUINO
Software and Serial-USB connection information:ON the cd you will
find the FTDI driver and Arduino program version 1. Install both
and restart your mac. Copy the Geiger
ketch folder to the same folder as your Arduino program is and
remember where that is as that will be where you go to
ave your sketch everytime you make a change to it. There will
also be a Library folder that will also need to be in the
ame folder. Just remember that the folder has to be the same
exact name as the sketch name is. And also within Arduino,
ou will have to go to preferences and show Arduino where your
default sketch folder is.
ARDUINO SETTINGS: Brohogan Software system version 10.1
. Open Arduino
. Open the saved sketch .ino file, connect your Geiger counter
to the USB with power switch off.
. Verify the file by clicking the little check mark icon.
. Click TOOLS, and Select Board type as Arduino UNO, and select
serial port as the top tty choice.
. Click Serial Monitor (top right looking glass icon). Set Baud
rate to 9600 and you should see the CPM, uSv and geiger counter
oltage data coming up once per minute.
or more info go to website under Software section on the DIY
geiger counter website. Or go to Arduino.cc
GEIGER BOT SUGGESTED SETTINGS: (You may have to play with it to
get it just r ight)
GO TO:https://sites.google.com/site/geigerbot/OTHER SOFTWARE
LINKS:http://www.blackcatsystems.com/GM/download.htmlhttp://www.imagesco.com/geiger/geiger-graph.html
GEIGER GRAPH FOR PC NETWORKS: (cost is around $60. Use the
OPTIONAL FTDI 3.5mm to USB cable)
This is a PC only software.
Select options Select Geiger Counter Select LND712 CS137 Adjust
Conversion
factor to your tube:123 for LND712
175 for SBM-20360 for LND7317
Select I/O Settings
Auto Adjust OFF
(you may need to playwith this setting)
RMS Window 1Delay Window 30
Volume Thresh 20000
Ultrafast Rates ON
