Civil Defence RADIAC Equipment: a Fallout Shelter Essential

[@robertschemonia5617]

Hey! I have the CDV-700! And it works flawlessly. It even still has the flake of depleted Uranium on the side as a check source. According to the manual, it is still within spec when you do an operational check with it. I got it from where I work for $10. So at that price, even if it didn't work at all, it would still make a super cool decoration/conversation piece. The CDV-700 is the one with the probe you can take loose out of the handle, and has a beta shield that can be opened and closed. It is for "low level" compared to the Civil Defense survey meters. The survey meters were for much, much higher levels of fallout. If you have a survey meter at home, and get it to wiggle and detect, get out of that house. Unless it is from a dedicated test source, of course. As usual, love the video. Extremely well put together, very well spoken and scripted, and awesome camera work. I can't believe this channel doesn't have a bigger following than it does.

[@AldoSchmedack]

I got a survey meter as the issue is with the low doses they are fine but high doses they will get saturated and not show any radiation, and not just peg out if a nuke drops. Have BOTH!

[@Inflorescensse]

Nice! I have 2 for my science class as well as 3 of the geigers. Found in the basement of my university and donated to me.

[@ZA-mb5di]

I bought a Lionel CDV-700 off eBay a year or so ago. Yes, it had (and still has) the check source on the side.

[@legotrain15]

Yall just be careful, the high voltage unit in lionel and vic 700 units has usually gone bad after 20 years. Considering the 700 units are 60.years old you have to replace the high voltage unit. If you don't replace them it will kill your geiger counter.

[@robertschemonia5617]

@legotrain15 so far, mine works great. And I am aware of the HV dangers in all geiger counters. I occasionally have to work on them (Ludlum) for the place I work at. And when I say work on them, I mean verify that someone dropping it from 3 or 4 feet killed it. I do NOT make any adjustment to them in any way, other than calibrating the display to zero as per the manual. I do a lot of stuff with old CB and radio equipment that has HV stuff in them, and I also do 90% of the 3 phase electrical at the same place. I know all about getting bit by that 60Hz 240VAC bug. It has been a LONG time since I was shocked and it wasn't due to a fault in a component or piece of equipment. I follow all LOTO procedures, mainly because I am the safety officer at work. Lead by example an whatnot. I even go as far as to use a heavy ground strap, or I'll short all 3 phases together, so if someone does remove my LOTO stuff and flip a breaker, it just pops. Well, hopefully trips the breaker and doesn't cause an arc flash/blast. (Which can 100% happen at 240VAC, btw.)

[@kpanic23]

I just can't get over how perfectly you nailed the German pronunciation of "Röntgen"… 👏

[@mattwilliams3456]

I’m always impressed at the quality videos you put out and baffled that more people haven’t found your engrossing catalog of work.

[@n1vg]

I got a CD V-700 many years ago and it worked for maybe half an hour before the corona discharge regulator tube died. I ended up rebuilding it into a digital version with an LCD. Wrote up a little webpage about it and forgot about it, and then the Fukushima disaster happened and suddenly my project was linked by CNET. That thing is 21 years old now and still working, and I think I *might* have changed the battery on it once.

[@Poodleinacan]

That's pretty sweet!

[@ReggieArford]

Could you please post a link to your project?

[@TBizzell68]

In the early’90s I worked at a fire station by myself. I found a civil defense box in storage. It had all the instruments and dosimeters. It also had pamphlets and instructional materials for dealing with fallout etc. It had a projector and those film strips for a slide show. It was pretty interesting to a 20is year old, and still is.

[@ElectronicsGuy666]

Same experience except it was the mid 90s. Used to work night shifts and if I couldn’t go back to sleep after a run I’d poke around. Pretty fascinating that age.

[@MRblazedBEANS]

Sounds out of game fallout

[@polaris911]

i don't think I've ever learned so much from a youtube video. Fascinating. Great work

[@herzogsbuick]

you wrote for Today I Found Out? The many-tentacled Simon I've enjoyed over the years, but I'm glad I've found your deep dives, I enjoy them a lot, I can see the care you put into them. Plus your topics are more inline with what I'm actually into, as opposed to general knowledge (which I also like, but just generally). Is that experience what made you start making videos?

[@Roope00]

I have no idea why your channel isn't more popular, the algorithm seems to have finally discovered the channel on my part and I am very happy with that as your content is great!

[@MRblazedBEANS]

It is now! The algorithm blew him up around 5 months ago!

[@clyax113]

26:52 All I'm hearing is that I have a chance of getting super powers from exposing myself to radiation. Spiderman powers, here I come!

[@JohnDBreeding]

Outstanding episode. Thank you for making a somewhat murky subject much clearer.

[@tsbrownie]

GM tubes also include a bit of alcohol to squelch the tendency to cascade. In school we used a tube our prof made that was a 3" copper plumbing end cap, with a BNC connector that had a brass rod from the center connection into the chamber. To use it you just wiped a bit of alcohol on the inside and set it over the sample. It was sensitive to everything.

[@Trustme722]

Can't believe I just found this channel. Deserves way more subs and views

[@Inflorescensse]

what a fabulous description of how the Sievert works. I’m going to use this in my science class.

[@SwingingChoke]

I have the 715 and 700 both work fantastic. There was another 715 that has a remote chamber that was on a 35ft cable that could be set outside. I have the manuals for all, but going back to the 715. The circuit check is more than just a battery check. The circuit check is a basic check of the circuitry and battery. The ion failure would cause no circuit check to do nothing.

[@mariekatherine5238]

Our parents were both Civil Defense Block Captains. We still have a RADIAC dosimeter in the attic. In the 1950’s, there were exactly three houses on the block, one of which was a summer residence only.

[@alwaysOverthinking-cl5tz]

I live in New Britain. They used to be a global manufacturing powerhouse but, after offshoring It's a shell of it's former self. There are abandoned 6+ story factories left and right. Even those are slowly being torn down except for the few that are thankfully being turned into apartments. Anyway, I always just find it cool to see the real things made in this city's glory days.

[@stephenbritton9297]

NB, like Bridgeport, were so vital to the war effort in the 40’s, then fell off the map. Offshoring, moving south, and mergers and acquisitions.

[@sometwo2117]

I actually live near the old Victoreen Factory in Cleveland, OH. I just purchased one off eBay, guess I’m bringing her back home lol

[@randy25rhoads]

One of my prized possessions is a set of never used, new old stock fallout shelter signs. The tiny glass beads that act as retroreflectors are so interesting.

[@CarlVanWormerAE7GD]

I was told that the survey meters were not very sensitive and that if you detected "anything" you were being dangerously exposed. I have some of the survey meters and also some Geiger counters. Do you need a CDV-700 for your collection?

[@jimbob-jy4bm]

Super informative, thank you sir!

[@decofox6789]

I haven't learned this much in 30 minutes in years. You have my gratitude.

[@therakshasan8547]

The CDV 15 gamma survey meter is thet tool my grand father used when he was in the Civil Defense . I have that modle at present.

[@chrstfer2452]

Oh shit youre a today i found out contributor? No wonder your videos are so excellent for being a smaller channel

[@JordaanDiYulio]

Greetings from New Britain, CT!

[@earlbucklin8323]

you are a great teacher

[@sski]

AH! Coolness! Thanks for this. I have a machine by "G.E. Smith & Associates - Houston, Texas" and it's a "GS-1000A", Serial # 679 I found it at a thrift store a couple of years ago and it works! It's now part of my SHTF kit, but sits in my display case for now. Pretty cool unit. Cheers!

[@timothyexner]

I worked at several nuclear plants in the U.S. thirty years ago. We used thermo-luminescent dosimeters to measure cumulative dose and electronic dosimeters to measure acute dose in real time and transmit it to the Radiation Protection team's computer so they could advise us through our headsets.

[@andrewlewis4253]

We still use these now. I was in the cavity just this afternoon with my transmitting "self-reading dosimeter". We switched from TLD to "DLR" about 5 years ago. Same item, just different name. Dosimeter of Legal Record now.

[@michaelogden5958]

Completely off-topic, but I wonder if there is enough history behind label makers before and after - as in 19:37 (depicting '009') to make a video. Interesting video, as usual. Thanks!

[@dougbotimer8005]

Ok, I’m old. I remember, as a Civil Air Patrol Cadet, using all that equipment in Civil Defense exercises.

[@AhmedOuk]

Excellent

[@marknesselhaus4376]

I have a CDV-715 R / Mod 1A and I store it with a couple of fresh batteries wrapped up outside the case for storage. I live not too far from a N-power plant and bought this unit a few years ago. Good solid construction and it should continue to have a long service life.

[@AzrethK9]

Got a CDV-717 with manual and some guides a few years ago. Should be working fine. It's the version with the detachable detector and extension cord on a little drum.

[@fredblonder7850]

You should have mentioned how the ionization chamber has been repurposed for use in ionization smoke detectors. ;-)

[@CanadianMacGyver]

I already covered that in my Cloud Chamber video :)

[@waltertomashefsky2682]

I thought that yellow box looked a lot like a big yellow smoke detector.

[@charlesseymour1482]

​@@CanadianMacGyverhow can I download your video collection

[@greencanner4284]

a little bit of info about those pencil dosimeters, you don't actually put it all the way to charge, the charger has a little light in it so you can read the dosimeter and you use the charge dial to zero it out, and then you're good to go

[@wbwarren57]

Great video! Thank you.

[@crystalsheep1434]

Another great video

[@Lurker1979]

The radiation badge. I know that well. I grew up on a US sub base. My dad wear those as part of his job in the Navy.

[@charlesachurch7265]

Radioactive lightening conductors? Another fascinating subject. Xxx

[@44R0Ndin]

It occurs to me that there could be a rather simple and expedient method to construct a dosimeter using silicon wafers etched and doped into the flash memory cell we know from its use in solid state drives, flash drives, and memory cards such as microSD. The principle is the same as the pencil dosimeter. Charge is stored or discharged from a flash memory cell's floating MOSFET gate to indicate the presence of a 1 or 0 stored in that cell. Incoming radiation will tend to disrupt this stored charge, leading to what is known in spacecraft software engineering as a "bit flip error". However, this can prove to be a source of data, rather than just a source of data corruption. By patterning the data on the flash memory IC a certain way, and then reading it constantly, you can detect these bit flip errors as they happen, tally them up, and display the count of said radiation-induced errors. The principle is the same as a "Programmable ROM eraser" that is usually based on UV light, except it uses more energetic sources to influence the data storage media, and it's used to create data rather than to destroy it. I'm sure that having a radiation detector based fully on semiconductor electronics without needing a Geiger-Muller tube or ionization chamber is important to some sort of industry somewhere. It also occurs to me that you could do a similar thing (more akin this time to a film dosimiter) again using only silicon-based electronics, if you use a CCD based image sensor instead of a flash memory cell array. The advantage is that it will require less energy to detect the radiation, and you'll be able to tell how much energy each detection event had, the disadvantage is that you would have to use means to prevent visible light entering the sensor's detection plane because that would provide false detection events.

[@rwsmith7638]

Big time learning experience!

[@RobCamp-rmc_0]

I have a Victoreen CD V-720, manufactured in 1961, sitting next to me right now. I wonder whether, if I remove the metal housing from the detection element, it would be able to detect beta particles, as the detection element looks similar to the ones from the meters with the removable shielding for that purpose. _[edit]_ well, after a bit of reading, I’m beginning to wonder if the original housing on my model was replaced because the CD V-720 should have that retractable shield for detection of beta radiation. Interesting.

[@matthewsylvester9103]

I respect the tie matching the tool color 😂

[@j7ndominica051]

If you say "Rhghentgen" while speaking English as if you were developing a radium jaw, that makes radiation units easier to remember.

[@agy234]

What is that intro music from? It sounds so familiar? Is it from RCA?

[@44R0Ndin]

I have deduced one potential additional downside to the pencil or quartz fiber dosimeter. It must include a UV light filter on both ends of the viewing tube, for if UV light impacts the quartz fiber, that too could generate ion pairs and thereby cause a false increase in the measured rate of radiation exposure.

[@BaronVonQuiply]

There's a school near me that still has their Fallout Shelter signs on the walls

[@hizurumegumi5727]

What is the intro music called?

[@Bob-qk2zg]

I own a CD-V-715. I live a mere 10 miles from a nuclear plant and regularly monitor my home environment. I have never gotten a reading above background radiation. The nuclear plant is safe and I have the ability to prove it.

[@andrewlewis4253]

I work in nuclear power plants. They are safe enough..

[@jacksong6226]

I have the manual for this exact model, if you want it!

[@genebohannon8820]

I bought a detector in the early oughts and some iodine tablets to add to my kit. I now have an arsenal but am getting to old to make good use of it. Yup, you bet'cha Im American.

[@Poodleinacan]

You could go uranium hunting in places where they can be found in the open and see how much radiation they give out, I suppose 😅

[@syncmaster710n14]

Does anyone know what the intro song is? It sounds familiar but I can't think what it is.

[@daxythedogo]

I know this is late, but if you don't know yet, this intro is the RCA intro.

[@timothybaker8234]

In the event of a nuclear attachments at school, we were instructed back in the 1970’s, to hide under our desks.

[@Poodleinacan]

I wish we could have heard the noise the CDV-700 makes

[@curtwuollet2912]

Has anyone seen the retrofit procedure for the landers 715?

[@AldoSchmedack]

No tell me more! 😮

[@curtwuollet2912]

@@AldoSchmedack You see them marked with a R for refurbed. But I've never seen a document on what they do. Mine responded to TLC and dessicant beads but it would be nice to know if more is called for

[@harrymarsh8477]

Wow, Lionel [trains] made a radiation counter!

[@FAMUCHOLLY]

r/Hr is the EXPOSURE rate. Dose rate would be registered in rem/Hr.

[@dougwalker4944]

please reference the music..

[@dalehuff5740]

Have you ever heard of A MR. Maclusky he had a glove box expold in his face At the Hanford nuclar site after that happend he was called the nuclar man

[@mnemosynevermont5524]

How much radiation comes off vaseline glass?

[@Poodleinacan]

Not too much... But also, not that it's dangerous radiation. It's only dangerous if the uranium ware is broken

[@Nachiebree]

That detector chamber sounds like a reverse smoke detector

[@fasteddie4145]

I have a pair of these.....

[@user-qf6yt3id3w]

The OCD had great attention to detail but tended to obsess over hand washing.

[@RCAvhstape]

We see what you did there.

[@JinKee]

3.6 Roentgen. Not great, not terrible.

[@MikeSamuelsII-ve8gp]

They made tons of these and most are still unused. Don't pay more than $20 for a working one here in the U.S.

[@Inflorescensse]

Ive got 3 of the regular geigers and 2 gamma for my science class. So much fun especially when i slip a source in a kids pocket.

[@Shinzon23]

Aren't you giving your kids cancer?

[@ronaldjorgensen6839]

i past yje military certification test on your geiger counter but never collected certificates AND LOST MY NUCLEAR SAMPLE IT DECAYED

[@mgpBLARG]

Omg, they actually a banana for reference?

[@stephenbritton9297]

How much gives you superpowers… asking for a friend…

[@joshm2610]

Technology Connections but add history and subtract the snark

[@DonaldRichards-mr3lz]

O C D M ITEM NO. CDV - 700 MODEL NO. 6B SER.NO. THE VICTOREN INSTRUMENT CO. CLEVELAND, OHIO On the left side is an OPERATIONAL CHECK SOURCE On the right side a CD AND Triangle .