could I use arduino in place of an amplifier in basic geiger counter?

Other Hardware Sensors
1

I want to make a Geiger counter from scratch. I saw a blog on making one but it includes building a 1 shot pulse detector. (To detect pulses from the geiger tube.) Could I instead run the geiger tube to the arduino and tell it to beep a speaker if it receives signal? This would save a lot of trouble.

2

yes, take a look at this schematic (from sparkfun): http://dlnmh9ip6v2uc.cloudfront.net/datasheets/Sensors/Radiation/Geiger_Counter-v21.pdf

3

The Sparkfun Geiger counter doesn't use an Arduino. But since they use the same processor it is easy to adapt. Using an Arduino makes it even easier. The chip for USB is already on the Arduino board, and the tranformer for audio out is not needed if a piezo beeper is used.

This is the link to the Sparkfun page : Geiger Counter - SEN-10742 - SparkFun Electronics
They use the LND712 Geiger tube.
This is the page for the LND712 : http://www.lndinc.com/products/711/
The LND712 need 500V (recommended operating voltage).

Anyone knows a cheaper Geiger tube ? or an alternative way to detect radiation ?

4

and the tranformer for audio out is not needed if a piezo beeper is used.

They used audio transformer to generate high voltage, not for audio output.

Anyone knows a cheaper Geiger tube ? or an alternative way to detect radiation ?

Alternative is semiconductor , "elektor" has published a series of articles, stating last year:

5

lesto:
yes, take a look at this schematic (from sparkfun): http://dlnmh9ip6v2uc.cloudfront.net/datasheets/Sensors/Radiation/Geiger_Counter-v21.pdf

Thank you, but I am relatively new to schematics. I know how to read and build all of the parts on the PDF, but where do they lead to? (They look like they are floating.)

6

Collector of Q4 has associated signal line OUT. You can see the same name at pin 32 uCPU. On arduino board it equivalent to digital pin2.

7

Magician:
They used audio transformer to generate high voltage, not for audio output....
Alternative is semiconductor , "elektor" has published a series of articles, stating last year

Thanks Magician, for the info.

8

never mind. I think it might be more simple to follow the original diagram and leave out the arduino. Thanks for the help, though.