Product Selection & Uses

How to Select Your Instrument

I. Who Buys Our Products?

IMI’s radiation detection instruments have a wide variety of applications within a broad spectrum of contexts. A few examples for several market segments are listed below:

II. Geiger Counter or Surface Contamination Meter?

Determining whether you need a general purpose Geiger Counter or a Surface Contamination Meter is dependent primarily on your intended use of the instrument. The hand-held Geiger Counters are suitable for a wide variety of applications that include detecting radioactive sources, surveying ambient or background levels of radiation, monitoring radiation levels, surveying for radioactive contamination, monitoring personal radiation exposure, and determining whether certain machines are “leaking” radiation.

The Surface Contamination Meters may be used for all of these applications as well, but they were specifically designed for use in laboratories and medical or research facilities where radioactive substances are in use. These instruments are also suitable for many applications in nuclear power plants and scrap metal facilities.

The Radalert 100™ and the Inspector Alert™ are very similar in functionality. The primary difference between them is the size and geometry of the Geiger tube. In the Radalert 100™, the tube is a long thin cylinder with a mica end window through which alpha, beta, low-level gamma, and x radiation can pass. The Inspector Alert™ uses a larger Geiger tube with a “pancake” geometry that provides a much larger surface area for the mica window and, thus, greater sensitivity to radionuclides and a faster response time. This is the type of detector recommended by regulatory agencies and health physicists for surface contamination measurements of a number of commonly-used radionuclides, including C-14, P-32, S-35, Cr-51, I-125, Na-22, Cl-36, Ca-45, Co-57, Zn-65, Tc-99m, In-111, and Ti-201. (For the Cl-36 and Ca-45, the measurement should be made using the wipe test attachment).

III. Geiger Counter: Radalert 100™

• The Radalert 100™ has an LED light and a beeper that register radiation events.
• The Radalert 100™ uses a Halogen-quenched Geiger-Mueller tube with a mica end window that detects alpha, beta, gamma, and x-radiation.
• The Radalert 100™ reads in mR/hr, μSv/hr, CPM, or CPS
• The Radalert 100™ has a digital LCD.
• The Radalert 100™ has both data output and calibration input ports.
• The Radalert 100™ offers a number of features, including an audible alert feature that sounds when the radiation level reaches a user-set threshold, a timer function that accumulates counts for a user-set time interval, and a utility menu that allows the user to select options for several operating parameters.