Real-time radioactivity data from Madrid

Real-Time Beta and Gamma Radiation Data in Madrid

Yes, the graph below, barring unexpected problems, has been generated right nowin real time. Note the times.

[wpdatachart id=1]

There is a page on the website where you can see various graphs. You can see it by clicking here.

I will now tell you how the detector works.

After having my detector Geiger finished and working, the next step is to send this radioactivity information to the network. I have not been able to find in the internet a single station in Madrid sending Beta/Gamma radiation data in real time, so this may be the first station in Madrid to send this kind of data (and I am very excited, because it is difficult to be the first in something in the internet nowadays :-)).

The Geiger counter I have built has a serial port through which the detected radiation data is transmitted every 15 seconds. This has made things much easier, as all I have had to do is provide it with "something" that reads the data and sends it to my home automation system and to the network.

EspEasy

As in other occasions, I have used a NodeMCU with the ESPEASY firmware. This time there was no ESPEASY plugin to read the serial output of my Geiger counter, but it was not very difficult to adapt another plugin, already existing, to read them.

EspEasy Geiger Counter

The new device reads the serial output of the Geiger counter, processes it to extract the specific Pulses Per Minute data and sends this data via MQTT to my broker.

Send to Radmon with Node-Red

A node in Nore-Red receives the radioactivity data sent by the device and forwards it to the Radmon.org. Radmon.org is a site where hundreds of volunteers from all over the world send, in real time, the data obtained by their detectors to facilitate their visualisation, generation of graphs, etc.

The "Build Radmon url" function is very simple and simply builds a url, following the Radmon API specifications with my username, password and the last measure.

Saving data in InfluxDB

Another Node-Network node inserts the data into an InfluxDB database, which allows me to subsequently create graphs of this data in Grafana.

9 thoughts on “Datos de radiactividad de Madrid en tiempo real”

  1. Hi, I have seen this entry when searching for people who are taking radioactivity data, I am interested in the subject and I am surprised I have not found more people.

    Reply
  2. Hello,

    Great work by the way,
    I've been trying to create similiar sensor, but I have a problem with adapting ESPEasy plugin.
    I have tried a to modify pulse counter, but without any success. Could you please share more information your solution for this?

    Reply
    • Hello Michal.

      Thank you very much for your comment.

      You don't have to modify the pulse counter. Just connect his serial port to the ESP8266's serial port.

      I'm willing expand the post, or create a new one, to explain in more detail the process. Please, tell me what are you having problems with if I know what to focus on.

      Reply
      • Hello. I have a problem with ESPEasy not working with a counter - Pulse Counter can't read pulses on any GPIO pin.
        This problem does not occur on ESPurna-Geiger build, which I use as a temporary solution, so I think that the problem might be in ESPEasy script(?).

        Meanwhile, thanks to Your tutorial, I've created prototype detector and it works!

        Reply
  3. Radiation monitor for zendick
    MIAMI SHORES, FL, United States at coordinates 25.8673, -80.1758
    Geiger counter with SBM-20 tube
    1356 CPM on 2020-11-10

    PREVIOUS READING WAS 3435CPM!!!!!!!!!!

    TELL ME WHAT'S GOING ON...

    Reply

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