Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab Toy (1950-1951) | Hacker News Reader

Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab Toy (1950-1951)

orau.org

84 pointsevo_935 comments

The '50s were a different time. When I was in third grade, I think it was 1959, I got to go to Mrs. Spencer's Workshop for part of each day. This was a special class where we could make up our own projects and do them.

I wanted to make a printed circuit board for a science fair project, and I wanted to etch it myself. I didn't have a source for a phenolic board with a copper layer, but I figured I could at least demonstrate the concept by masking both sides of a copper sheet with electrical tape as a resist.

So I asked Mrs. Spencer if she could get me a sheet of copper, some electrical tape, and a tank of nitric acid. And she did!

I masked the copper with the tape and dunked it in the nitric acid, and watched it dissolve the copper. Then rinsed off the copper, peeled off the tape, and glued the copper strips to a cutting board to make the circuit. (I figured the cutting board would satisfy the "board" part of "printed circuit board".)

This was the best third grade project ever!

When I was kid you could buy pharao's serpents over the counter at joke shops in the UK.

This is a mercury compound that gives off mercury vapour when lit: "If the reaction is performed inside a container, a gray film of mercury coating on its inner surface can be observed"

The instructions told you to be in a well-ventilated place. Oh yeah. Helpful.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury%28II%29_thiocyanate#Ph...

Really good video, well worth watching if you've never seen this before <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQdK7gaZS0k>

Replying to myself, the Pharao's Serpent isn't about gassing kids with metallic mercury vapour, that's just a bonus, but the peculiar growths it produces. It looks like a mashup of CGI and '70s stop-motion making a cheap Dr. Who monster. It's well worth seeing if you've not before.

I wish these toys were available today. This one is not particularly dangerous (U-238 is barely radioactive), yet very educational and entertaining.

I try to perform some chemical and biological experiments with my daughter, however, it is much more interesting when you can do such things without adult supervision; and e.g. home CRISPR kits, while available, require precision and many difficult steps to achieve the results (there are no guarantees).

Reminds me of a friend mentioning his college friend talking about the micro biology lab procedures he had to do. Making a reagent using a 60 step process involving mixing colorless solutions to get another colorless solution. The dismay when you test the reagent and find it no workie.

> This one is not particularly dangerous (U-238 is barely radioactive)

No, and uranium ore isn't that concentrated either (they probably didn't use high grade stuff).

Though Zn-65, Rb-106, Po-210 and Pb-210 aren't as nice but the concentrations would probably have been negligible, otherwise I would stay away from those.

I remember cloud chamber experiments we did at a special laboratory when in high school and it was really nice to see the beta radiation being deflected by a magnetic field and curl up a bit.

Yes, I will try to build a cloud chamber myself, it is not particularly difficult. Low-grade needle sources should also be obtainable.

Smoke detectors for one are the easiest and most affordable source of a of any alpha radiation (Am-241). Though most new ones are based on other methods.

We don’t have them in Switzerland, unfortunately.

There are no smoke detectors in Switzerland? Or do you guys use some other substance in yours?

A bit of both. They are much less of them due do different fire safety codes, and where we have them, they use different principles (optical, etc.)

I wish these toys were available today.

Maybe if they were, fewer people would be afraid of science. And atomic energy.

When we were kids one of my cousins was signed up for some kind of science experiment of the month club. The first kit came with a microscope and all kinds of instruments. Then each month a box would arrive full of slides and rocks and all kinds of things with instructions for performing five or six different experiments.

Even as an adult, if such a thing existed I would subscribe to it today.

https://www.thimble.io/courses/

That seems like a good choice for some. It's sad, though, that for Thimble, and so many others, that "science"=electronics, when there is so much more to explore.

Have no fear for atomic energy, none of them can stop the time

Well U238 is still a heavy metal and as such pretty poisonous. (As is the rest in the kit.) So most likely the samples are encased in glass, however one should be pretty certain that that glass does not get damaged.

So is e.g. lead. And yes, like chemical kits, these are targeted for kids who already learned not to swallow the components and materials. :)

I'm pretty sure the cleaning supplies in the average home are more dangerous than anything in this kit.

Yes, both are pretty toxic.

I'd heartlessly hazard that weeding future nuclear engineers out who are unable to master reading "Do not consume" warnings is probably for the best...

I had a 1970 version of the Gilbert chemistry set. It was pretty good, not quite as cool as the Kosmos one. I still have a few remnants of it.

It was just before the end of chemistry sets.

has anybody tried to reorder materials for thier kit ?

https://www.orau.org/PTP/collection/atomictoys/GilbertAtomic... [IMAGE]

video from Atlas Obscura about the toy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeyoJGqKbOQ

wouldn't the Zn-65 sample (gamma rays) in the kit be hazardous ?

https://ehs.princeton.edu/laboratory-research/radiation-safe...

To be fair, most products and practices in the 1950's would be considered wildly dangerous by today's standards. Hell, we were still using leaded gasoline (gasoline with tetraethyllead additive) up until the 90's. Think about how dangerous lead poisoning is and now imagine that we used to add it to gasoline and every gas powered motor was spewing vaporized lead. Good times.

They still use that fuel in airports: avgas

so there's lead raining down on us from piston powered planes?

I had no idea. FAA confirms: https://www.faa.gov/news/fact_sheets/news_story.cfm?newsId=1...

Yeah it's a problem because there is no money in light aviation and a lot of liabilities. And leaded aviation gas appears as a liability, especially to refineries.

There are increasing attempts to produce diesel aircraft engines. Complicated by there not being any money in light aviation.

The Windscale nuclear power plant was spewing out radiation years before it caught fire

Depends on how much of it they give you, on the flip side with a half-life of 244 days you'd better be using your kit soon after purchase, and better hope it didn't sit on the shelves long.

I have long been enamoured with the idea of building a series of educational science toy sets were in some way better than those I remember growing up. Seems like a nice pastime.

Po-210 is an incredibly powerful alpha emitter, and because of that it's one of the most toxic of all isotopes. LD50 is one microgram.

The fact that someone was selling it in a kit for kids is terrifying.

~~Note that the article mentions Pb-210 not Po-210, ie. lead not polonium. Pb-210 was known as Radiolead.~~ (edit: it actually contains both)

Po-210 is deadly when ingested but not very dangerous when outside the body. It also has a very short half life, so you need it fresh out of a reactor if you are to poison a defected spy or a dissident with it.

If anyone else found this comment about poisoning defected spies oddly familiar, you might also be thinking of the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko[0], indeed using Po-210.

[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvi...

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