Cosmic Ray Monitoring Station

My new PICAXE-14 Datalogger has lots of uses including monitoring cosmic ray strikes. I connected an Aware Electronics RM-60 PRO geiger counter to datalogger and then programmed the PICAXE-14 to record the number of clicks for 10 seconds each 10 seconds. After 24 hours, the Cosmic Ray Monitoring Station recorded over 8,400 records.

The RM-60 has a GM Tube measuring 1.5 inches long and 0.5 inches in diameter. Therefore, data from the Cosmic Ray Monitoring Station has units of counts per 10 s per 1.5 square inches.

The results were graphed using Excel to produce the chart below.

The average flux for this 24 hour session was 3.77 counts/10 s/1.5 square inches. The standard deviation was 2.33 counts/10 s/1.5 square inches. Here's a table of counts exceeding 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 standard deviations.

STDDEV Number of Cosmic Rays Exceeding
2.             199
3.             63
4.             5
5.             1
6.             1
7.             0