Is your lens on this list?

[AgX]

I have a few questions about the list. Where is my Canon 35/2 FD SSC (1st version)? Doesn't that one count anymore? Where is the Aero Ektar? When a lens shows the same amount of radiation as normal background radiation, how do you test that and what good is the test? Why is the Canon 35/2 New FD also an excellent lens even though it does not seem to contain any radioactive elements?

The guy making that list:

I prepared a test of radioactivity on majority of my lenses.

 

[AgX]

Thorium emits alpha particles that only travel an inch or two and in the very small quantitys of Thorium that may be in a lens can't penetrate human skin.

This comes true for the lens. Not for small particles getting into the body, for instance by breathing. During production a lot of possibly fatal dust is produced and must be cared for. Basically the lens after discarding may turn into something critical too. Being complete it still shields itself its Alpha particles.

 

[Newt_on_Swings]

Interesting. I have one the schneider xenar. Never knew it was a hot lens. Cool

 

[Gerald C Koch]

One of the preferred ways of storing long lived radio-active waste is to incorporate it into glass beads. Even if they should escape their container the glass would need many millennia to dissolve and expose the waste. So the safest way to deal with these lenses is to use them and not worry.

And please monitors make this the last thread on these lenses.

 

[Mainecoonmaniac]

I was going to get a shutter speed checker, but now I'm going for a Geiger counter.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I do not care if it is. It is not worth the effort to panic. zzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

[Ektagraphic]

This has given me a good laugh for the night! I never even thought I would ever see anything like this, but it's good to know I suppose

 

[TheToadMen]

I can remember watching a US governement warning from the 1950's.
Something about sitting under a table in the classroom while loading your camera ???????

Can't quite remember the detais though .....

Bert from Holland
http://thetoadmen.blogspot.nl

 

[AgX]

Interesting. I have one the schneider xenar. Never knew it was a hot lens. Cool

Please read post #10.

Your Xenar is not a hot lens.

 

[David Brown]

I do not care if it is. It is not worth the effort to panic. zzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

[Dali]

http://forum.mflenses.com/radioactivity-of-old-manual-lenses-t25714.html

View attachment 100110

So what is the conclusion? Some lenses are radioactive, nothing new under the sun, eveyone knows that. But what are the possible effects if I use one or the other lens? Without such conclusion, sorry, I consider this thread as a tempest in a teapot since it does not teach me anything.

 

[AgX]

Read this too:

http://home.earthlink.net/~michaelbriggs/aeroektar/aeroektar.html

 

[Tony-S]

So what is the conclusion? Some lenses are radioactive, nothing new under the sun, eveyone knows that. But what are the possible effects if I use one or the other lens? Without such conclusion, sorry, I consider this thread as a tempest in a teapot since it does not teach me anything.

This guy shot with a Pentax Spotmatic F and the 50mm f/1.4 Super Takumar. Need more be said?

 

[Dali]

This guy shot with a Pentax Spotmatic F and the 50mm f/1.4 Super Takumar. Need more be said?

View attachment 100145

Yeah, he forgot the lead ERC... What a shame the internet did not exist back then...

 

[Theo Sulphate]

So what is the conclusion? Some lenses are radioactive, nothing new under the sun, eveyone knows that. But what are the possible effects if I use one or the other lens? Without such conclusion, sorry, I consider this thread as a tempest in a teapot since it does not teach me anything.

The conclusion is that the radioactivity of the lenses is far too small to worry about. The average worldwide background radiation, which your body gets every day, is at a rate of 2.4 milliSieverts per year (2,400,000 nSv per year); that's about 274 nSv you get per hour just for being on the planet. Some of those lenses were above the background radiation level, but you're not with those lenses 24 hours a day, every day. Several organizations have estimated a 5-hour cross-country flight as giving you 40 microSieverts (40,000 nSv) which is 40x what the "hot" lens is giving you.

 

[Newt_on_Swings]

I guess hot is not really hot at all with consumer lenses.

Interestingly this reminds me of some photos taken after the meltdown at Chernobyl of inside the structure of the elephants foot, with that much radiation it was still just a little fogging on the images. But I don't think anyone would want use that camera again.

http://rarehistoricalphotos.com/the-elephant-foot-of-the-chernobyl-disaster-1986/

 

[Sirius Glass]

The conclusion is that the radioactivity of the lenses is far too small to worry about. The average worldwide background radiation, which your body gets every day, is at a rate of 2.4 milliSieverts per year (2,400,000 nSv per year); that's about 274 nSv you get per hour just for being on the planet. Some of those lenses were above the background radiation level, but you're not with those lenses 24 hours a day, every day. Several organizations have estimated a 5-hour cross-country flight as giving you 40 microSieverts (40,000 nSv) which is 40x what the "hot" lens is giving you.

Follow your good advice, I would add that one not swallow these lenses. That would gum up the aperture and shutter, if one, and possibly add some heavy metals to your system.

 

[PentaxBronica]

I guess hot is not really hot at all with consumer lenses.

Interestingly this reminds me of some photos taken after the meltdown at Chernobyl of inside the structure of the elephants foot, with that much radiation it was still just a little fogging on the images. But I don't think anyone would want use that camera again.

http://rarehistoricalphotos.com/the-elephant-foot-of-the-chernobyl-disaster-1986/

I remember seeing photos taken by someone who went up on the roof with the "liquidators" (who had a few seconds to scoop up a shovel load of reactor debris and fling it over the edge). Along the bottom edge of the images were lots of little grains/specks, caused by the radiation coming from the debris they were walking over.

I've left film in my Spotmatic and Super Takumar 50mm f1.4 for months before now, it showed no signs of fogging or graining afterwards. While I don't sleep near the lens (it hangs on the back of the spare room door) I'm not worried.

 

[benjiboy]

I remember seeing photos taken by someone who went up on the roof with the "liquidators" (who had a few seconds to scoop up a shovel load of reactor debris and fling it over the edge). Along the bottom edge of the images were lots of little grains/specks, caused by the radiation coming from the debris they were walking over.

I've left film in my Spotmatic and Super Takumar 50mm f1.4 for months before now, it showed no signs of fogging or graining afterwards. While I don't sleep near the lens (it hangs on the back of the spare room door) I'm not worried.

Alpha particle that Thorium emits only have a very short range of an inch or two so if on your camera wouldn't penetrate the shutter curtain, I have left my Canon 35mm f2 Thorium lens on a camera with 400 ISO film in it for several months in the past with no ill effects.

 

[AgX]

Thorium not only emits Alpha- (and Beta-) but also Gamma-radiation.
Though I can't assess the affect on health by that.

 

[PentaxBronica]

If they were really dangerous I'd expect to see a spike in cancers amongst pro photographers of the era.

However, given how common smoking was at the time these lenses were in widespread production and use I think you might have trouble with the statistics!

 

[JW PHOTO]

If they were really dangerous I'd expect to see a spike in cancers amongst pro photographers of the era.

However, given how common smoking was at the time these lenses were in widespread production and use I think you might have trouble with the statistics!

The Surgeon General has it all wrong you know. Smoking does NOT cause cancer! R. J. Reynolds even said so and Philip Morris even backed old R.J. up. So, light'em up! John W

 

[Dr Croubie]

The Surgeon General has it all wrong you know. Smoking does NOT cause cancer! R. J. Reynolds even said so and Philip Morris even backed old R.J. up. So, light'em up! John W

There's nothing wrong with smoking.

It's inhaling burnt tar and tobacco vapour into your lungs that's the problem (or even just bum-sucking it into your mouth is bad too). So if you can smoke without doing that you're fine.

 

[Sirius Glass]

There is nothing wrong with smoking as long as you do not exhale.