Yes, I know what you might be thinking... "This guy is a wacko ... He is gonna fry himself ... What is he doing with a X-ray machine?". I have a complete operational X-ray machine which I have pieced together from various parts. It is a complete working optical system which generates X-rays that can easily penetrate steel! Warning: This device is not a toy - no one should try to duplicate this unless they know what they are doing. No joke - serious stuff here.
This is the setup of the X-ray machine. To the left is an X-ray head which was part of a device known as a "Mobile C-Arm", which was used for taking pictures of small animals and livestock. The X-ray head contains the X-ray tube and transformer, and is very similar to dental ray units. The C-Arm motor drive section was damaged, so I removed the X-ray head and controller, and did a little re-wiring to make it operate stand-alone, as well as add interlocks, etc.. The X-ray head is a fixed-target anode type, which can operate up to 120 kilovolts at 30 milliamps (but only for extreme short time periods at this high current).
The X-ray head is aimed at an image-intensifier tube, or fluoroscope. This device "images" the X-rays impinging on the image tube onto a built-in phosphor screen. The intensifier has a set of lenses which is coupled to a Vidicon CCTV camera, seen on the right.The CCTV video signal is fed into a CCTV monitor, and is digitized by a Snappy video digitizer device which is connected to a PC, to allow for capturing digital images. The result is a live picture of the glowing phosphor screen within the image intensifier, which the screen is stimulated by the X-ray emission from the X-ray head. The sample that is to be X-rayed is placed between the X-ray head and the image intensifier. Sitting on top of the X-ray head is one of many Geiger counters, which are used to survey the area when the unit is operated.
Here is a top-view of the setup, which shows the X-ray head, image intensifier tube, and camera. Normally this is covered with lead and copper/cadmium sheeting to reduce radiation to acceptable levels, measured to be equivalent to normal background readings. Additionally, the unit is only operated in a short burst - long enough for the Snappy device to grab the video. This is a fully operational setup!
Here is a picture of the control unit for the X-ray head. This device controls the applied voltage and current to the X-ray head. It also has a line-voltage adjustment feature - this is used to keep the calibration accurate for given fluxuations in AC line voltage. This whole unit operates of of 110VAC, at about 8 amps. The timer at the top has been disabled. To keep the unit from inadvertant activation, there are several interlocks which have to be manually set for the unit to operate. In addition, the unit will only "single-shot", meaning that one of the interlocks must be manually reset before the unit will energize for another "shot"
I am in the process of uploading some images from the setup - hopefully I will have them online soon. The picture at the top was taken from the image intensifier tube, but with another X-ray source. It is a picture of a 3.5 inch floppy disk - you can see the spindle and the sliding door and spring.