Cosmic Radiation Shielding Plate for Space!

So I enjoy making functional props. And when I say functional, I mean really functional - think tricked out cyberdecks with built in geiger-counters, fake space food (that I end up eating), Geiger-counters that work and look weird, gas sensors that reminisce to 1980's army surplus.

And today, an item that combines my love of science and drama and radiation. I present to you, my General Purpose Ionizing Radiation Shielding Element. (Not to be used in event of an actual cosmic radiation flare event...well...I suppose that if there is an actual event, you'd best slap this on somewhere and hope for the best. It might actually save you. But don't take my word for it....)

You can check out my other works on my Insta: @paulhoets

The story of mobile ionizing radiation shielding today

There are many materials that are used for radiation shielding beyond solid lead, but the problem with lead is that it is...well..pretty heavy. Which is why it works so well. That won't do for actual clothing, nor will it help in space, where getting stuff up is fantastically expensive.

In reality, radiation armour uses a combination of layers of high-z materials (high atomic number) like zinc, lead, copper, aluminum and steel, sandwiched together carefully, along with materials where the atoms are more finely packed together, such as hydrogen. The radiation gets slowed down by the initial dense materials, and emit other types of radiation, such as x-rays, which subsequent layers are supposed to deal with. The result is taht you can have thick lead, or smarter designed sandwiches of shielding.

Water has a lot of hydrogen in it, and it comes in a pretty convenient, semi-malleable form. Its for this reason that reactor cooling ponds and reactor pools are quite effective in stopping any kind of radiation. But again, water is kinda bulky and heavy, but we one day might use hydrocarbon fuel and water tanks as effective shielding for long-range, low-cancer voyages. Beyond water, the next best thing for packing hydrogen is high density plastic, usually HDPE (high-density-polyethylene).

Boron and boric acid are also used to slow down neutrons and certain other high energy particles. I had no actual HDPE on hand, but I have some ideas on how to really improve my armour, and that will probably be in a follow-up.

My first attempt at radiation armour will be a simple sandwich of aluminium foil and boric acid pellets.

The Right Stuff

The trigger for me to finally jump into this project was not the actual idea behind how to make ionizing radiation shielding that could theoretically absorb radiation, but rather, how to package it in a cool way. And the Space contest, to be honest - I really want to buy a 3D printer, but being an adult is expensive, as you fellow adults may be well aware....

1] The day came when I was poking around my local stationary shop, and I saw this snazzy padded A4 aluminium foil package sheath. It caught my eye, I looked at it, and thought about what I could do, and I realized it was time to make some shielding.

2] Next was to dig into my vast collection of sundry velcro bits. I specifically bought a length of sky-blue velcro, because nothing says 1985 Space Shuttle like sky-blue velcro. White velcro patches are pretty good too.

3] Boric acid pellets. This is quite easily accessible, relatively safe (keep it away from your ant friends - its the stuff magic bug-killing chalk is made of...), and it really is used for radiation shielding (and attempting to stop reactor meltdowns, in the case of the boric acid dumped on Chernobyl).

Sticker Bombing!

I started by making some stickers for the plate. The first one was a recycle of a previous sticker I made, but after trying it out, I became highly dissatisfied, as it would clash with the velcro and aluminium, and wouldn't really match the style. Looks pretty cool though, and you can get it off Redbubble (here), if you want to fund my unhealthy prop-making addiction.

In the end, I remade a completely new sticker that made more sense and contained some storytelling/world-building. Again, you can grab it here. I also had a big fat NASA sticker lying around, so I slapped that on for good measure too, and it looked pretty good.

Velcro Bombing!

I added velcro to both sides, especially the sky-blue stuff. This gives the impression it would actually be placed on a space station wall or the outside of a space suit. I lost self control and added a black patch to the empty space. I...I couldn't help myself. Its velcro, y'know?

The actual shielding

Initially I tried to bind the boric acid pellets with glue, slime, and another type of glue, and every time the result was a horrible water-grey slop that didn't hold together very well. Some kind of clay might be a better bet in the future, but for the time being I just vacuum-sealed the pellets into a roughly A4 sized plastic pouch, which then went inside the main pouch. The symmetry of the whole thing is a bit unbalanced, thin at the edges, thick in the middle.

In reality, the real radiation shielding blocks used by NASA, CSA, ESA and ROSCOSMOS are boxy rectangular blocks, kind of like impact plates in bullet-proof vests, but flat.

My shielding.... it is what it is.

And put it all together. Not much to say really. I will give it an actual test in the weeks to come, using my array of dodgy Geiger-counters and my various (low-level) radiation sources.

Hope you like my Instructable!

It was created with the Space contest in mind, so please vote for me if you reckon I got The Right Stuff!

In the future, I might add plates of copper and thin steel and aluminium to increase the theoretical stopping power - as my explanation in the intro explained, the rule goes: higher-z metals first, hydrogen last.

You can check out my other works on my Insta: @paulhoets

Radiation-shielding-themed prop stickers here (the cyberpunk-theme) and here (1980s NASA theme).

Thanks for reading!