The manuscript presents new data on systematic effects encountered with regard to beta source calibration in luminescence dating. As the authors claim, source calibration is a central part in obtaining reliable luminescence dating results and systematic errors should be avoided whenever possible. While in the past 40 years numerous papers on that topic were published, the authors draw particular attention to the aliquot size and its impact on the calibration results, an aspect that has not been

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... considered previously. The dataset compiled by the authors on three different luminescence readers with various source geometries, grain sizes and aliquot sizes supports the conclusions drawn, as well as do the results of GEANT4 modelling in general. There are some slight discrepancies between experimental and modelled data that remain unexplained though. The same is true for the "edge effect" that the authors think to be the reason for the C1 GChronD Interactive comment Printer-friendly version Discussion paper