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Detecting Metal for fun and for treasure
Xaquin
Right behind you!Registered User regular
Right behind you!Registered User regular
There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy's life that he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.
- Mark Twain
So, I enjoy metal detecting and recently had the chance to go out for a few hours and actually get down to it.
It's hard work, sometimes a huge pain in the ass and very rarely do you find anything. But still .... treasure you know?
(you will never find this)
(or will you?)
First off, you need you some gear!
Gotta have your Metal Detector (I have a Bounty Hunter Tracker IV because I'm poor)
a good folding shovel (they make better tools, but again, since I haven't found buried treasure yet, I'll stick to the cheap fellow pictured)
Gloves to keep your hands from getting disgusting
A good Backpack to hold your:
Screwdriver (for assembling your MD)
Tissues (for blowing your nose)
Poncho (in case of rain)
Knife (in case of hobos)
Electrical Tape ( .... )
String (for .... something, I'm sure)
First Aid Kit (in case of cuts or snake bites)
Extra Batteries (in case your other ones go bad)
Compass (for finding north)
I like to research stuff before I go traipsing off through the woods.
I find places like this:
and dig up worthless crap like this:
(something metal) (a hinge perhaps)
A pull tab
two bottle caps
ok, the knife is kind of cool, but that was a fluke
most of the time it's rusty nails and old cans
sometimes though you'll spend a month or so really researching a cool Civil War site and find the door to an old cast iron wood stove
sometimes you'll wander around a beach and find 40 cents and some fake jewelry!
and sometimes (like today) you'll find a billion rusty nails (not pictured) and 510 yen (buried 6" deep on a beach in southern maryland of all places)
Anyone here metal detect? Anyone want to?
- Mark Twain
So, I enjoy metal detecting and recently had the chance to go out for a few hours and actually get down to it.
It's hard work, sometimes a huge pain in the ass and very rarely do you find anything. But still .... treasure you know?
(you will never find this)
(or will you?)
First off, you need you some gear!
Gotta have your Metal Detector (I have a Bounty Hunter Tracker IV because I'm poor)
a good folding shovel (they make better tools, but again, since I haven't found buried treasure yet, I'll stick to the cheap fellow pictured)
Gloves to keep your hands from getting disgusting
A good Backpack to hold your:
Screwdriver (for assembling your MD)
Tissues (for blowing your nose)
Poncho (in case of rain)
Knife (in case of hobos)
Electrical Tape ( .... )
String (for .... something, I'm sure)
First Aid Kit (in case of cuts or snake bites)
Extra Batteries (in case your other ones go bad)
Compass (for finding north)
I like to research stuff before I go traipsing off through the woods.
I find places like this:
and dig up worthless crap like this:
(something metal) (a hinge perhaps)
A pull tab
two bottle caps
ok, the knife is kind of cool, but that was a fluke
most of the time it's rusty nails and old cans
sometimes though you'll spend a month or so really researching a cool Civil War site and find the door to an old cast iron wood stove
sometimes you'll wander around a beach and find 40 cents and some fake jewelry!
and sometimes (like today) you'll find a billion rusty nails (not pictured) and 510 yen (buried 6" deep on a beach in southern maryland of all places)
Anyone here metal detect? Anyone want to?
Xaquin on
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Whether you can get underwater ones that can account for the large amount of metal you're wearing I don't know.
but I know very little of this as it would be way too rich for my blood
The one I have was just shy of $100 new. There are models into the thousands.
edit: the Tesoro Sand Shark can go down to 200ft
I should probably read more about how they actually work.
[edit] Looks like it would work, but then weird salvage rules start to come into play.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/04/pictures/110404-gold-treasure-iron-age-roman-coins-british-science/
Related excerpts
20th century tankers might contain some pretty sweet finds.
I've always wanted to expore some wrecks underwater, although I expect the experience is about as close to playing a survival-horror game in real life as it gets.
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I don't know anything about metal detecting. Do certain types of rocks also set of the detector, or is that really rare/only happens in certain places (lots of volcanic rock or something). Also, can you look for meteorites with the detector?
I think certain kinds of rock can set off a detector but they're pretty uncommon (like if they have a lot of iron or copper in them)
I know people find meteorites with them!
edit: Meteorite Detecting
Ended up with no ring, 26 cents and a small medallion that said, "Somebody loves you!" Which was almost like being slapped in the face.
xbl - HowYouGetAnts
steam - WeAreAllGeth
basically: if the rock has enough elemental metal in it then yeah it will set it off, but that's pretty rare
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Yeah, I realize that the overlap between the range of detectors and the depth in the ground at which there's less chance of prior disruption to the context isn't that great, but it's kind of obnoxious to listen to family members want to go to town with a metal detector and a shovel on a new possible archaeological site that you've found before you have a chance to go through all of the proper procedures. Plus there's all the legal stuff to contend with.
Seems like it would be more of a hobby than a way to make serious income. Like, you're going to be hanging around at the beach anyway so you may as well detect some metal and have a chance of getting some moneys while you're there.
I mostly MD for the history and just to see what's out there. I'm not sure what I'd do if I every found anything of historical significance. 'It belongs in a museum' would probably be my attitude hehe
I'm sure some people are probably pretty careless. I always make sure to fill in any holes and honestly, I end up packing out a bunch of garbage.
The value of my finds currently total $6.74 (0.41 in dimes and a penny and $6.33 in Yen)
I would love to find an old weapon or something. I'm trying to set aside some time to head to my friends farm where parts of the Army of the Potomac camped for several months. The only annoying part is that a lot of the fields were corn last season and it's difficult to swing a MD when there are old tough corn stalks every foot.
civil/revolutionary war stuff is pretty cool
just remember, don't fuck with cannon balls
Yeah, I'm not sure what I'd do if I found an old one of those. A guy I know found a grapeshot canister though which was really cool and could be handled as it didn't have the explosive base attached.
Amateur bomb disposal ranks up there with DIY vasectomies in terms of ideas that are bad.
I've been tempted to research some MDs and buy one. Then on weekends just go on a small roadtrip and scout some places.
you can get decent ones from $95 - $250. Mine was $95 +/- and is pretty accurate down to 6-8 inches depending on soil conditions.
I gotta ask, why shouldn't you fuck with cannonballs? I thought they were just round lumps of metal, do they have something dangerous inside?
Finding solid cannonballs offers no danger whatsoever.
My wife and I borrowed her grandfathers metal detector and went to a park that used to be a small zoo in the middle of our city. We found some remnants but everything was permanently fixed to the ground. We had fun but let me just say it was the first and last time we ever went out with a metal detector.
EDIT: Beat'd
I'm actually not from Florida but I was diving in the Gulf around Venice and the Atlantic around Jupiter.
They always have extremely interesting life anyway, as for the horror movie part, nothing like getting close to a hole in the hull to inspect and have a moray eel pop out. There's always random debris you can find at the bottom that makes you wonder why? But ya sounds like the best stuff is situated around the caribbean, this article on treasure sounds cool: http://www.popularmechanics.com/outdoors/sports/watersports/4230711
Just FYI.
early explosive artillery used black powder as an explosive which will take centuries to degrade if kept away from air light and water... like you'd find in a sealed iron ball.
there are plenty of stories out there of people keeping antique cannon balls next to fireplaces or dropping them on something hard and having them explode.
this fellow right here found it.
low tide on the Potomac yields all sorts of stuff
pics when I get home
Even digging the holes in the first place disturbs the context. And garbage is mostly what Archaeologists look at. That is why they don't get along with the amateur metal detector crowd.
That said, I think lots of them are being stuffy about it. People are going to dig holes anyway, so deal.
If you find anything that seems to be a large quantity with historical value I would contact the state archaeologists office though. When they come out to do a dig, you can often volunteer to work on it, and then you get to see all the cool stuff.
Speaking of nails, having done an archaeological field school dig, I have seen more fasteners that I ever thought I would. Round nails, square nails, tacks, staples. It mostly comes down to two things. Carelessness and the lack of garbage service everywhere before a certain period. I'm not sure when they got hard on construction sites actually taking off their garbage, but before a certain period of time they just lit it on fire and buried it.
but they're listening to every word I say
on the other hand, they try to preserve stuff as much as possible and we wouldn't have the improved methods in the future if they weren't trying things now, but I'm sure you could turn this idea into a clever-sounding yet ignorant quip.
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The only problem with parks is apparently, 2 men in their 30's with metal detectors screams predator to parents and principals. Kids love to ask me questions about my machine and I have to run away from them like a leper so mom doesn't freak out.