Increasing depth through use of rods in the ground, connected to a power source....

[gitterdug]

About 30 years or so ago I remember some talk about driving two brass or copper rods into the ground and then applying voltage to the rods via a car battery, with the thought being that the flow of the power through wet ground would increase the conductivity of a non-ferrous target such as copper or silver, or gold, etc.

As I recall, the claim was made that by increasing the conductivity of the target in this manner, it would respond more effectively at depth than a normal target would without power being applied.

Since the ground here where I live is soaking wet everywhere, I would think that it might be a great time to try this. Searching on Google, I don't seem to be able to recover any hits relevant to the thought.

I was wanting to throw it out here, and see if any of you remember what I am talking about, and even better yet, if there were positive results obtained. Though I have no advanced knowledge of such things, at first blush, it makes some sense to me that by introducing an electrical current in the ground near a conductive object (obviously with conductive conditions such as wet ground), It would responde more readily to a magnetic field and it would be charged.....so, let's see what the experts here have to share about my question.....

Read, discuss amongst yourselves....

Dennis, the inquisitive.....

 

[doc holiday]

Would not this also charge the conductive elements of the soil matrix?

 

[DigPan]

It's the way my dad many years ago use to get red worms to go fishing. They would jump out of the ground. All you had to do was pick them up and put in a can, then off to fish.

I really think that would put so much interference in the ground that it would mess with the machine.

 

[Tom Slick]

I have tried it with a unit my friend had. It was in the early 1990's and I think it was made by Fisher or maybe Compass. Neither of us were sold on it and lugging the car battery around wasn't much fun either. I think if there was much to it, everyone would be selling them now.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Tom Slick's analysis is spot on. It was an ... uh .... interesting idea. But in actual practice, it was a pain-in-the-b*tt, without much benefit. You have to lug a car battery around (or have your car closeby to run jumper cables out to your zone). And fiddle with long spikes, wires, etc....

I took the setup to a park in a city near me, where we'd pulled coins back to barbers over the years. And since the park was very stratified (age correlated to depth), we always had the suspicion that there older coins, a tad deeper than we were reaching. Not very junky. Moist soil that cut like butter, etc... Seemed to be the perfect test zone. After all the setup, and ample time to let the ground "charge", my observations was the following: I got no more deeper coins there, but did notice that strange little teensy items "came alive". For example: something like a pencil eraser top now came in at bold penny/dime on the TID - disc. Or tteeennssy little fragments of coins hit by a mower, now were louder bolder. But no older deeper coins.

So perhaps it would be sufficient for nugget hunters? I dunno. But in today's world of super-powered nugget machines "more sensitivity" is HARDLY anyone's need anymore, that they can't ful-fill with some of the power-houses available on today's market.

 

[Tom Slick]

Tom in CA. I'm another Tom that spent many of my earlier detecting years in CA. We tried the Car Battery thing at a couple of old schools and a park in Riverside. You reminded me of the really small items that seemed to get "lit up" but we never got an older, deeper coin using it and of course you wanted to use it when the soil was damp enough.

 

[Steve O]

DigPan, you kicked up some memories....the worms come shooting out of the ground...they ain't too happy either.

 

[mudpuppy]

Interesting info about the old days and ideas! Yeah on the worms, memories there too..as an aside on the worms, I stab all targets with a screwdriver, and worms come boiling out of the ground just by stabbing a screwdriver down there for a target...!

My first few years detecting, as I was switching over from my former "Waste of Time" fishing, I took along a worm container and kept them, took them home and added them to my worm ranch...I bet I'm running a couple thousand head on my 4x8 spread.

I havnt fished for 2yrs now...I dont pick up any more worms either..dont want to overgraze what I got...anyway, a guy can catch a lot of worms just by poking a screwdriver down in some nice damp earth! they really come boiling on up! Wish I discovered this when I fished...wish I discovered detecting way back before I started fishing...I would have never wet a line I can tell you! After 45+ years fishing, I got pretty good at paying attention to the weather and can tie a knot and run a boat, back a trailer, and all the associated skills, so all that time was not a complete waste I guess...back to the topic of electric rods...the DNR shocks up fish with those...so its a good trick to sort of file away in a guys mind if he ever needs worms or fish...never heard of it regarding detecting until today, so thanks for bringing it up Gitterdug!
Mud