Can you identify this?

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cranky
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Can you identify this?

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I went metal detecting yesterday at a local beach and found a big lump of some sort of old concretion that read iron and had a little bit of something pointy poking out. Curious I took the lump home and took a hammer to it to find out what was inside and found this
detecting 10 jun 21 #3 - C.jpg
I'm curious if anybody knows what it is. It's about 6 in long, 3 inches wide and maybe a half inch thick. It's either cast or wrought iron. The non pointy end may have been broken off but if it was it was a clean break, although tumbling around in puget sound for decades may have polished it a bit. It could also be the end of a sprue where it was cast in a mold but I can't really tell for sure.
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Re: Can you identify this?

Post by cob »

Logging tool I don't know the proper name, but you drive the pointy end into a log to attach rope

for making rafts of logs for transport on water. Weyerhaeuser operated in your neck of the woods.

edit; that is the proper shape just rusty, the flat end is the hammer strike surface.
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Deplorable
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Re: Can you identify this?

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Last edited by Deplorable on Fri Jun 11, 2021 6:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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I concur with Cobs assessment. I don't recall the name but its for clinching logs together for a float down the river "back in the day".
Back when the floated logs down the river to the mill in big floats, they would cinch them together to form a big mass. A cable was run through that hole.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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be water my friend
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Re: Can you identify this?

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cob wrote: Fri Jun 11, 2021 6:22 pm https://www.westechrigging.com/rafting- ... gLm0_D_BwE

apparently it's still "the day"
Damn. I don't recall the last time I saw a raft of logs, but I've been away from the big rivers of the west for a while. I remember seeing them on the Columbia and Snake rivers as a kid, but it seems all the logs pulled out of the woods around here travel by truck.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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Well, that makes perfect sense to me. There was a water driven sawmill beginning around 1890 about 3 miles down the shore from where I found this. I'm not sure how long it was in operation but given there was a buildup around the rafting dog was larger than a softball I would say it is quite old. That's a neat little piece of history that kind of makes my efforts worth it, and here I was disappointing because all I found that day was a quarter, 3 dimes, 5 pennies, 2 bullets, a dead drone and a lot of trash. Now I'm happy I took the time to go.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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cranky wrote: Fri Jun 11, 2021 7:30 pm Well, that makes perfect sense to me. There was a water driven sawmill beginning around 1890 about 3 miles down the shore from where I found this. I'm not sure how long it was in operation but given there was a buildup around the rafting dog was larger than a softball I would say it is quite old. That's a neat little piece of history that kind of makes my efforts worth it, and here I was disappointing because all I found that day was a quarter, 3 dimes, 5 pennies, 2 bullets, a dead drone and a lot of trash. Now I'm happy I took the time to go.
You found more treasure in a day, than I've found in three years with my detector.
They don't work so good by themselves. I need more free time.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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Deplorable wrote: Fri Jun 11, 2021 9:03 pm You found more treasure in a day, than I've found in three years with my detector.
They don't work so good by themselves. I need more free time.
Finding the time to detect is the biggest issue. I got it about 10 years ago and used to go out almost every weekend, now it's sporadic at best. I've had my detector in my truck for the past few month because I noticed the city tore down the house that was on land that was a city park and I wanted to detect around where the house used to be but before I could they paved the whole area :( So instead I've been stopping once in a while in various spots on my way home and spending 10 or 15 minutes detecting. I haven't found much, just a 3 lbs lead weight and trash. Then I looked at the local tide table and noticed that this week which is the week in June I happened to be off work had significantly low tides in the late AM and decided to take a day and go to the area I used to frequent which is where I found the rafting dog.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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I find more "treasures" prowling the local bar parking lots on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
My detector gets used on camping trips, and trips to the beach. One year it came in handy finding someone's wedding band they lost around their camp site.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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My best find ever was a great big gold signet ring which I almost passed up. I was searching a park and not finding much of anything except open holes left by someone else that had been there recently. In an hour I had only found 4 pennies and was on my way back to the car when I got yet another penny signal which I at first ignored. I took 2 more steps then said "screw it, may as well make the days haul a nickel", took two steps back and dug it up only to find a nice big gold ring facing up with the round flat surface at the top so it showed as a coin and was about the size of a penny. That ring alone paid for all my detecting equipment.
MD2 07DEC11 - C.JPG
I also found an old Chinese coin that if memory serves dates somewhere in the early to mid 1800s. I found that where a big shipping dock was in the late 1800s.
MD 6 19 OCT 11 - C.JPG
I enjoy detecting but those are the only significant things I have ever found. As far as making money I tend to do better going to a casino :D
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Re: Can you identify this?

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Cranky, I don't want to hijack your thread, but I'm looking for a metal detector right now. Can any of you guys recommend features or brands that you like/don't like? I just need to locate some property boundary markers for now (rebar with ID caps). I don't need anything fancy but when I buy something I like it to be high quality. Any suggestions are appreciated!
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Re: Can you identify this?

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River Rat wrote: Sun Jun 13, 2021 6:15 am Cranky, I don't want to hijack your thread, but I'm looking for a metal detector right now. Can any of you guys recommend features or brands that you like/don't like? I just need to locate some property boundary markers for now (rebar with ID caps). I don't need anything fancy but when I buy something I like it to be high quality. Any suggestions are appreciated!
Garrett entry level ACE 200 will probably be fine for what you're looking to do.
I have a Garrett 300. It's found a lot of trash, very little treasure. Mostly bullets, shell casings, bottle caps, and nails. Found a couple pocket knives, a ring, gold nugget necklace, and an old fork.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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Thanks Deplorable. I've been looking into those, they look like a good option. Also found a good price on a new White's coin master. Looks like White's went out of business last year and this local dealer is liquidating stock. Trying to decide between those two unless I stumble across something better soon.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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River Rat wrote: Sun Jun 13, 2021 6:15 am Cranky, I don't want to hijack your thread, but I'm looking for a metal detector right now. Can any of you guys recommend features or brands that you like/don't like? I just need to locate some property boundary markers for now (rebar with ID caps). I don't need anything fancy but when I buy something I like it to be high quality. Any suggestions are appreciated!
I haven't done any research on metal detectors since shortly after I bought mine but It sounds like an Ace 200 would probably work fine for you, I'm sure the coinmaster would too.

Mine is a Fisher F2, which I don't think is even made any more but when I bought it it came with 2 coils and a pin pointer for somewhere around $250. It's not a bad detector, I think at the time it compared to the Ace 250. I have no real complaints about it but the external speaker stopped working after the first year. That was never an issue since I always use headphones anyway because I don't like people staring at me every time it makes a noise. It lacks ground balance, which can make things a bit of a challenge at time, for instance down where I was detecting the other day nickles read as iron for some reason so I tend not to dig them up. One day I was in the same place and had chased a +12, -3 foot tide all the way out when someone showed up with an expensive detector and all he found were the nickles I left behind. Depth is good, In one local park I have found numerous pull tabs more than 12 inches deep. I know there are some others who detect, Bushman is one but can't think of any of the rest.
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Re: Can you identify this?

Post by River Rat »

Thank you guys. I'll probably pull the trigger on the Ace 200 soon. For now it's just a tool I need, but I could see it turning into another hobby after reading this thread.
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Re: Can you identify this?

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River Rat wrote: Wed Jun 16, 2021 5:53 pm Thank you guys. I'll probably pull the trigger on the Ace 200 soon. For now it's just a tool I need, but I could see it turning into another hobby after reading this thread.
In my experience, it has the potential to be the least expensive hobby you can get into. Well, behind maybe whittling. :think:
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