Hidden Treasures Under a House
Under House Metal Detecting Finds
Well not exactly hidden treasure, but I found some nice stuff yesterday at an old house which has no floorboards (eaten away by termites)
I spent around 6 hours detecting yesterday, I went for a long drive as I usually do and love to do, looking for places to go metal detecting and I went to a few old homesteads around the district.
The first one I went to was just basically a very old iron shack, I had no luck there, and did not hang around for long, because the ground was like concrete and impossible to get the shovel in, usually I carry a geologist pick ax, but I keep on forgetting to take with me, as I do with my metal detecting pouch, so at the end of the day my pockets are full of sand.
The Australian Iron Shack
After leaving the old iron shack, I headed East of town to a place where I have been previously hunting for old Australian bottles, feeling alot more confident and excited.
This old place had two old abandoned houses, the first place was very old for Australian standards, probably late 19th Century, it is a mud brick home, very weathered and very damaged by termites and the elements of weather.
The Australian Mud Brick House
Once again that old place had ground like concrete, so I did not really try much detecting, but around 200 metres away was the next old house…. this is the house which gave up some of its hidden treasures.
The house looked pretty good on the outside, but on the inside it was just ball walls, no floorboards due to termites, and as soon as I noticed it had no floorboards, thats when I started feeling a little excited, knowing that there was a good chance to find things that had either been buried under the floorboards, or to find things that may have fallen between the floorboards.
No Floorboards - Treasure Hunters Dream
Mystery Coin in the Sift
So I started detecting and it did not take long to get a strong signal, the soil was beautiful and soft so I had no trouble digging soil into my sift. What I found was a coin of some type which I had never found before, because it was bigger than all the previous Australian Pre-Decimal Coins I had found before, but there was no way I could identify it because it had a big shell of corrosion surrounding it.
I thought the coin would be well and truly damaged from the corrosion, that is only if it was a copper coin, but was it copper?
I leave that surprise to a post tomorrow, because I am still impatiently cleaning this unknown find… so please come back tomorrow and you’ll see my surprise find … (nothing special, but I have never seen one before)
The Mystery Coin Found Under Floorboards
The Mystery Coin above will be revealed on the site soon!
Anyhow, besides that item, this is what I found under the floorboards and around the house:
- 1912 Australian Half Penny
- 1922 Australian Half Penny
- 1925 Australian Half Penny
- 1939 Australian Six Pence
- 1942 Australian Three Pence
The Third House
I did find some other coins, six pence and three pence, but due to my carelessness, I had them in my top pocket and they must have fallen out when I was digging or bending over, but will find them on my return hopefully!
I found other stuff at the house as follows:
- Silver Tea Spoon
- 2 Silver Bangles / Bracelets
- Buttons
- Some Bottles and Jars
- Plenty of Junk!
Will be heading back to that place in the very near future!
Then finally on the way home, I past another old house, and thought, bugger it, I will test my luck there as well!
And I found some more coins.
- 1948 Australian Shilling
- 1950 Australian Shilling
- 1951 Australian Three Pence
- numerous 1 and 2 cent coins
The Last House for the Day!
Yesterdays Church Metal Detecting Coin Finds
Well, here are some close up photos of the coins I found yesterday at an old Metal Detecting at an old Church near my hometown.
Click on the images below to see a good close up photo!
Old Church Metal Detecting Find - 1942 Silver Australian Three Pence
Old Church Metal Detecting Find - 1956 Silver Australian Three Pence
More photos from yesterday:
1955 Silver Australian Three Pence
I would like to say that in 1966 Australia introduced Decimal Currency, so I would say that the above 1966 coins would have been definately sitting under the soil for 43 years.
In 1966, coins were introduced in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 50 cents. One-dollar coins were introduced in 1984, followed by two-dollar coins in 1988. The one- and two-cent coins were discontinued in 1991 and withdrawn from circulation. Cash transactions are rounded to the nearest five cents. As with most public changes to currency systems, there has been a great amount of seignorage of the discontinued coins. All coins portray the head of state, Queen Elizabeth II, on the obverse, and are produced by the Royal Australian Mint.
Today’s Old Church Finds using my E-Trac Metal Detector
Todays E-Trac Metal Detecting Finds from a Churchyard
Click on the above image to see a bigger photo
I went shopping today at a town around 100 kilometres from my hometown and also went to visit my Mum who is currently residing at a nursing home.
On the way back, I decided that I would go and visit this old Church which located in the middle of nowhere, it is just a Church around 20 kilometres from my town.
I have been there before Metal Detecting, but I had no luck, also because there were a lot of mosquitos and I took my girlfriend and Mum at the time and they just did not want to hang around, so it was a bit of a rush job.
Anyhow, today I was by myself, so I had plenty of time, at least an hour or two before it got dark. So I detected in the same areas as before, and this time I had some great luck.
Using my Minelab E-Trac Metal Detector, I found 4 Silver Three Pence Coins, one of which I dropped and will have to go back at a later date to find again. Thats the most silver coins I have found in a day, so I am really happy about that.
I also found an Australian Penny, which looks to be damaged from the highly salinity affected soil (Soil Salinity is a major problem in Western Australia)
I also found a couple of 10 Cent Coins, which had been in the ground for quite a while, but finding modern day coins is nothing to show off about, unless you find a hidden stash of them.
And I also found the usual junk.
I am glad I went back to the church for another try, gives me some confidence to go back there again in the near future to try my luck again.
I know of plenty of other Churches around the district which are in the middle of nowhere, so I can’t wait to test my luck on them as well.
Finding the silver coins also gives me the opportunity to give them a clean using my Coin Cleaning Electrolysis Method
Cleaning Silver Coins and Silver Ring – Before and After Photos
.925 Stamped Sterling Silver Ring - Before and After Cleaning
If your a reader of this blog, the other day I wrote a post on finding some Coins and a Silver Ring in a Western Australian Lake (Lake Dumbleyung) which has extreme salinty, so salty that it is more saltier than the Dead Sea.
The coins were totally encrusted with mud, salt, tiny stones, shells and grit, so much so that it was basically like concrete. The Silver Ring was not so bad, but was badly tarnished, basically it was totally black from being in the salty water and black mud for many years.
So I put myself to task to attempt to clean the coins and the ring.
I knew that if the coins were also silver then they would be basically still okay, but if the coins were copper Australian Pennys then they would be basically beyond repair.
I tried a few cleaning techniques, the first cleaning method I used was soaking the coins in Distilled water for a couple of days, but I lost my patience with that as I knew it would just take too long, so then I used the good old Electrolysis Coin Cleaning method and that worked a treat.
When I originally found the coins in the Lake, I didn’t have a clue about what type of coins they were. All up there was around 10 coins I found.
The electrolysis helped me identify what the coins were as follows:
1 x $2 coin
1 x $1 coin
1 x 20 cent coin
3 x Australian Copper Pennys
3 x Silver Shillings and
1 x Silver Sixpence
As predicted apart from the Silver Coins, the other non silver coins were basically ruined from corrosion. The Australian pennys were basically paper thin, eaten away by corrosion and other chemical reactions and only one of the pennys was just barely identifiable as you can see in the photo below … the Queens head!
But amazingly the Silver Shillings and the Silver Sixpence came out in excellent condition, and what strikes me as being so amazing is that the four silver coins I found, had been buried in the black salty mud for at least 50 YEARS! Yes there was some mild deterioration of the silver, but nothing like the other coins.
Once I could make out the dates of the coins, I went to a good Australian Coin Values website to see if I had hit the lucky jackpot and found myself a coin of value, but unfortunately there only worth a few bucks at most.
After I finished with the Electrolysis cleaning, I cleaned up the Silver Coins with some Goddards Silver Cleaning Cream and a soft cloth , and they came out pretty good, as did the Silver Ring I found also which is stamped .925, which means it is Sterling Silver 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% other metals, usually copper.
Here are the before and after pics. Click on the photos to get a better view.
Australian Silver Shillings - Cleaning Before and After
Australian Silver Sixpence - Before and After Cleaning
Australian Copper Pennys - Before and After Cleaning
Coins & Silver Ring Found in Salt Laden Mud
I went back out to the local Lake yesterday with the aim of possibly finding another Ring or two. This time I carried out a proper Metal Detecting grid search of a small area where there was likely a lot of human activity when the Lake had water in it, water skiing, swimming, sunbathing etc
The area I searched was not the same area where I did a quick 15 minute search and found the Lost Gold Wedding Ring five days ago, so I decided I would try my luck in a different area, and come back to the “Gold Ring Area” another time.
I came a bit more prepared this time, I brought with me some insect repellent, to stave off the annoying flys that bite, it only helped a little, and these flys are the worse I have encounted, they would even bite through my BeautUtes.com Chesty Bonds Singlet, they must have mosquito like fangs! I ended up rubbing insect repellent all over my singlet and decided next time I will come even more prepared … with a long sleeve shirt!
Anyhow I knew I would find myself some coins, obviously lost out of swimmers pockets, I also knew that the coins I would find would be severely covered in corrosion from the salty environment the coins had been laying in for anywhere up from 5 years to up to 50 years or more.
So I ended up finding around 10 coins, and I have not got a clue what the coins exactly are, such as Pre-Decimal Australian Coins (Pennys, Shillings, Six Pence ) (Prior 1965) or Post-Decimal Australian Coins (5, 10, 20, 50 Cent Coins) (Post 1966) because as you can see in the photos below the coins a surrounded by a shell of corrosion, and no doubt are damaged beyond repair.
I was also happy when I found a nice Silver Ring, possibly another Lost male or female wedding ring, not really that sure, but nethertheless another nice ring to add to my collection of Western Australian lost and found rings to write about on this Metal Detecting Blog!
So after finding this stuff with my metal detector I have decided to do some experimental “Coin Cleaning, and I found this great coin cleaning link and I currently have the coins soaking in Distilled Water as per instructions below:
Distilled Water Coin Cleaning
Technique:
One of the gentlest methods of cleaning coins is using distilled water (DW) soaks. This requires that you soak the coin for 24 hours remove the coin and gently scrub the coin with a soft toothbrush. Change the water and then repeat until the coin is clean.Theory:
Distilled water contains almost no dissolved minerals. When you put a coin in DW the minerals on the coin transfer to the water until the DW is saturated with minerals.
Good Candidates
See other Coin Cleaning Methods
It will be interesting to see what the results are, I will keep you all updated on this.
As I say, it is highly likely that none of the coins will be unidentifiable due to the corrosion.
The 5, 10, 20 and 50 cent coins are made of cupro-nickel (75 per cent copper and 25 per cent nickel). The one and two dollar coins are made of aluminium bronze (92 per cent copper, 6 per cent aluminium and 2 per cent nickel). These coins will corrode slowly in a salt laden environment such as the lake I found them in or in the Ocean.
The Australian Pre-Decimal Penny and Half-Penny is made out of copper and will corrode very quickly in salty enviroments.
The Australian Six Pence, Three Pence, and Shilling are made out of pure silver.
A commonly asked question: Does Silver rust?
Silver will react to salty soil and water and can suffer from sulphide related tarnish. 80% of the lost silver rings I have recovered from the ocean have suffered from tarnish, but a bit of silvo or silver polish will bring the ring back to it’s former glory.
I once found two Australian Silver Six Pence coins in the ocean, those coins were in a shell of rust, and when I cracked open the shell, inside the silver coins were like brand knew.
Read more on Australias’ Salinity Crisis
Stay tuned for before and after photos of the coins and the silver ring!
Here are the photos of the coins and the ring I found yesterday
Billy - Toto - Ginger - Metal Detecting at Lake Dumbleyung Western Australia
Coin suffering from Corrosion - Australian Pre-Decimal Penny?
Australian Coin with major Corrosion
The Silver Ring Found in Salt Lake - Major Tarnish - Nil Corrosion
My First Silver Australian Three Pence!
I went out the local bush today to my “secret treasure hunting place” near Dumbleyung in Western Australia.
I spent a couple of hours out there, it was nice cool weather with a bit of light rain. We have had quite a bit of rain over the last couple days, so that makes Metal Detecting alot better, because the soil is wet and it is easier for My Minelab E-Trac Metal Detector to pick up signals…. plus when its wet and cool, there are no snakes around.
I found the usual pieces of melted lead which I do like finding for some stupid reason, I spose because its rare to find lead and it can be easily melted down for fishing sinkers and so forth, so at the moment I reckon I have around 5 kilograms of found lead.
Anyhow I found a few interesting things which I like as follows.
An old aluminum D&W Gibbs LTD Soap Box lid
D & W Gibbs Ltd, soap manufacturers lid
Another Beautiful Aluminum Lid with a Ships Anchor stamped on it. Can’t found out any information about this one, except is says L N on either side of the Anchor and down the bottom it says “Made in Hong Kong. Its also Aluminum. I would class this and the one above as a junk find, but I still like them
Lid - Ships Anchor - Made in Hong Kong
Was pretty happy to find another Australian Copper Half-Penny to add to my collection. Dated 1950
1950 Australian Copper Half-Penny1950 Australian Copper Half-Penny - Other Side
But my find of the day would have to be my first ever Silver Australian Three-Pence, Dated 1950, made my day, I love finding firsts!
Silver Australian Three-Pence, Dated 1950
Silver Australian Three-Pence, Dated 1950
