Animal Magnetism

[+tands]

I couldn't figure out why my Etrex Vista would work outstanding sometimes and other times point hundreds of feet in the wrong direction all in the same day. Yesterday I figured it out while running in the forest scouting a cache rampage. I broke and dislocated my right wrist 2 years ago. I guess the pins and metal stuff they put in my right wrist throw the compass off on the Vista by about 45 degrees. Left hand is dead on. Also holding in right hand slowed signal lock! Really! Tried it 10 times cuz I couldn't believe it. Gonna have to go southpaw on GPS use now! Even in the car with the compass on holding the unit in my right hand throws off the arrow noticably. Something to consider while using your GPS. Change hands and see if it helps.

 

- T of TandS

[+IVxIV]

Umm,, that sounds a bit too hard to chew

 

How many pounds of metal do you have in your wrist? Have you held a mechanical compass around your wrist/arm? Is the needle influenced by that in the slightest?

[Timmus]

HMMMMMM.....It's possible that what your seeing is related to the metal in your wrist but usually stainless steel is used and that isn't magnetic or attracted to magnets.....now, if they used drywall screws............

 

Timmus

[+Xangxa]

I've seen some wierd stuff like that before, with an ordinary compass. If I hold my Silva to my chest I do not get an accurate reading sometimes. And I do not have any implants (at least that I know of. Maybe there was an alien abuduction in my past ). I do not even wear a watch or any jewelry. So was it a magnentic field caused by my body? Or was there a magnetic field created by something beneath the soil and thus creating a coincidental effect?

 

Stainless steel is non-magnetic? That's new to me. I'll have to get my wife's flatware out and check that out. The skeptic in me thought that all ferrite based materials were magnetic, but I've been wrong before.

[Timmus]

"Stainless steel is non-magnetic? That's new to me. I'll have to get my wife's flatware out and check that out. The skeptic in me thought that all ferrite based materials were magnetic, but I've been wrong before.

"

I thought so too until I bought my wife a stainless steel refrigerator last year...none of her magnets stuck to it ... I did a little research and found out that s/s steel is non-magnetic...I guess it's the nickel they alloy it with.

 

Timmus

Edited May 3, 2005 by Timmus

[+TresOkies]

I'd believe it. I have a friend who got zapped by an arc welder years ago. From that point on, he swears he cannot wear a watch. I do know that he wreaks havoc on computers in short order. Hard drives go bad, screens stop working, and floppies lose their formating. Macs and PCs. I'm sure a delicate instrument like a GPS would not last long in his hands.

 

Even though I'm an engineer and believe in observable phenomena, I think there are some things we haven't figured out fully.

[+Learned Gerbil]

My arm is full of metal - but it does not appear to be magnetic. I suspect that it is mainly titanium.

[+OienLabs]

I am not a specialist in this but I thought the only magnetic metals was iron an nicel.

 

On the other han I possess a kitchen knife all made of stainless steel or so it seems. Seems to be made of one peace. But the blade is magnetic while the shank is not. I cannot see any color diffrence from blade to shank. Interesting.

 

So there is stainless steel an there is stainless steel.

[+tands]

In response, yes, magnetic compasses of the analog variety have done this also, today.

But the response is much much less.

 

Electronic compasses are 'flux gate.' There is something in them about inducing a field and measuring it's deflection by magnetic field vectors. Anything that conducts electricity close to them can goof them up I'm pretty sure, and since the wires in my hand are nice and small they don't need much juice as far as emf to excite them.

 

I don't know what's in there, but it is absolutely happening. Another theory could include induced fields in the small wire used for such things created by interaction with the reference signal in the gps. It's pretty common for gps units to goof eachother up if too close to eachother. This might even have something to do with WAAS which is terrestrially based and uses a radio signal if I've got it right.

 

For jollies I'll take some pictures of the phenomenon when the wife gets home for the skeptics.

 

- T of TandS

Edited May 3, 2005 by tands