Micro Nugget Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 I HAVE BEEN FINDING THESE WIRES SCATTERED OVER SEVERAL SQUARE MILES OF DESERT IN AN AREA USED DURING WW2 FOR FIGHTER PILOT TRAINING. MOST LOCAL FOLKS FIGURE THESE ARE FROM SCREENS USED BY THE OLD-TIMERS. OTHERS HOLD TO THE VIEW THAT SOMEONE INTENTIONALLY SPREAD THEM AROUND TO DISCOURAGE METAL DETECTING. BUT THESE THEORIES DON'T SEEM TO STAND UP TO SCRUTINY. 1ST, THE WIRES ARE UNIFORMLY SCATTERED OVER SUCH A HUGE AREA THAT NO SINGLE JOHNNY _ISS-OFF COULD HAVE DONE SUCH A THOROUGH JOB IN A LIFETIME. 2ND, THE WIRES THEMSELVES ARE BRITTLE, BREAK EASILY AND MOSTLY ARE BENT OR KINKED UNLIKE ANY CLASSIFIER SCREEN I'VE EVER SEEN AND ARE OF FAIRLY UNIFORM MAXIMUM LENGH (EXCEPT, OF COURSE, FOR THOSE THAT HAVE BEEN BROKEN INTO SMALLER PIECES). 3RD, THEY ARE FOUND IN MANY STRETCHES OF DESERT THAT SHOW ZERO SIGNS OF PRIOR DRYWASHING ACTIVITY OR OLD-TIMER CAMPSITES. 4TH THIS AREA WAS USED FOR STRAFING PRACTICE DURING WW2. 50 CAL. SHELL CASINGS, METAL BELT CLIPS AND BULLETS ARE SCATTERED ALL OVER THE IDENTICAL AREAS THAT THE WIRES ARE FOUND. QUERY: ARE THERE ANY MILITARY VETERAN OR OTHER ORDNANCE GUYS WHO ARE FAMILIAR WITH HOW TRACER ROUNDS ARE PUT TOGETHER? MY HUNCH IS THAT THESE WIRES SOMEHOW ARE CONNECTED TO SUCH TRACER AMMO BECAUSE THE BRITTLENESS AND KINKING STRONGLY SUGGEST THAT THEY WERE SUBJECTED TO INTENSE HEAT BEFORE FALLING TO THE GROUND. THESE WIRES ARE MODERATELY MAGNETIC AND GIVE OFF SIGNALS BOTH TO VLF AND PI MACHINES THAT ARE JUST TOO SWEET TO RISK PASSING UP. ANY INFORMED CLARIFICATION WILL BE HIGHLY APPRECIATED. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grubstake Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 No, tracer rounds, have a pocket in the back. Powder side with phosphorous, Spelling and it lites the stuff when fired, its the same suff they use in strike anywhere matches. Grubstake Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alwaysdirty Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 Geez Micro, no need to yell. We can hear you! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andyy Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 (edited) Looks like somebody's hair is falling out Edited July 19, 2016 by Andyy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DolanDave Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 (edited) Those same wires are found all over the Franconia Arizona meteorite strewn field area for many many miles, and drive detectors crazy. They are from WW2 training, usually a long tow target (I believe called a drogue) was flown behind a plane and shot at. Edited July 19, 2016 by DolanDave 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dakota Slim Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 WHY IS MARTIN YELLING? This is not like him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fredmason Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 Martin maybe anti radar flack....maybe you can't hear me...MAYBE ANTI RADAR FLACK>..what ever that is... sorry Martin, it can't all be easy for you...hahahaha 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azdigger Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 I think them wires are from the targets that was pulled behind planes. They are all over Franconia and that is what Jim "Pale Face " Smaller told me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homefire Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 New Meteorite. Classed as SPACE WORMS. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisski Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 Looks like Chaff to me. According to the second link, the type you're finding, kind of pictured in the first link, was outmoded by something pictured in the second link. https://www.quora.com/In-the-metal-gear-saga-there-are-these-famous-chaff-grenades-Is-there-something-like-this-in-real-life https://www.ar15.com/archive/topic.html?b=1&f=5&t=1531611 Makes sense to me how if it was ever a training area above the area you found it, after many years of use, the wires would accumulate over the ground. Chaff is used to defeat a radar missile. Flares are used to defeat an IR missile. The chaff would have left the airplane with a slight explosive charge, which could account for the burning. I don't want to get hung up on the chaff explanation though. Could have been something common from a long time ago, like steel wool that was thrown in an old timers fire, and then the wind picked it up and blew it all over the place. I also don't think they're drones from WW2. The towed drones I used to see in the 80s were built of a pretty thick gauge metal. Had to be to survive being towed at 200+ MPH. Chaff was around for WWII though. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomH Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 If it were from a tow target, it would be from the cable...not the target. The ones we used at Luke were aluminum. Chaff is very thin foil strips. You will find them all over around Tom Wells road at the Q. I dont know what they used in WW2 but if any of that were sucked in a jet engine, there would be problems. Tom H. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DolanDave Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 Tow Targets were used extensively in WW2 training, as shown in picture. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Tom Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 Tom, those places were used long before there were jets. I remember firing at towed targets with 40mm and 20 mm guns and they would tell us not to hit them just see how close you can get. Somehow we could hear what they were saying and if we got too close to the plane the pilot would veer of and go home. Every once in a while we would sink a towed wooden target pulled by a ship. We would catch hell for that but I think that the Old Man secretly enjoyed it. I think that that's why my hearing is so bad now as we didn't use any ear protection in those days. The towed sleeves might have been made out of reinforced by screen canvas. Kind of looks like screen material to me. Old Tom 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micro Nugget Posted July 21, 2016 Author Share Posted July 21, 2016 Thanks for the input everyone. I guess these wires will remain a mystery for a while. Apologies for the upper case -- didn't notice it until too deep into the text and afraid to try the edit feature for fear of losing everything. One of my prospecting buddies, Colonel Ralph Wetterhahn, says the chaff he is familiar with consists of flat, thin strips of aluminum. I'm not sure if radar guided artillery existed during WW2. Aside from the tracer round idea, I thought maybe these wires might have been part of some military experiment for confusing such artillery guidance system, but Ralph says he doesn't think so. I posted the attached photo before on another thread. It shows 50 nuggets recovered over a month's time before the temps entered triple digits. My estimate is that I have to dig 4 or 5 of these stupid wires for every nugget I find in that region. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomH Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Thats a pretty good trash to treasure ratio! Nice gold! Tom H. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomH Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Hey...also, are you finding the wire in washes? or on hillsides and such? Got a theory... Going camping so I may not answer. Tom H. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DolanDave Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Nice Gold congrats Micro Nugget, I would rather dig those old pieces of wire anyday for some gold n meteorites.... Dave. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pairadiceau Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 (edited) Yes, as Tom mentioned there are lots of those pesky aluminum strips found around Tom Wells Road area. I did notice Shep casually scattering same in his wake in an effort to discourage stalkers. Edited July 21, 2016 by pairadiceau 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micro Nugget Posted July 21, 2016 Author Share Posted July 21, 2016 Tom: The wires are fairly random and uniformly scattered across vast areas. Some are 4 or even 6 inches deep. Most are within an inch or two of the surface. The washes don't seem to have any particular concentrations. If anything, it is under the bushes and brush that are more likely to conceal the little devils -- probably they get caught during the frequent high wind events is my speculation. The ones that are deeper are in places where water seems to have had a hand in piling up loose dirt. Occasionally I come across rusting sections of old wire screens -- always in places where there also are old-timer diggins and campsites. These screens likely were used for classification. But the mystery wires never are rusted and they seem thinner. They must contain some sort of alloy that prevents oxidation but yet is magnetic. A few months ago I did some detecting in the Tom Wells Road locale for the first time. And, yes, I dug a few of those aluminum strips. But the whoopee nugget moments are SO worth the bother of digging wire trash. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homefire Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 It seems the wires are pretty much of uniform size. I'm thinking they were from some Fragmentation Munition but I can't find any at this time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mn90403 Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 (edited) I've found my share of these wires and most of the time they are just a straight little piece that sticks to my magnet and I have a hard time seeing it with the black sand. I think they are brittle but I'll have to test that. I've never gotten one bent in a circle. Martin is also right about them being without rust. If they did oxidize then they probably would all be gone. Many of the ones I find have the desert patina on them without extras like the change I find at the beach. Mitchel Edited July 21, 2016 by mn90403 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisski Posted July 22, 2016 Share Posted July 22, 2016 Odd that they would stick to the magnet but not rust. Maybe as the chaff was discharged by the explosion and it burnt the iron, giving it some kind of protection against rust, or maybe it was an iron, aluminum alloy. I'm assuming the sweet signal is some kind of target ID on the metal detector, which could mean an alloy. I still think it was an early form of chaff they were experimenting with in WWII. Not much on the internet about it, but an old Wings Documentary said the chaff sometimes dumped from planes in WWII as either a decoy or to mask an incoming bomber formation, not from radar guided artillery, but from, German Early Warning radar. I know with chaff nowadays, it is used a lot in every day training, but live rounds are rarely fired. The chaff has to land somewhere and just doesn't disappear, so I think an old training area would build up and get distributed by the wind over time. I don't know of any air to air training areas around the Tom Wells area. Doesn't mean it wasn't around for WWII. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El Dorado Posted July 22, 2016 Share Posted July 22, 2016 looking at the wires, some have a corrugated pattern and some are straighter. I would guess they were originally together in a weaved pattern and may have been a screen of some sort.....If they are brittle that might indicate some nickle in the alloy and that is why they might not rust that much....just a WAG. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swampstomper Al Posted July 23, 2016 Share Posted July 23, 2016 6 hours ago, El Dorado said: looking at the wires, some have a corrugated pattern and some are straighter. I would guess they were originally together in a weaved pattern and may have been a screen of some sort.....If they are brittle that might indicate some nickle in the alloy and that is why they might not rust that much....just a WAG. Has anyone done an overlay of where these wire bits are being found against WWII training locations and etc..? Continuing along El D's line of WAG reasoning, I'm seeing motor pool and/or fuel transference facilities.. Seems to me we used wire mesh for filtration and/or straining of diesel, oils and other lubricants during that time frame.. Cheap and 'disposable'.. Swamp Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AzNuggetBob Posted July 23, 2016 Share Posted July 23, 2016 I agree could some type of target or radar testing material they were testing at that time. but I will say Ive dug a bunch of that aluminumized chaff. AzNuggetBob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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