Replies

1. 
   Sphere | Sep 09, 2005 09:12pm | #1

   Sure. Hold the drilled dowels in each hand, orient the coat hanger wire parallel to each other facing forward to your motion. Walk at a steady , slow pace with the contraption in front of you, when the wires cross each other, plumb down and find yer pipe or water source.

   It does not work for everyone, I know an old timer that has a penny with a driller hole in it, he suspendes it in a mason jar w/ a string, it will tap the side of the jar say 7 times..he somehow equates that to the depth of said well..IIRC 7' per tap,x 7taps = 49' to 5 gal a minute....he might be dead by now, it was a while ago that he demonstrated that.

   Apple twig with a fork is just as accurate for underground springs and such..IF you have the magnetism to pull it off. Personally, I can hold the switch with all my might, and the bark will peel from the downward force.

   Somes gots it, and somes don't.

     Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks

2. 
   oats | Sep 09, 2005 09:25pm | #2

   This works ...really. Better than digging a bunch of random holes.
   Operation Manual: Brace your upper arms/elblows at your waist. The short leg of the "L" shaped wire should be in the "sleeve" (can be made of 6" straight piece of garden hose with a smooth edge). The purpose of a smooth edge and bracing your arms is to keep the reading as clean and uninfluenced as possible.
   Hold the "sleeves" vertically, letting the "L" shaped wires move freely. Walk back and forth to cover all ground area. Your wires will cross above the water source. Mark the spot on the ground under where your wires crossed, with a rock, stick, whatever. To confirm the "reading", walk away and double back several times, marking the spot where your wires cross. If you can't get a clear reading, keep trying until you get a unmistakable signal. This also a great way to find buried water/sewer lines.
   Now if I could just find oil that way, I'd be rich.

1. 
   4Lorn1 | Sep 10, 2005 02:43am | #5

   Re: "This works ...really. Better than digging a bunch of random holes."Sure. About half the time it is ...Exactly what simple probability would predict. LOL.Of course anyone can skew the results, either way, by simply noting, refusing to note, the signs in the terrain. Lower spots tend to, entirely logically, reduce the depth needing to be drilled for water.Damp spots, deeper green vegetation and increased humidity, also tend to yield more water than other locations.On lower side of a rock, clay or other impermeable underground plane, tends to have more water at a shallower depth than where the rock emerges. Assuming you don't drill through the plane.Dowsing, witching or clacking for water fall into the category of unproven methods. it is not clear that they work at all and when they seem to the mechanism seems to be as as much a measure of the practitioners ability to notice, possibly subconsciously, subtle clues as it is any unseen forces working on the wires, twigs or rocks.Because of this all I can advise is that you not pay for any such services. If you do don't pay for error. Make the practitioner commit to a prediction, both depth and volume, and subtract some portion of any payment for any error plus or minus. Make them put their money where their mouth is. This keeps it win-win. They make more money for accuracy and less for inaccuracy. Most anyone can talk a good story. make them walk it.I once had a boss who had the uncanny ability to find water, in this case water lines. His instrument of choice was a Ditch Witch. You could always be sure that if he dropped the blade on a trencher water would come bubbling up from a water, sewer or sprinkler line. It was so much a constant that it became a standing joke that if you were stranded in the desert you best bet was having the boss break out a Ditch Witch. Your thirst, assuming it wasn't a sewer line, would soon be slaked. We could look at maps and question HOs where water lines were and many times they would swear the water lines were hundreds of feet away. Then the trench would start filling with water.

3. 
   Mooney | Sep 09, 2005 10:16pm | #3

   Ive heard about it all my life just as you +

   Ive heatrd enough testimony to believe the wires or branch fork will dip down involuntarily.

   Had a niece have a well drilled. I was the soninlaw  of a water well driller. She asked me if witching works.

   Fatherinlaw believed in the lay of land and liked to drill in "sways" in the land.  He believed they were caused to allow drainage through the ground in the bibilcal flood. He said he never missed a well in a sway or a ravine. He did not believe in witching . Said they failed too many times .

   Contrary almost all wellls here hit water but sometimes not much . So it might be proven that doctors work, but the ratio is high here of reaching some water anyway.

   She had her well witched and got 2 gallons per minute. I told her so much for me about witching. I would rather try a depression or a sway for that at least makes logical sense whether its true or not.

   Tim

    

4. 
   JonE | Sep 10, 2005 01:19am | #4

   It works.  It's hard not to find water in my area, but how much water and how deep you have to go to get it can be entirely dependent on the skill of the dowser, or if's it's "witched" at all.    We have a fair number of drillers around here, the ones who dowse invariably get, on average, twice the yield and much shallower wells than those who dont.  The state has the records to prove it. 

   FWIW, I can't dowse worth a darn, but my mother can.  She picked the spot for my well, using a forked apple branch.  That stick dipped down on the spot we eventually drilled, made the skin on her hands raw from the force.  She is able to ask questions of the stick, like depth, yield and the quality of the water ("is it good water?" she'd ask, and the stick would nod.).   The well driller came out and dowsed it again, after I had pulled the stake - just to test him.  He was within six inches of the spot.   She predicted 190 feet and 20 gallons per minute, he drilled to 220 and got 14 gallons consistently and probably could have gotten 20 for demand periods.   I'm satisfied with that.  It's also perfect quality - low hardness, no iron, no sulfur.

   The well driller gave me the option of a fixed price for the well, or paying by the foot for the borehole and casing.  I did the math based on the "witchcraft", paid by the foot, and saved two thousand dollars.  He said it was one of the cheapest wells he'd drilled in a long time; everybody wants to pay the fixed price because they don't believe in dowsing. 

    

5. 
   dtgardengirl | Sep 10, 2005 03:01am | #6

   A couple of years back I watched from my office window and saw one in an office park!  Apparently they believed it would work.  I was surprised. 

   Did you know people also do this for graves?  There's a whole thing on that, but it's not water.

6. 
   maddog3 | Sep 10, 2005 03:42am | #7

   I made my own, no big deal, #12 solid , I found the drain to the septic, and the two power feeds out to the sheds, that was at the old place.

   at the new castle, I have located the leach bed, the water feed to the barn, and two more power feeds just using my pieces of wire,

   it still impresses me though, each time I find something

   "
1. 
   junkhound | Sep 10, 2005 04:59pm | #8

   Witched my own wells with a 16 oz beer can, when the can was empty, knew 'water' was below; oh, and when drilling, always hit water within 5 feet depth of where it was expected.

   BTW, looking up nearby wells on the state hydrology survey and talking to neighbors helped a 'little' <G>

1. 
   maddog3 | Sep 10, 2005 05:44pm | #9

   were you careful not to get any "water"on your boots?Hydrology??? isn't that how someone grows lettuce without dirt?"

1. 
   jimblodgett | Sep 10, 2005 06:07pm | #10

   Some people are REALLY gifted at it. 

   It's not just finding the well spot either.  I've seen a dowser take a piece of brush with a root ball on it and "bob" it out in front of him, counting the bobs until it becomes still to tell you how deep the well will be.

   There was a very well known dowser in the town I grew up in who people hired to dowse for precious metals even.  I'm pretty sure he used rods made from the metal(s) he was looking for, but can't say for sure on that part. 

1. 
   Piffin | Sep 10, 2005 06:52pm | #11

   I used to be a skeptic about witching until one time we were on a job and needed to find the waste water line. It was an eleven acre site and The line could have been any where in an acre and a half.One of my older carps simply asked "Why dont you dowse for it? You can do it!"He bent a couple copper wires and showed me how to hold them.I started off wondering if I was being set up for coffee break entertainment...but the wirees consitantly crossed alongg the same line, every time I crossed it. We were a little confused by a second line coming to it. we painted that line and dug there, and found the main and an old Y ttying in that nobody knew about. since then, I have dowsed to find bureied power ( I was still confirming for myself whether it worked or not so I would give it a try before calling dig safe. i was always right on)
   other supply and water lines, and water for a well. One one property, I marked a spot for drilling and the owner also wanted another well sunk, "just in case"??? he picked the spot for the second well, and I was not getting much confirmation from my dowsing there. his spot produced fifteen gallons a minute. mine made over eighty. 

    

   Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!

2. 
   BillHartmann | Sep 10, 2005 07:04pm | #12

   The former city sewer & water maintance man claimed that he could find the sewer line and electrical line (for the force main sewer grinder pump).I was installing a drain pipe that had to run parallel to the sewer line.Now the location was known at the street where there was a cutoff valve. And a few feet down the yard where the electrical conduit, which the city contractor install about 6" deep, went down deeper to I am assuming the deep of the sewer line. And about 10ft more down the yard the electric lines from the neighbor crossed over my yard, this time only aobut 1" deep", and then went deep.At the other end was my neighbors pump on his side and mine on my side and I was runing the drain between them.So I knew exactly where they where for the first 15 ft or so, but had no idea of how they ran to the pumps and where they Y'd.He ignored all of the know evidence and witched them about 18" to the south of the know parts.That is exactly where I ran my drain and had no problems with the sewer or electrical.

3. 
   blue_eyed_devil | Sep 10, 2005 07:10pm | #13

   PIFFIN! YOU'RE GOING TO BE A MILLIONAIRE!

   I demand a 10% finders fee for this information.

   Go to http://skepdic.com/dowsing.html. When you read that article, you'll find a link to the million dollar challenge. I think you're a lock for it.

   blue, dreamily thinking of what I'm going to invest the 100 g's in. 

4. 
   jimblodgett | Sep 10, 2005 07:55pm | #14

   Maybe you'll be able to afford a decent hammer and throw that frikkin' Rocket away! 

5. 
   blue_eyed_devil | Sep 11, 2005 02:48am | #16

   Jim, I haven't carried a rocket in ten years. I'm high teching it with a Stilletto (wood handle that I managed to install myself.)

   That 100 grand will come in handy this Christmas.

   blue 

6. 
   jimblodgett | Sep 11, 2005 07:09am | #18

   I work with Ken Hill every once in a while, blue.  He's about our age and still uses a Rocket.  I get a chuckle every time I think about it and remember you and the rest of the old Rocket freaks I've worked with through the years. 

   The rigging axe framers were just going out when I was coming up, but when I went in the union in the early 80s, seemed like every other guy swung a Rocket.  Frikkin' short handled clubs is what they always felt like to me. Pretty much indestructable, though, I'll give them that. 

7. 
   blue_eyed_devil | Sep 11, 2005 06:20pm | #22

   Back in those days Jim (79-80's) Rockets were popular here too. Since we hand pounded most everything, they represented a good balance between the need for speed and power. They were good on the pine, as well as the studs.

   Back in those days, everyone on our rough crew carried  sandpaper (80grit) too! We used that to sand the corner of the exterior piine! I used to carry a chisel and low angle block plane!

   Hahahahahahaha! Thanks goodness for rough sawn trim.

   blue 

7. 
   Hoohuli | Sep 10, 2005 08:22pm | #15

   I had to find where the main water line crossed under a 175' long driveway. The owner said water witching would work and brought me a couple of right angle bent #12 wires. I walked up and down the driveway and the wires always crossed at the same place. We dug on both sides of the concrete and sure enough the pipe was there! Sure saved ####lot of digging on my part. Used it several times since then, always works!!!!

   If at first you don't succeed, GET A BIGGER HAMMER!
8. 
   bldrbill | Sep 11, 2005 03:49am | #17

   I've had several wells drilled and all of them have been witched.  One of the drillers taught me how to do it--we used a forked stick from a privet bush.  The stick dipped down for me just like it did for him.  But it won't work for everyone.  As it was explained to me, "You've got to have the lectricity in your body."

9. 
   Jer | Sep 11, 2005 03:25pm | #19

   Yeah it works, even though there are skeptics. I had to find an old line once before digging a fondation and I used the coathangers. I was shown by my wife's grandpop, an old Texas oil man, how to use the coathangers. My mother could do it with an apple branch, but after tryin it once being the good Christian she was, she would never want to fool with that kind of thing ever again.

10. 
    Shacko | Sep 11, 2005 05:29pm | #20

    I am not shouting, my computer has taking over the size of the type!.  I've been in a situation where more than once  when this has worked!Don't ask me how.

1. 
   Adrian | Sep 11, 2005 05:44pm | #21

   I believe it works, and have done it. My step-father used to do it on archaeological sites too....Russian archaeologists supposedly do it form moving vehicles. Whatever tool you use is simply a way to focus on stimuli we're all exposed to, according to the theory. .....They dowse for oil too, and supposedly have found it in places where the conventioanl thinking couldn't find it.

   Look up dowsing with a pendulum, if you want to push the boundaries a little....weird stuff, but my friends and I used to experiment and you'd be surprised.Cabinetmaker/college woodworking instructor. Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

11. 
    diddidit | Sep 11, 2005 07:17pm | #23

     

    62929.24 in reply to 62929.1 

    No one has ever demonstrated any truth to dowsing claims under controlled conditions. In double-blind tests, dowsing success has always been exactly as predicted by random chance.

    Translation - it doesn't exist. Read about the ideomotor effect.

    People are incredibly good at forgetting when something didn't work and only remembering the times it did appear to work - memory is not a reliable data source.

    There's ground water under something like 70% of the world's habitable land. Them's pretty good odds...

    did

    p.s. that was me deleting the last one - forgot to check the HTML included box...

    Cure Diabetes!