We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

--
Regards


SantaUK

SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

Yes, quite likely. You can hear quite low water flow in pipes.
Bob

In article ,
Bob Minchin writes:
SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

Yes, quite likely. You can hear quite low water flow in pipes.

Leaks generate white(ish) noise, which tends to be identifiable.
You can attach two microphones to two different points on a pipe,
detect the phase shift between them, and work out exactly how far
the leak is on the pipe from the microphones. Saves digging up a
whole pipe just to find it.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On Thu, 1 Oct 2009 11:19:52 +0100, SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

The gushing (from a big leak) or hissing (from a small one) sound
that water escaping under pressure makes.

SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

--
Regards


SantaUK

It's a characteristic 'hissing' noise and the very traditional device
is known as a 'listening stick'. The old hands can find leaks more
reliably than the modern electronic 'cross correlators'.

wrote:
SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the
incoming water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and
listening into a big sucker on the other end. What are they
listening for?

--
Regards


SantaUK

It's a characteristic 'hissing' noise and the very traditional device
is known as a 'listening stick'. The old hands can find leaks more
reliably than the modern electronic 'cross correlators'.

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember "The Medway Handyman"
saying something like:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.

buys popcorn and coke
Ok...

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember "The Medway Handyman"
saying something like:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water
companys leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic
detectors & believe it or not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they
worked a treat. I have my doubts.

buys popcorn and coke
Ok...

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/encyclopedia.html

Click 'D' then 'Dowsing'.


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman & Biggest Skeptic
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

SantaUK wrote:

We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?


illegal*emigrants
\0

The Medway Handyman wrote:
wrote:
SantaUK wrote:
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the
incoming water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and
listening into a big sucker on the other end. What are they
listening for?

--
Regards


SantaUK

It's a characteristic 'hissing' noise and the very traditional device
is known as a 'listening stick'. The old hands can find leaks more
reliably than the modern electronic 'cross correlators'.

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

Know a couple of water guys who carry dowsing rods (as standard kit)
in the van. They say the rods are not infallible but can be useful
when all else has failed. Given an on-the-spot demo where an obscure
water main was pinpointed.
Dowsing's a puzzler and I'm keeping my options open

On 1 Oct, 19:49, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. *They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. *She swore blind they worked a treat. *I have my doubts.

One of our neighbours does this. Quick stuff is the electronic gadget,
harder stuff is a stick in the ear.

Then if it desn't work, you get out the dowsing rods. This gives you
time to think, and it also makes the awed audience shut up for a bit,
so you can actually hear the water.

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...
On 1 Oct, 19:49, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it
or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.

One of our neighbours does this. Quick stuff is the electronic gadget,
harder stuff is a stick in the ear.

Then if it desn't work, you get out the dowsing rods. This gives you
time to think, and it also makes the awed audience shut up for a bit,
so you can actually hear the water.

Sure! - a couple of bent welding rods works a treat.

On 2 Oct, 10:18, "Neil" wrote:

Sure! - a couple of bent welding rods works a treat.

If anyone claims to be able to dowse with welding rods, I find the
best response to be to fix them with a Hard Stare in your best crazy
wiccan manner (I live near Bristol, we get lots of practice) and
denounce them as a charlatan, for Cold Iron rods cannot possibly work
for anything as fey as dowsing and the fast folk would never help you
with them. Then produce a set of bronze (brazing) rods and use those.
Silver or mithril would be even better.

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 1 Oct, 19:49, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.

One of our neighbours does this. Quick stuff is the electronic gadget,
harder stuff is a stick in the ear.

Then if it desn't work, you get out the dowsing rods. This gives you
time to think, and it also makes the awed audience shut up for a bit,
so you can actually hear the water.

The odd thing is that Randi makes the point that a dowsing system is
actually something held at a point of extreme instability..the slightest
vibration can cause the rods to twitch.. I wonder if its nothing more
than a vibration detector.

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...
On 2 Oct, 10:18, "Neil" wrote:

Sure! - a couple of bent welding rods works a treat.

If anyone claims to be able to dowse with welding rods, I find the
best response to be to fix them with a Hard Stare in your best crazy
wiccan manner (I live near Bristol, we get lots of practice) and
denounce them as a charlatan, for Cold Iron rods cannot possibly work
for anything as fey as dowsing and the fast folk would never help you
with them. Then produce a set of bronze (brazing) rods and use those.
Silver or mithril would be even better.

Well I know nothing of dowsing but I've seen this work countless times - in
fact we used to spend hours messing about (playing) while on night shift.
Have you tried it?

On Fri, 02 Oct 2009 11:16:29 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 1 Oct, 19:49, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:

Did some jobs last year for a lady who worked for the local water companys
leak detection unit. They used sticks, electronic detectors & believe it or
not - dowsing rods. She swore blind they worked a treat. I have my doubts.

One of our neighbours does this. Quick stuff is the electronic gadget,
harder stuff is a stick in the ear.

Then if it desn't work, you get out the dowsing rods. This gives you
time to think, and it also makes the awed audience shut up for a bit,
so you can actually hear the water.

The odd thing is that Randi makes the point that a dowsing system is
actually something held at a point of extreme instability..the slightest
vibration can cause the rods to twitch.. I wonder if its nothing more
than a vibration detector.

A lot of vibrations from water would be less than those from roads, unless
the leak is close and a a reasonable rate.

There's a place NE of Doncaster that found and aquifer with v. good water
in it and now sells the water. Given that this is flat land and used to
have a lot of leaking septic tanks, this is remarkable.
Some water was found about 10 - 15ft. down; drilling a bit further found
nothing. A dowser was called in and he found the shallow source
immediately. He then moved around and found more places - enough to get
some sort of line. He reckoned that it was about 80ft. down and so it
proved.
What surprised me was that there was good water and any flow at that depth,
as the area is about 5m above sea level.
--
Peter.
The head of a pin will hold more angels if
it's been flattened with an angel-grinder.

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...


Then if it desn't work, you get out the dowsing rods. This gives you
time to think, and it also makes the awed audience shut up for a bit,
so you can actually hear the water.

They do that sort of stuff around 02:00 here.
It was about then that they were poking sticks down stopcock holes last time
I saw them.

If I saw a lunatic dowsing at that time of night I would phone for an
ambulance to collect them.

"PeterC" wrote in message
...


A lot of vibrations from water would be less than those from roads, unless
the leak is close and a a reasonable rate.

There's a place NE of Doncaster that found and aquifer with v. good water
in it and now sells the water. Given that this is flat land and used to
have a lot of leaking septic tanks, this is remarkable.
Some water was found about 10 - 15ft. down; drilling a bit further found
nothing. A dowser was called in and he found the shallow source
immediately. He then moved around and found more places - enough to get
some sort of line. He reckoned that it was about 80ft. down and so it
proved.

I bet you could have drilled anywhere for miles and found water, that's the
way aquifers are.
If they aren't you are going to suck them dry almost immediately.

I bet experienced people with a geological map can study them and find the
water without even having to go there and dowse.

On Fri, 2 Oct 2009 13:47:42 +0100, dennis@home wrote:

"PeterC" wrote in message
...

A lot of vibrations from water would be less than those from roads, unless
the leak is close and a a reasonable rate.

There's a place NE of Doncaster that found and aquifer with v. good water
in it and now sells the water. Given that this is flat land and used to
have a lot of leaking septic tanks, this is remarkable.
Some water was found about 10 - 15ft. down; drilling a bit further found
nothing. A dowser was called in and he found the shallow source
immediately. He then moved around and found more places - enough to get
some sort of line. He reckoned that it was about 80ft. down and so it
proved.

I bet you could have drilled anywhere for miles and found water, that's the
way aquifers are.
If they aren't you are going to suck them dry almost immediately.

I bet experienced people with a geological map can study them and find the
water without even having to go there and dowse.


Yes, this one must wander around a bit. It apparentl goes to at least York
and, given the lack of any hills, must just spread in the porous strata.
--
Peter.
The head of a pin will hold more angels if
it's been flattened with an angel-grinder.

Thanks for the answers - even the one about illegal immigrants!

--
Regards


SantaUK
"SantaUK" wrote in message
...
We just had two guys going round our cul-de-sac lifting all the incoming
water mains covers and sticking a pole down the hole, and listening into a
big sucker on the other end. What are they listening for?

--
Regards


SantaUK