Everywhere I go I carry a small cheap pocket compass. Oftentimes I even remove the plate so all I have to carry is a little round plastic disc not much bigger than a silver dollar. Cheap? Yes, but all compasses work which is why you can pay $5 and get one that is “guaranteed” to work.
So imaging my puzzlefaction when I was in a thick patch of woods on an overcast day and checked my compass bearing. Somehow it seemed all wrong, how did I get on the other side of the swamp? So I checked again, and again. Then the sun came out and it was setting in the east! Back at the hacienda I set the compass on my dining room table to discover that my home had rotated 180 degrees. This wasn’t like the “zona de silencio” in Chihuahua where my compass was about 30 degrees off, it was exactly backwards! I threw it away and got a new one (a different brand I think). The new one worked for about two weeks, then it too suddenly reversed itself. This so mystified me that I got out my various other compasses and lined them up . All pointed in the right direction except for the new one which was exactly backwards. I even took photographs. I carefully reviewed my activities over the last several months, but had been nowhere near any powerful magnets such as an MRI. My Swiss army knife is mildly magnetic but I carry it in the other pocket. It is worthy of note that I live in a world with very few electromagnetic devices of any kind, my very own zona de silencio. I don’t even have cell phone service despite living near a major city. I searched on line for an explanation but none could be found. One leading compass manufacturer stated that on rare occasions there could be “anomalies”, but other than that zip nada. At present my compass works perfectly. Would one of y’all Texican rocket scientists please offer me an explanation of this mystery??? Sleazel From: Texascavers <texascavers-boun...@texascavers.com> On Behalf Of Logan Sent: Monday, July 22, 2019 11:30 PM To: texascavers@texascavers.com; Dwight Deal <dirt...@comcast.net>; SWR Cavers <swrcav...@googlegroups.com>; texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Brunton Stories: Dwight's story (see below) about paying $5 for a supposedly "defective" Brunton with east and west reversed reminds me of a similar story regarding metric hand tapes. Like cavers, archeologists were the other group I belonged to who started using the metric system for documenting sites. Good quality metric hand tapes that could withstand the rigors of field work were hard to find. Doug Boyd (PhD), a well-known archeologist from the Texas Panhandle (Tulia) would stop at every small-town hardware store (on the square of course) on the slim hope they might have some. In Snyder TX, at the far back of the store, he actually found a dozen or more still in the original box, with a hand-written price of something like "$2 each". He carried the box up to the old owner at the antique cash register and asked "Are these really only $2 each?" The old man said "Yep" so Doug said he would buy the whole box. The old feller looked at him closely and said in a genuine West Texas drawl "Well Sonny, I've got to be honest with ya' , them tapes ain't riot." Doug, having been raised in Tulia (unlike Dwight) felt obligated to try to explain the metric system to the owner, who just said something like "$2 each, take em or leave em". Doug got years of use out of those tapes--best deal he ever found. Logan On 7/22/2019 4:27 PM, Dwight Deal wrote: I was a geology student in 1956 and starting to survey caves in New York and West Virginia. I stumbled on a used Brunton in a pawn shop in Manhattan. New ones did indeed sell for around $100 at that time. This one was a reasonable bargain but still, I thought, on the high-side for a pawn shop item. (I don't remember exactly but in the $35-40 range) It was, however, in really good (I'd call it "like new") condition. I had my wallet out and was about to consummate the deal . Then I told the guy: “Wait. This is defective!” “What!” “Yes, look at this, they have east and west reversed!” I think I paid him $5.00 for it. Also came with a nice, new-looking leather case. DirtDoc (If you have never used a Brunton, you may not understand why this is so humorous. That's the way they are built so they read correctly when you look down at the compass needle. There was absolutely nothing wrong with it.) This has been a major tool of mine for 63 years. I still have this and it has been used both for surface geology and in many, many, miles of cave, a lot of it virgin (including Jewel Cave). Used it on the surface a few months ago to locate some survey corners in Big Bend. There was no GPS information available. One of the best bargains I ever made. Buyer Beware! CC _______________________________________________ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com <mailto:Texascavers@texascavers.com> | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
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