Mill weight?

yacorie · Apr 23, 2018

I headed down to a spot that used to be a ponded area but has been mostly drained over the last 2 years because a dam broke. Historically, there was some type of mill at this location but except for some old maps indicating it, there really is no evidence of it existing.

I was going around the edge, in what would have been shallow water previously and finding a ton of old fishing lures and headstamps, as expected, but no coins or jewelry.

I ended up getting a signal of 14/15 on the equinox and decided to dig it because I wasn't getting any type of iron grunt with it. This is what I pulled out - it was a solid 15 inches in thick black muck.

In the air it still rings up as a 14 on the Nox.

This thing must weight 20 lbs and is only about 6 inches high - sorry the picture is sideways. I tried to bang off some of the black/oxidized looking metal to expose underneath - so that is what the 3rd picture is.

I tried to google to figure out what it was and whether i could find something similar but haven't had any luck. Does anyone know what this would have been? It was on the edge which would have had water at one time but not anywhere more than 12-18 inches so I don't think it was being used as an anchor.

Thanks

SoOregonMd · Apr 23, 2018

No Idea but first impression is the loop on top looks to hold a rope or chain or something.. perhaps it is a weight to hold something in place like maybe a buoy or anchor of some type ?

BeeaCrab · Apr 23, 2018

Hello there

I’m not 100% certain but is there a hole or pivot in the bottom of it? Being there there was a old mill that was in the area it may have been an old tobacco or grain tobacco scale they could have used it to counter balance weight. If you look on eBay you will see many of them that are actually identical to them. Hope that helps you out to the right direction.

yacorie · Apr 23, 2018

SoOregonMd said:
No Idea but first impression is the loop on top looks to hold a rope or chain or something.. perhaps it is a weight to hold something in place like maybe a buoy or anchor of some type ?

Yeah that is certainly a possibility that someone had used it to anchor something in place but I can't imagine what it might have been i the location where I found it. However, who knows what was there 100 years ago.

yacorie · Apr 23, 2018

BeeaCrab said:
I’m not 100% certain but is there a hole or pivot in the bottom of it? Being there there was a old mill that was in the area it may have been an old tobacco or grain tobacco scale they could have used it to counter balance weight. If you look on eBay you will see many of them that are actually identical to them. Hope that helps you out to the right direction.

the bottom is flat. I just looked those up on ebay and they are very similar looking but this thing weighs about 20 pounds. I'm going to weight it later but it would have had to be one big scale if thats what this is.

BeeaCrab · Apr 23, 2018

Sizes vary

I seems some of them weighting up to 38-60 points. It sounds strange but I know I’ve seen something similar to that before at an old farm we have been to.

hoser · Apr 23, 2018

Could it be a counter balance weight for a door or heavy hinged cover? Nice find.

yacorie · Apr 24, 2018

hoser said:
Could it be a counter balance weight for a door or heavy hinged cover? Nice find.

thats actually a really good thought and not one I had considered.

Tpmetal · Apr 24, 2018

Counter balance weight of some sort seems right. I suppose a large scale weight is possible too.

Mill weight?

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