Moms uncles old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

[silversaddle1]

Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

An oldie but goodie! An old Fisher M-Scope, you know, made out of wood with vaccum tubes inside it. It's all here, books and everything. I wonder if he found all his trade silver pcs. with it?

I don't suppose it's worth much, but it is a neat find!

 

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[mick56]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector!

Need some pics!!

 

[johnnycat]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector!

Yes, lets have some pics.

 

[silversaddle1]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector!

Pics!!

 

[mick56]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Too cool! Is there a date in the book?

 

[silversaddle1]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Too cool! Is there a date in the book?

The shipping tag on the box says 1954. Value-$250.00! That was a lot on money in 1954!

 

[NGE]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Found this info for you.......NGE Fisher "M-Scope" (1946-47)




The M-Scope was manufactured by the Fisher Research Laboratory, Inc., of Palo Alto, California. Designed for uranium prospecting, it came with a shoulder strap and a GM detector at the end of a 36” “walking stick” probe. The latter eliminated the need to bend over to inspect ore and it made it easier to access hard-to-reach places. The wooden case which protected the electronics from rain and dust, had a hinged top that when opened allowed access to the controls.

The meter scale, which goes from 0 – 100 in arbitrary units, is unusual in that it reads from right to left with the resting position of the needle at 100. The only control, aside from the on/off switch, is the audio volume control.

Detector: glass wall GM (clear glass and cylindrical copper cathode)

Range: one scale, 0 – 100 in arbitrary units.

Audio: speaker and headphones

Size: 5” x 9.5” x 9.5”

Batteries: two 1.5 volt and one 67.5 volt

Two mysterious aspects of the M-Scope are its name and the patent number (2,066,561), both of which are identified on a plate affixed to the lid of the box. The patent, issued to G.R. Fisher in 1933, is for a metal detector known as the "Metalloscope.” My guess is that the company abbreviated this to "M-Scope" and for some unknown reason (probably a lack of imagination) decided to apply this term to a variety of their products including their portable radiation detectors. In the early 1950s, Fisher produced a very similar instrument that used a GM walking stick. This instrument, the Model C-16, was also referred to as the "M-scope" but it had a metal case rather than a wooden one like the "M-scope" in the collection..

This particular example was used by a prospector in the Maryville region of east Tennessee.

On loan from Howard McCloud


Museum Directory Survey Instruments


Last updated: 07/25/07
Copyright 1999, Oak Ridge Associated Universities

 

[Monty]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

I'll bet it was heavy to carry around. Monty

 

[BIG61AL]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Holy smokes......that thing is oooooooooold.
square coil

how does it perform - depth - accuracy?

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Sheesh Peopl, that is a fairly recent one,. I used the old Fisher "Metal scope". It was far larger, heavier, and had to use two handles, one on eaxch side. As for those batteries, sigh, heavy, expensive, and not available just anywhere, especially in Mexico at that time. Very short life. The smallest battery weighed more than two or three of modern detectors together..

The "D" batteries were for the filaments, the 67/1.2 volt one was for plate voltage.

.The "M": socpe pictured was a tremendous improvement, even better was when they went transitorized.

As for performance, they are the same as today's two box. The only difference is that other manufacturers went to ground balancing while the fisher didn't??

Practical result was that enough dry holes were dug to make many Hoover damns, simply because most did not understand their instrument. It was originally designed for searching for veins. However, IF there was a treasure of sufficient size within 20 30 ft they would lock on to it. They accounted for many milions in treasure recoveries..

They are very effective machines even today., especially if you aren't looking for coins, but caches in a trashy zone.

Get the batteries for it and have fun. The set up instructions generally were printed on the face of the front box, the receiver.. If you have any problems em me. The tubes are still available. batteries will prob be a mai lorder thingie, unless you live in a large city.

Don Jose de La Mancha

 

[mojjax]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Here's one I got at a garage sale many years ago .

 

[silversaddle1]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Sheesh Peopl, that is a fairly recent one,. I used the old Fisher "Metal scope". It was far larger, heavier, and had to use two handles, one on eaxch side. As for those batteries, sigh, heavy, expensive, and not available just anywhere, especially in Mexico at that time. Very short life. The smallest battery weighed more than two or three of modern detectors together..

The "D" batteries were for the filaments, the 67/1.2 volt one was for plate voltage.

.The "M": socpe pictured was a tremendous improvement, even better was when they went transitorized.

As for performance, they are the same as today's two box. The only difference is that other manufacturers went to ground balancing while the fisher didn't??

Practical result was that enough dry holes were dug to make many Hoover damns, simply because most did not understand their instrument. It was originally designed for searching for veins. However, IF there was a treasure of sufficient size within 20 30 ft they would lock on to it. They accounted for many milions in treasure recoveries..

They are very effective machines even today., especially if you aren't looking for coins, but caches in a trashy zone.

Get the batteries for it and have fun. The set up instructions generally were printed on the face of the front box, the receiver.. If you have any problems em me. The tubes are still available. batteries will prob be a mai lorder thingie, unless you live in a large city.

Don Jose de La Mancha

Wow! I didn't think a guy could find batteries for the ol' girl anymore. And it's all here, it has 7 or eight books to go along with it to tell how to use the machine to find different types of ore and such. I'm not a expert on MD's but this thing is so nice, it should be in a museum! Any guesses on value?

Thanks!

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Silver-saddle and mojjaxmas, thanx for the trip down "memory lane"

Can you guys post those pix on the "Vintage detector forum"? Here's the link:

http://members6.boardhost.com/classicdetector/index.html?1172512320

Fisher is quite fond of advertising that they are the oldest manufacturer out there. Well, they're the first company out there "that still exists" anyhow (there were other dabblers before them). But for their first 20-odd years, they made nothing but 2-box units, that could not find individual coins. Great for cache hunting (and still are to this day) as Real de Topaya points out. But for coins, no-go. Those could not find anything smaller than a soda can.

Ironically as it sounds, the best cache hunting machines would be the less sensitive dinasours that could only find big items. What better "discriminator" could there be in cache hunting, than to have a machine that "can't" find something smaller than a soda can? Doh! Good-bye pesky nails, tabs, individual coins, etc.... All you get is tool-box and toaster sized items. So at the advent of more sensitive 2-box machines, you might ask yourself "why bother?" The old technology (barring battery problems, ergonomics, etc...) was all that was needed.

There were probably more caches found in the 1960s and earlier, than in all the years since then. The old BFO and early TRs that struggled to get coins beyond a few inches, were ideally suited to getting larger items deeper. But today's power houses that effortlessly get coins at 8, 9 and 10", have actually spoiled us into passing those "hubcab junk" signals

I have tried to cache hunt with a standard coin machine, thinking I would just "ignore all small signals". But it is next to impossible. You keep getting sidetracked on those coin-sized signals, and keep giving into the mindset of passing "big junk", no matter how hard you try. A 2 -box unit solves that problem But of course, life can get pretty lonely if there wasn't, in fact, a cache to find. Ie.: you might go dozens of sites before you ever got a larger object of any value. I can think of 100s of "overload" signals I've got with my standard coin machine, and they invariably turn out to be barrel hoops, cast iron stove doors, hubcabs, etc....

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Re: Mom's uncle's old M-Scope detector! Pics added!!!

Tom you just won ***** and a

Don Jose de La Mancha