lead cylinder

[Moe (fl)]

Found this lead cylinder at the beach. It is very heavy (15-20 lbs).

It has writing: "West ... Sharkers".

Any ideas?

Thanks.

 

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[trikikiwi]

A longline end weight.
I'm looking for an example
Mike

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

Now thats interesting. Is it really lead? It looks huge judging by the plastic gallon jug behind it. I cant tell what the round dark object is in front.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

The writing sounds English. I wonder if it could be an old lead sounding weight?

 

[RELICDUDE07]

sounds like it could be

 

[IronSpike]

I agree. I did have to look up sounding weight and how it worked.

http://images.google.com/imgres?img...ev=/images?q=sounding+weights&hl=en&sa=N&um=1

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

His also looks like it has the dimple on the bottom to collect a small sample of the ocean bottom. How deep was it found and does your beach have renourishment?

 

[RELICDUDE07]

moes ship may have come in I think your in the right area More sounding weights

 

[Moe (fl)]

It was found 2 feet down! The object in front is a nickel.

Thanks.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

You may want to show that to the museum in Sebastian. Could we see a close-up of the writing? Do your beaches have renourishment fill like ours? Is it really lead?

 

[Moe (fl)]

A longline end weight.

Could this be a long line end weight?

It is really heavy!

 

[Moe (fl)]

I need to take more pics.

It is definitely lead. Could be modern! No renourishment left (mostly gone)!

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

I need to take more pics.

It is definitely lead. Could be modern! No renourishment left (mostly gone)!

I dont know if it could modern. Its hard to find anything old with all the renourishment and no storms, but maybe your beaches dont have as much fill or all the mders that we have. I dont know what modern use there is for 20 pounds of lead! I think its old unless someone was trying to make a lead Santeria head but couldnt find the shells.

 

[trikikiwi]

A longline end weight.

Could this be a long line end weight?

It is really heavy!

I say, definitely a shark fishing long-line end weight - my reasoning being;

1. It's really heavy - if you are setting a long-line where you are probably going to catch multiple sharks, you need a very heavy weight to hold the line. Anyone who has hooked a shark of any size on a rod or hand-line will appreciate what I'm saying

2. It was found deep in the sand because it's heavy.

3. Moe says it has West ...... Sharkers written on it.

4. There are three main fishing techniques that commercial shark fishers' employ in order to catch sharks, longlining, drift gillnetting and strikenetting.
http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/education/sharks/sharkfishing.html
(looks like a cool site/museum )

Mike

 

[IronSpike]

I can follow that reasoning. Also writting has: "West...Sharkers".

Was it dropped on the beach or close to the shore? Would expect lost weights like that to be found further from shore, but maybe hurricanes etc. moves heavy objects good distances over time?

 

[Deerhunter24]

I need to take more pics.

It is definitely lead. Could be modern! No renourishment left (mostly gone)!

I dont know if it could modern. Its hard to find anything old with all the renourishment and no storms, but maybe your beaches dont have as much fill or all the mders that we have. I dont know what modern use there is for 20 pounds of lead! I think its old unless someone was trying to make a lead Santeria head but couldnt find the shells.
[/quoe]t


I made fishing sinkers for a company in Michigan for 10 years. Obviously, since fishing sinkers are made of lead, it required me to melt down lead in order to repour the lead into sinker molds. Believe it or not, there are plenty of uses for large amount of lead. I believe that lead is the one of the only materials that can safely hold radioactive materials. We would get these 36 lb. lead containers that looked somewhat similiar to what the gentlemen found, although obviously different from what he found, it just looked similar. These containers were once used to house radioactive materials. However, after the radioactive materials are removed from these containers, it takes about 90 days for the lead to become non-radioactive. We waited a year before getting them, so they were plenty safe, but just thought it was interesting there are in fact modern uses for lead. Hospitals have all kinds of the stuff, as they deal with plenty of lead containers in the Radiation department.

They also make many very small lead containers, some as small as thimbles the materials. It all depends on how radioactive the materials are that they are putting in them. The big 36 lb. containers were almost completely solid lead, except for a small hole at the bottom, probably enough for a roll of quarters to fit inside. This lets you know that if they used that much lead as a container, then it was extremely radioactive material that was inside.

Deerhunter24.


BTW...I have absolutely no idea what the lead container is, but make sure that you wear gloves when handling it.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

Thinking more about it, there doesnt seem be much corrosion. I thought maybe it was buried under the sand. I think now it could be modern and I hope you can ID. Thinking on what Deerhunter said, someone may have disposed of something by dumping in the ocean.. I like Trikiwis shark idea. I hope we can see a pic of the writing. It can help date it.

 

[IronSpike]

Moe hope you're ok and that you didn't find radioactive material

Any new pics of the writing?