Really rusty something-a narritive

[ambam]

So, after a long boring day of diging alluminum foil, bottle caps, pull tabs and an entire budweiser can out of my yard, I decided to try digging between the two houses. So far today the happiest person was the neighborhood newspaper delivery boy who I gave a 2000 quater I dug up (more than 6" down under a rock!). I was getting good at telling the difference between hits based on switching from all metal to SPD (sychronus phase discrimination) when I found an area that included positive hits with the SPD and negatives. Lots of both. So I decided to dig anyway. I felt a gentle scrape at the end of my garden trowel (which was so dead it bent on 1/8" tree root...its going to get a nice funeral) I wasn't sure if it was a rock or metal, so I reached down to use my fingers to brush away some of the dirt. Unfortunately I couldn't brush the mud that was pretending to be dirt in the yard. So I scraped with my fingers, pushing gently...and went straight through the dang metal. How did I know if was metal? the rust filled cut on my hand *sigh* at least I had my tetnas last year. So, keeping in mind that this was a fragile chunk of rusty metal, I dug around it until I had over half cleared away. I wiggled it a little to see if it was loose yet, and half of it came out. Another third came out shortly there after, followed by the rest. I was now the proud owner of a very rusty unidentifiable rectangle of metal. Well, I removed a little bit of the soil from the ground and stuck the detector back in the hole (about 1' by 2' wide/long) and still got many strong signals...so I dug more...and found a half round chunk of slightly less rusty metal with no identifiying marks...one side of the item, the 'arc' side had 1/4" cuts making it look like it was tabs, and the opposite side had a 1/8" lip...I keep digging and find a hunk of twisted metal that might be a few links of rather large chain, a 2" by 5" piece of metal, and a long bar with an eye hook in one end. I have no idea what this stuff is. I failed to get pics as its dark out now and my boyfriend won't let me bring them in the house. Ah, well its weathered outside this long.

Is there any way to get the rust off without disolving the item? What about the dirt? I'm just curious as to what it could be. If it helps, the two houses were built in the 1930's.

HH,
Ambertiredbutpleasedwithlearninghermachinely

[RingDancer]

Very interesting day!!! You are doing great if you pulled a quarter out! You will get use to the signals and learn what to dig and what not to dig! Funny how your boyfriend won't let you bring that stuff in the house! lol! My husband said I had more metal laying around in this house than he does! Glad you had your tetanus shot! And post a pic of your finds later if you can!

Have fun! and Happy hunting!

Pat