Off the Subject ... Towtec

[Patrick]

Did anyone buy a Towtec board from Eric Foster? If so, do you have any plans on trying to build something out of it?


Patrick

[Jan]

Patrick,


What board would that be ?


Perhaps an idea is extract only interesting part from sensor data, digitize it and send that topside over twisted pair or lightpipe.


That way cable length of 200+ meters should not be a problem. (Lightpipe can do 3000 meters without amplification)


But first I want to look into existing boards and principles.


Regards, Jan

[Carl]

I have not yet but I will probably do so, mostly to play with.

[Charles, Oak Island,NC]

since a magnetometer will not detect gold I purchased two of his towtec boards and schematic. I am going to builad boat tow detectors (give me three). Hope they come in soon.

[Tod]

I got two. Should be here soon. I came up with 11 turns of 18 gage wire for a coil of 5'x 1.5' to match Eric's design. My coil is going to be open in the center and have weighted plastic pipe skids on the ends to hold it off the bottom. I might have a weighted tow line to keep it down. I found 300' of 20 gage twinax cable at the junk yard, I tried the cable on a single tansducer towfish and it worked just fine but all I got for an image was just blobs. I'm going to try to use it for the coil. I found a nice way to coil the cable was to lay it down in a figure eight in a tub.


Tod

[Charles, Oak Island,NC]

Tod, would you take the time to give a little more detail on making the coil.


thanks

[Tod]

It's still in my head right now. When I get more time I'll try to draw something up. Should we take this back to Eric's forum?


Tod

[Charles, Oak Island,NC]

Tod,


was waiting for the two boards and schematic to arrive 1st to see if he included any coil info.


thanks