Odd One. Anyone into ‘Carpentry’ or Metal Detectors?

Iwasgoodonce

Old School Grand Master
I enjoy, but aren’t much good at making things from wood. The wood tends to be quite rough; often old pallets complete with nails and the fragmented remains there of.
The blades in my planer/thicknesser take a bit of a battering therefore. Taking them out to sharpen and remove the nicks is a pain.

I’m wondering if I can use a metal detector’s pin pointer to warn me if there’s metal in the wood? I have no idea if they can do this or whether the pieces will be too small?

Any recommendations? TIA.
 
In the name of science and helping out I have just dug my Pinpointer out and found a battery for it, not only that but I even found a small piece of wood with some small bits of metal embedded!

The results... It works well but you have to mess with the sensitivity, I found it needed to be quite sensitive which did result in lots of false positives and as the metal was quite small I had to hold it close once I had adjusted it to a level I found worked. Didn't dig the actual metal detector out as the built in pinponter doesn't work as well as the Bullseye and I'm lazy.

Hope it helps, I'd say its worth a go and a used pinpointer can be quite cheap if you trusted a used one, I don;t think they are that expensive new if you think you would use it enough, I've had this for years and it still works well.

I made a video too but it wont let me attach it!
 

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Thank you so much @Totoro . That is very helpful. The problem is the nails that hold some pallets together have arms that stop them pulling out. My homemade pallet breaker provides huge leverage that pulls the nails out often leaving the arms behind.

Maybe I’m going about this the wrong way? Perhaps I should get hold of a coffee table and take it apart and make a pallet out of the bits?
 
Thank you so much @Totoro . That is very helpful. The problem is the nails that hold some pallets together have arms that stop them pulling out. My homemade pallet breaker provides huge leverage that pulls the nails out often leaving the arms behind.

Maybe I’m going about this the wrong way? Perhaps I should get hold of a coffee table and take it apart and make a pallet out of the bits?

Does my link work? See what you think, I think it would work but you have to hold it very close to the wood on the settings I just used
 
I’ve taken a chance on a Dr Otek on ebay. A recognised make (?) rather than one of the many copies for sale. If it does t work on the wood, I’ll see if I can find a key I lost in the back garden!

Thanks All.
 
I’ve taken a chance on a Dr Otek on ebay. A recognised make (?) rather than one of the many copies for sale. If it does t work on the wood, I’ll see if I can find a key I lost in the back garden!

Thanks All.
Looks like it should do the job, only time will tell.

The most use my metal detector gets is when friends have lost their keys, comes in very handy for that. Once my friends dog eat a mince pie complete with foil case... We tracked it through the dog over the next couple of days! True story
 
the best way to remove nails from pallets is to set fire to the pallets. You will have a lovely pile of metal at the end of the process. :)

a pinpointer is as good of a method as any and you can by stupid expensive one's just for wood workers with fancy names printed on them. I've never bothered but know a few people who have and they all get mixed results.
 
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