One site, four mysteries - please help!

brianc053

Hero Member
Jan 27, 2015
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Morris County, NJ
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Detector(s) used
Minelab Equinox 800
XP Deus 2
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
Question about toy train and some other unusual items

Hi everyone. I had a quiet morning at work so I detected at a new location here in town, a property with a late 1700's house (but with a lot of disturbed ground, making it tough to find the undisturbed really old areas).

I only found one coin (a wheat penny, date not recoverable) and I don't think I found anything super-old yet, but I found two mystery items and two items that I don't know much about and that I'm hoping you'll help with.

Item #1: the weirdest item of them all, this large item could be a lot of things. I originally thought it was a watering can nozzle (it's definitely not). Then I thought it was possibly an incense burner (no way to open it). But as I cleaned it I noticed the hole in the side/bottom that's in line with the two non-iron silvery "things" (rivets, decorations?), and maybe most importantly the item is not completely hollow. In between the upper and lower halves there's a layer of metal, kind of like the beef in a hamburger. When I tap on it through the grill with a thin object the sound is like a microphone membrane, if that makes sense.
Any ideas?
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Item #2: First, I hit it with the shovel. Oops, it happens. I thought this was just some sort of cap to something until I cleaned out the underside, where I found that removable piece in the 2nd and 3rd pictures. And there's a tiny hole in the middle of the chrome-looking cap thing. Thoughts?
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Item #3: OK I know this is a doorknob. But I know nothing about how to date a doorknob. Can anyone point me to resources where I can do some reading please?
KBIZSqf.jpg u7K1ggr.jpg

Item #4: And I know this is part of an old toy train. I did enough research to know it's part of a "floor train", but I'm too ignorant to know if this is aluminum, tin, iron or some other metal. Sorry - please help me learn. The underside says "T6" and "MADE" nothing else (no "made in USA" or similar, just the word MADE).
Thanks in advance for all your help!
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