Buried Phone Cable?

[MartinL]

Would a buried phone line to a residential home be detected by a metal detector, or does the shielding of the cable isolate that from the detection? I would think the cable would be at a reasonable depth and not too deep. martin

[coinnut]

In my State everything is supposed to be burried at least 18 deep and that includes cable and phone lines. With that being said, I have detected my phone line (which was installed by the phone company) at about 2-3 deep lol But it does not give a great signal, mostly because of it's thin shape, I think. :thinkingabout: I not sure if the shielding (if any) has anything to do with it, but I could be wrong. It seems detectors are great at detecting rounder objects (even iron ones >:#) better that detecting thin or linked items. Just my thoughts on it.

[MartinL]

Do you remember the Vdi number it gave you? I wouldn't have thought about unless I'd dug one hole and hit a colorful thin root, chopped in two. I right off looked at the telephone box by the street and my house behind me, and thought I'd really screwed up, but it was only a root. I did track something close by though that was lengthy and in-line to the house,...didn't dig though. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if this country home built in 1970 had codes followed well. Thanks for the reply. I'll test some wiring I have laying around the house tomorrow for grins. martin

[coinnut]

I didn't do a VDI number since I was using the E Trac. I was mostly just doing what you did. Look at the box, look at where it enters the house, and detect the line straight between them. If you get a signal almost everytime you go over that line where you think it is...you are there lol That's the only way I know how to trace a line. When I dig for one, I dig a shallow plug sideways and not down, to minimize the cutting the line factor. Deep plugs will cut the line, but just skimming the grass may save you a lot of headaches.

[Ill Digger]

It should be. I located a under ground dog fence for a friend last summer. That wire is alot thinner. :yes:
The only way I could locate it was first he had to shut it off. Then I could only pick it up on pin point mode.(DFX- trigger forward) It was a VERY faint signal. Sounding like it was really deep :confused: But I was able to follow it 2/3 of the way around his yard.
He wanted to make sure they weren't going to hit it with a stump grinder lol
If it's real deep you probably won't be able to pick it up though. In newer construction, the phone line is buried with the electric line. And a electric service going to a house is USUALLY 30 to 36 inches deep.
But if you call your local utility company they will come out and locate all utility lines for free with in 48 hours. They don't want the lines hit so they offer this service for free.