Garlic and Compasses

[Ships_Cat]

We here at Ship Hydrodynamic Investigations and Technologies have performed an interesting little sideline experiment recently. One of our researchers, Alan Savius, turned up the interesting fact that there was an old belief that magnets could be deactivated by rubbing them with garlic. Apparantly William Gilbert disproved this back in the 16th Century but we could find no record of anyone having looked into the effect of garlic on magnetic compasses let alone finding anything disproving the possibility.

So we did some experiments to check how close a compass could be to garlic before being deactivated (if it was at all) and were surprised by the result. We found that for 100 grams of garlic a 6 inch compass card was completely deactivated if it was closer than 500mm to the garlic, for 50 grams garlic 350mm, for 25 grams 250 mm, etc. That is the compass suddenly become deactivated if closer than a distance proportional to square root of the mass of garlic.

On consideration this is not altogether surprising as most of us know that treacle is an anathema to gyro compasses and that the force of gravity follows an inverse square law.

We would be very interested to hear if anyone has noticed such effects on their compass from the storage of garlic or anything else similar nearby. Also, if any way has been found to screen the effect.

John

 

[Deleted member 478]

what is a compass card?

 

[jimi]

Very interesting, I am in fact a vampire and have high sensitivity to the earth's magnetic field thus helping me to navigate. Proximity to garlic causes my senses to go haywire and thus I avoid it at all costs. Hope that helps.

 

[bumblefish]

Did someone (or several) get too much sun yesterday?

 

[jimi]

Not me, mate, avoid the sun at all costs .. can have disastrous consequences you know!

 

[rjp]

Haveyou checked the 'sell by' date of your garlic. If it was April 1st that might explain it.
Also of course some people claim to be repelled by the smell of garlic and as we know repulsion and attraction are typical properties of magnets so there could be a connection there. Could it be that the repulsion of the garlic is cancelling out the repulsion of the magnet at close proximity?

John

 

[graham]

we didnt have any garlic aboard so I tried an onion.Amazed by the effect. One large onion within 250mm of our mini contest and it was completely deviated towards the onion.Then tried a potato ,two small carrots and a packet of walkers cheese and onion crisps.All equally as effective.

Can any scientists among us explain this food deviation phenomena.

PS would the tin tray we held the vegetables in have had any influence on the outcome of the experiment??

 

[cgull]

Re: Garlic and Wimmin

I find if I eat Garlic it actually repels Wimmin!

 

[Major Catastrophe]

Ship_Cat, has it occurred to you that you have the compass upside down because of your location? Try standing on your head and trying it again.

 

[tugboat]

Re: Garlic and Wimmin

Are you gonna patent the method or can I? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[totopalm]

Never mind the Garlic, Do not get a Leek near your compass
could sink you. Vegetarians be warned!!

 

[Twister_Ken]

I have tried this, and it had no effect. I therefore conclude that the experiment is unrepeatable, unlike garlic.