December 7, 2025
Spice jars, spicier comments
Listen to Protons for Less Than $100
Build it with spice jars; commenters want treasure hunts, phone apps, and 100x quieter audio
TLDR: A sub-$100 DIY gadget lets you hear protons and measure Earth’s magnetic field using water-filled spice bottles. Commenters are split between real-world dreams (spotting underwater steel), “just use a phone app” skeptics, and audio nerds demanding 100x quieter amplifier swaps—proof that cheap science sparks big debates.
Move over MRI mystique—this DIY under-$100 gadget lets you literally listen to protons by wrapping wire around two spice bottles and plugging in headphones, and the comment section is louder than the protons. The build uses a simple circuit to align hydrogen atoms in water, then “listens” to their wobble in Earth’s magnetic field—like a baby version of MRI’s nuclear magnetic resonance, but at audio frequencies. The community split fast: one camp, led by treasure-hunt energy, asks if it can “find steel under 40 feet of water,” imagining backyard salvage ops. Another camp shrugs and says, “Dude, use your phone,” pointing to apps like Phyphox that use your phone’s built‑in magnet sensor. Then the audio purists barged in, roasting the humble amp chip and insisting on a quieter, cleaner upgrade for “~100x lower noise.” Cue the geeky turf war. Meanwhile, meta-commentators are winking “note the first comment,” as the thread spirals, and the peanut gallery chants “pics or it didn’t happen,” demanding photos and a demo video of the spice‑rack science. The article’s advice—use two counterwound coils to kill power-line hum, don’t test near metal—only added to the DIY mythos. Verdict: the proton tone is real, but the real resonance is in the replies.
Key Points
- •Proton-precession magnetometers use NMR to measure Earth’s magnetic field at audio frequencies via the precession of hydrogen nuclei.
- •Alexander Mumm created a simple circuit in 2022 enabling a low-cost, stripped-down magnetometer that the author successfully built.
- •The build uses two counterwound coils on Morton seasoning bottles to cancel external electromagnetic noise and enhance proton signals.
- •The device operates in three modes: polarize with DC current, collapse the field, and listen with a sensitive audio amplifier.
- •A MOSFET manages rapid switching; the amplifier runs on a 9 V battery and the coils are charged from a 36 V source; use outdoors away from iron.