Any radio amateur will tell you about the spectre of TVI, of their transmissions being inadvertently demodulated by the smallest of non-linearity in the neighbouring antenna systems, and spewing forth from the speakers of all and sundry. It’s very much a thing that the most unlikely of circuits can function as radio receivers, but… teeth? [Ringway Manchester] investigates tales of musical dental work.
Going through a series of news reports over the decades, including one of Lucille Ball uncovering a hidden Japanese spy transmitter, it’s something all experts who have looked at the issue have concluded there is little evidence for. It was also investigated by Mythbusters. But it’s an alluring tale, so is it entirely fabricated? What we can say is that teeth are sensitive to sound, not in themselves, but because the jaw provides a good path bringing vibrations to the region of the ear. And it’s certainly possible that the active chemical environment surrounding a metal filling in a patient’s mouth could give rise to electrical non-linearities. But could a human body in an ordinary RF environment act as a good enough antenna to provide enough energy for something to happen? We have our doubts.
It’s a perennial story (even in fiction), though, and we’re guessing that proof will come over the coming decades. If the tales of dental music and DJs continue after AM (or Long Wave in Europe) transmissions have been turned off, then it’s likely they’re more in the mind than in the mouth. If not, then we might have missed a radio phenomenon. The video is below the break.
Dental orthopantomogram: Temehetmebmk, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Gilligan, what have you done this time?!
That was my first exposure to this idea as well, Gilligan’s Island. Man, what a show!
I had braces when I was a kid. Curious proto nerd-child that I was (and nerdy enough to know FM broadcasts wouldn’t work) I tried to receive AM broadcast signals, even attaching antennas and diodes to the grillwork on my teeth. Nada. Direct audio signals from an amplifier were perceptible, but not “demodulated”.
So, stupid kid me thought I should see what a 9 volt battery touched to the top and bottom jaw wires would do. Like Dave Broadfoot used to say, when I regained consciousness… Man, that hurt.
I did something similar but only on one wire (accidentally, tongue-testing a 9V battery)… and that wire was made of nitinol – in addition to the awful electrical feeling and heat, it felt like it was trying to twist my whole jaw…i’m sure the actual force was pretty small, but it was deeply unsettling.
That which does not kill you … gives you stories you can tell for the rest of your life.
‘Bet you can’t pee over the electric fence.’
Not even a bobcat scout will pee on an electric fence.
But over it?
Dumb puppies.
We got one each later year, as they got one of us (not me, not that dumb).
Likely still happening, decades later.
I once stripped a POTS telephone wire with my bare teeth (stupid in itself) … while the other end was already plugged in. 48V. That was quite the “ringer” (and yeah, I know actual ringing voltage is 90V AC, that would’ve tasted more spicy)
There was once a webcomic where the protagonist became addicted to licking batteries and had turned over to the BLA (Battery Lickers Anonymous), can’t find it back.
I once tried to strip a thin mains cable of a radio, and just before I bit it, I noticed that the other end was still plugged into the socket.
I have been shocked by 110 a few times. a photo flash. a few other things, but POTS just hurts.
Don’t know about teeth, but a ordinary British Telecom coin call box was almost jammed by Radio Ulster’s big transmitter across the road near Lisburn, when I tried to use it at one point. (Maybe 300 m away) . I could just about hear the called person over the broadcast.
Obviously you need to form a crystal receiver with your fillings. That should work by chewing on crystal meth I guess.
Did mythbusters ask the people hearing radio if they were on meth?
Similar, but different.
Whenever I suspect a cracked, or lose filling, I wistle through s number of octaves, sure enough, at some point you hit a resonanant point where the sound distortsin your uears, transmitted through the bone.
Reliable detection, even when the dentists can’t pick it up yet.
Sorry if dumb question but what TVI means?
I think TVI as in “Televisão Independente”, portugese television channel : – ] Ah, that explains a LOT!
TeleVision Interference.
Back in the good old days of analogue television, ham radio operators sometimes caused interference to the TV reception of their neighbours. Caused by either poor shielding or construction of the TV receiver, poor filtering on the ham’s rig, or (usually) both.
More often, just the simple presence of an an antenna caused claimed interference, regardless of whether the transmitter was even powered.
Always put up the tower and mast for a few months before actually installing any transmitting antenna.
Perhaps a TV antenna.
It reveals the nut jobs.
They won’t care that they reported the problem before any broadcasts.
Too stupid and/or deluded to realize the obvious implication.
In 2025, the security cam at your front door will have the evidence.
I thought AM and LW were different things, and there could only be only few stations in total on long waves to start with. Both AM and LW travel the globe, when conditions are reasonably good, and I recall there are basically none LW stations left; at least there were none when I’ve listened with one of the old Grundigs years back.
Redardless, AM demodulation is reasonably straightfoward, obviously, only the half-wave, and theoretically one can do that with all kinds of stray things connected in unexpected ways, just you have to be somewhere near the transmitter. Don’t expect to catch Radio Havana in Nebraska, for example, though, I suspect Radio Bejing now can be heard from each toaster and fridge :]
People seem to be uncritically dismissing a lot of what people have experienced. I think this is a case of misattributing the source. It’s been known that having filing of various metals can result in an the creation of a battery. It’s also been known that this very low voltage/current battery can cause neurological discomfort. There is little doubt in my mind it can also cause periodic hallucinatory effects or possibly stimulate the auditory nerve.
RF may not be the source but that doesn’t mean dental work can’t make you hear things.
Lucille Ball claimed to have heard broadcasts through her temporary fillings in 1942, which supposedly led to a Japanese espionage ring. Then as now there was a lot of BS to get everyone on board with the war, and a lot of propaganda being pushed by the studios at the request of the feds, so who knows. It might have been true or as fake as a Hollywood marriage.
Great story, and about as far fetched as a fox-hole radio using a razorblade and a pencil lead.
As far as I remember, tooth fillings prior to regulations included mercury.
Mercury amalgam fillings are still in widespread use, even in the good old USA.
Ignoring all the written words beneath that title picture.. what is going on with those wisdom teeth?
Many are gifted with a jaw length that does not develop enough in early stages of growth, so called wisdom for us. Teeth do not all erupt at once. The last one to come “up” ends up growing into the previous tooth and ruining it before anything else happens including pain. I know.
In LA suburbs, there was no joy recieving KNX 2500 watt newsradio on everything. Comming back home during ‘Nahm era, caught KNX on the car radio just outside of Denver, knew I was going home
Actual 25 Kwatt, not 2.5. Need edit function
I’ve actually experienced what’s known as the electrophonic fireball phenomenon, it’s a real thing that’s been studied by scientists at Princeton and NASA.
That’s where you hear the meteor when you see it?
Me too, knew it couldn’t be when it happened.
I was really really stoned, but that’s not unusual.
The problem with breaking your enemy’s encryption is that you then have to come up with plausibility explanations for why your resources are so often in the right place at the right time.
Maybe the Lucille Ball tale is one such explanation.