Franconia Meteorite Field

[Gaustad18]

15 hours ago, mn90403 said:

There are a couple of cool days to be had in Franconia.  I'm going in a few hours.  It is a 300 mile drive for me.  Look for a white SUV.  I'll stay overnight and probably look for gold on day 2.  We'll see about a second night.

Good luck! I was just there a couple of weekends ago along with DolanDave. We found a few chondrites and irons. Weather looks nice this week. 

[mn90403]

I went and I'm back.  I spent one night there and swung the detector for about 14 hours in the two days.  The weather was darn near perfect.  I was not in the best of shape but it was good to have the 70s & 80s temps rather than the 90+ which is normal.

I found irons (16) that ranged from .9g down to unmeasurable.  They are in the circle at the center.  I didn't find any chondrites.  There are 5 meteor wrongs there that 'look like a meteor' but they are lacking in one way or another.  Mostly in their magnetic properties but I was able to hear them with the detector.

 

One area that I had parked my car on the north side of the tracks is now unavailable.  Someone has placed a fence and gate across the road and it makes the walk in about 2 miles farther.  I was able to detect the first day in the area on Dave's map.

[GB_Amateur]

9 hours ago, mn90403 said:

I found irons (16) that ranged from .9g down to unmeasurable.  They are in the circle at the center.  I didn't find any chondrites.  There are 5 meteor wrongs there that 'look like a meteor' but they are lacking in one way or another.  Mostly in their magnetic properties but I was able to hear them with the detector.

What detector(s) were you using?  Also I'm curious as to how you rejected some of your potential meteorites.  You gave us a hint ('magnetic properties') but more detail would be helpful.  I assume one thing that comes into play is knowing exactly what kind of meteoroid resulted in the strewn field you are hunting.  And thus you require your finds to match the properties of previous finds?

Good stuff!

[mn90403]

It is really a combination of things that go along with the 'slightly' magnetic properties.  One would be density.  These are not very heavy targets.  There is also no 'fusion crust' to indicate they have passed through the atmosphere similar with all the other meteorites you can find in that area.  They also have a bit of crystallization/mica structures in a couple of them which is not something known for the area.

There are no chondrules in them which is major.  A window doesn't show these features but I didn't have to window all of these to know.  I've done that before.