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Identified! ( Updated 7-23-2022)


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One of my finds with my new Deus II this weekend while detecting at a local baseball field was what I thought a chunk of iron. Upon looking at it tonight, I was expecting it to be highly magnetic; it was not. A strong magnet will attract to it, but it struggles to stick to it. I hit it a couple times with a hammer to see if I could break off any crud from the outside. A chunk came off, and it exposed a bright, metallic looking substrate. It is very heavy for its size. I tried scratching the metallic area, thinking it may be lead, but it would not scratch with an aluminum chain link fencing piece. Any help would be appreciated as to whether this could really be a meteorite. If I need to cut it to find out, help with what direction to cut would also be super!  

Update--I used a file on it, and it barely took anything off. The metal is very hard.

Update 4-28-22--The close-up pics were taken using a USB microscope.

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  • The title was changed to Meteorite Found In Park By Deus 2?

That is an interesting looking rock, I have seen some rocks around here that looked very close to that one.

They turned out to be slag, so I hope that what you found is a meteorite.

Good luck on your next hunt and I hope someone can help you verify that it is real.

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I don't think it is a meteorite, only rare achondrites have weak attraction to magnets, and your rock looks more like a regular chondrite on the outside, but it should have a stronger pull on the magnet. If you can grind a flat surface then we can see the internal make up better. Interesting find good luck!

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It looks like a rock as has been said, it is difficult to see metal as you point out if it is there in the pictures in order to have a good chance of accurately seeing what is inside you really need to polish the window you broke out with the hammer. The simplest method use sandpaper starting at around 100grit up to 2500grit will give a mirror finish but the metal flakes will be clear to the eye going up to around 400grit and stand out in the pictures. High amounts of iron will also high polish and reflect back but is harder to see in pictures and doesn’t really resemble iron nickel specks.

im a novice at this and there is great variety, but don’t want to suggest my opinion is anything other than that just it lacks the qualities that have been shared with me, but you will learn a lot testing you find and who knows?

here’s a window into gold basin meteorites the metal flakes photograph easily.

15D51C71-BCC2-48DB-8FB4-E739AF06024B.thumb.png.e31b6fe6fe9bdc6b5c2178a6aae328af.pngB6235CB0-2129-4E33-AB89-B7BD975BD9BC.thumb.png.f58c9b9aba37a150297169079e634232.png

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Great example, and your suggestions with polishing are just how i do it, simple but gets results.

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The "crust" on your piece is too thick in IMHO to be "fusion crust" which is usually on about as thick as a fingernail, I think it's slag.

But grind a window anyway to be sure.

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  • The title was changed to Updated Pics--meteorite Found In Park By Deus 2?
3 hours ago, Gold Seeker said:

The "crust" on your piece is too thick in IMHO to be "fusion crust" which is usually on about as thick as a fingernail, I think it's slag.

But grind a window anyway to be sure.

Sometimes deep coins come up with this crust on it as the soil here in this area of FL is so sandy. If it hit the ground red hot, it might fuse some sand to it. I'm just speculating. Thanks for your thoughts!

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The polished window has more the look from a fairly high amount of iron rather than iron nickel flakes (veins/threads) like found in meteorites, I don’t see any chondrites or evidence of fusion crust. I don’t think they hit the ground hot enough to fuse sand to the outside atmospheric action called ram pressure briefly melts the crust the interior remains cool the meteorites terminal velocity  reduces the approach speed to a period of dark flight prior to impacting earth.  

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  • The title was changed to Updated Pics (4-28-22)--meteorite Found In Park By Deus 2?
  • 2 months later...

Update...

A friend has access to a SEM and put a slice of my specimen into it. Sitting there watching it, I couldn't help but feel like Marty and Rick Lagina watching the spikes over the various elements. The pics are of the actual specimen.

While it would be amazing to have one, I believe it was close to a million dollars for the the one that showed the composition of my query.

Drumroll...it is not a meteorite.😞 It is, however, something that my friend had never seen before; we both learned something.

Here is what it turned out to be: http://meteorite-identification.com/Hot Rocks/ferromanganese.html .

There is a very high percentage of manganese, less iron, and even smaller amounts of silicon. 

While not what I wanted it to be, at least I have an answer. Thanks for all your thoughts.

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  • The title was changed to Identified! ( Updated 7-23-2022)

Nice to have access to such high-end equipment and an operator who knows how to use it.

Thanks for the followup.  It's easy sometimes to fail to do that when the hope for a goodie turns into the realization of a less-than-valuable piece (and admittedly I've been guilty of that resulting silent treatment myself).

Meteorite identification is not for armchair quarterbacks, that's for sure.

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