Little Off Topic But Not Completely

[CarlS]

These really aren't bullets or artillery but are in fact meteorites.  That they were shooting to earth as a projectile and I cleaned them with electrolysis was close enough to allow inclusion on our forum in my mind anyway.  I took the liberty to share them here as I thought there might be some interest in seeing them.

A first for me, I was asked to clean some meteorites in electrolysis.  I'm not sure I've ever held one bigger than a marble so didn't really know much about them.  This particular set comes from South America and is known to be 92% iron and 7% nickel.  The pair in the picture with the knife shown for size is what I got in the mail and is the uncleaned version.  I was surprised they were so rusted (worse than it appears in the image) with a 7% nickel makeup but they had lots of rust and grime from being buried.  But the rust wasn't deep.  I ran them for a few days and all the crud came loose.  There was still some hand cleaning in the cracks and crevices but they came out pretty good.

[redbob]

Now, that's something that you don't see everyday.

[Lt12pdr]

Very nice Carl.

[jonpatterson]

Carl....your work is out of this world..... literally 

[speedenforcer]

Not to sound dumb or sarcastic. this is a honest question. How do you tell something is a meteorite and not a piece of iron off of something  100 or 200 years old. I realize the contour doesn't look like it could actually be part of something.

[speedenforcer]

And my understanding they can actually be pretty valuable

[CarlS]

Good one Jon!

As I mentioned above, I "really know much about them".   All I can say is from handling them is they are quite dense; not porous like cast iron.  They also have a melted look to them.  I'm sure someone could make something or know of something that naturally occurs with this sort of look but I'm not aware.  You can tell by the fineness of the rust that the quality of the metal is good.  It would rust very slowly.  In this case the owner bought them from a dealer who deals in that sort of thing and they were from a known site.  And yes ones of this size I noticed when I was getting a Google education on them do go for pretty big bucks.  I believe these two would bring between $1000 and $2000 each but, again, that is my guess just from what I saw on the internet.

[divedigger]

found this blob many years ago and have no idea what it might be. It is very heavy for it's size and hard as woodpecker lips. i wonder if it could be a meteorite?

[divedigger]

another shot

[CarlS]

A forum member sent me this interesting link on a use of meteorite metal:
     http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-36432635

Dave:  Sure looks like a meteorite to me.  Congrats!

[alwion]

I know some get cleaned, but it can actually remove fusion crust also, Iron meteorites are nickle and iron, some have other trace minerals and sometimes graphite. the minerals inside crystalize Widmanstätten patterns ( google will show you samples) and like snowflakes, no two are identical.due to composition and the temperature when it enters the atmosphere. a good meteorite expert can tell you what you have just from the pattern. there are also pallasites which are iron and usually olivine, and stony meteorites. ALL meteorites have iron ( stoney takes a rare earth magnet) but some less than others. nwa ( north west africa) are found by nomads and sold in morroco, and usually just get a ID number and are cheap ( makes great gifts for the kids, even the big ones ) and are usually cheap . EVERYONE loves to have a falling star, if your out of christmas ideas

[CarlS]

Widmanstätten Patterns really should be called Thompson Structures.