Elemental Analysis of my potential Meteorite

[Steve in PA]

I posted pictures of a strange, heavy magnetic rock that set off my metal detector in a plowed field over the weekend. Last night I smoothed a small area with my bench grinder and shot it with our Positive Material Identification (PMI) gun at work.


I took four shots with the gun and here are the results. These are the only elements that showed up on all four shots. Six other elements showed up on two of the four shots, but I think the gun picked these as "best fit" in order to get to 100%. I think that it can be reliably stated that his rock is composed of Iron, Manganese, Silicon, Aluminum, plus small amounts of other elements that may require a more accurate instrument to determine.

Element	Shot 1	Shot 2	Shot 3	Shot 4	Ave
Iron (Fe)	77.3	72.8	76.7	78	76.2
Manganese (Mn)	9.43	13.05	10.54	7.5	10.13
Silicon (Si)	7	6.97	6.07	7	6.76
Aluminum (Al)	1.44	1.21	1.28	1.13	1.27
Titanium (Ti)	0.71	0.24	0.27	0.54	0.44

 

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[smokeythecat]

Sounds terrestrial. You are missing nickel. There is also a LOT of titanium in eastern PA, lending to my guess.

 

[galenrog]

Iron meteorites, to my understanding, always have substantial amounts of nickel alloyed with the iron.

Time for more coffee.

 

[Steve in PA]

Sounds terrestrial. You are missing nickel. There is also a LOT of titanium in eastern PA, lending to my guess.

Iron meteorites, to my understanding, always have substantial amounts of nickel alloyed with the iron.

Time for more coffee.

Yes to both f you, the lack of nickel is a concern. Looks like high grade Iron Ore. Just really odd as I have metal detected several areas of this field and this is the only piece I have found like this. Just trace amounts of Titanium showing up, and this was found in SW PA.

 

[The hunter Awang]

The absence of a dissolved shell is difficult to determine,

 

[Red-Coat]

The absence of a dissolved shell is difficult to determine,

No idea what that means, but it's not relevant here.

Metallic meteorites have around 6-20% nickel, with most of the rest as iron. There may be cobalt in amounts up to about 2%, copper in amounts up to about 0.02%, plus traces of manganese and tin. Anything else will usually be in parts per million, or present as non-native compounds. If you have significant amounts of iron but no nickel then you don't have a meteorite.