rock that made my LST sing

[bcache]

I'm going to try this without pic---no camera. Don't worry, I'm not going to beg you to call it a Meteorite.

About the size of my hand and about 1 inch thick.

Angular, worn edges. Is black with gray tint, has faint brown tint in some layers. Layers not well defined.

No crystal visible with 4 power lens.

Strongly magnetic to my RE magnet.

Strong hit on my LST.

Streaks red.

I find a few similar rocks in this area but not that common.

Sorry about the lack photo but a photo would look like a gray--black lump with no color definition.

Thanks,

Bill C

[Goldfinger]

Red streak indicates its probably hematite.

Steve

[bcache]

Red streak indicates its probably hematite.

Steve

Thanks for your reply Steve. Hematite is what I first thought. I am woefully ignorant when it comes to minerals so I spent many hours last night reading about rocks, minerals, meteorites etc.. Hoping to take a load of ignorance and transferring it to knowledge. I could only find a man made hematite that was magnetic. Is there a strongly magnetic natural hematite?

Bill C

[Goldfinger]

Yes- there is a strongly natural magnetic hematite. Up in Minnesota they used electromagnets magnets to separate the valuable hematite ore from the worthless gangue. But not all hematite is magnetic so I guess the natural magnetism forms only under certain conditions.

Here's a forum that might be useful to you www.mindat.org They have pretty much everything you would want to know about minerals. I used to spend quite a bit of time browsing through all those mineral pictures.

Steve