You all may think I am nuts but...I have very good success with my meager collection of common NWA's by keeping them in an acrylic sealable jar that I got from wallyworld for a few bucks, and keeping the container about half full of rice. The rice has been dried commercially and it absorbs any change in moisture arising from cooking dinner, washing dishes, the shower, other common things that temporarily raise humidity around the home. I have had great success storing the pass around specimens this way, and all for about $6. The white color of the rice shows off the dark brown meteorites very well. For the shows around here, this is a real display goodie for meteorite show and tell. If you can't figure out what I am explaining, I could send a picture to those asking.
Best Holiday, Dave F. Jörn Koblitz wrote:
Dear Stephen,
Thank you for your interesting (and important) questions, regarding preservation of chondrites (or more general: stony meteorites). I try to answer them from a scientific point of view:
1. Can one easily do more than just preventing future assaults from external moisture and fingerprint chemicals?
There are not so many ways. The best way is, just to store them in a dry environment, ideally with relative humidity <40%, better <20%. Use silica gel as desiccant. Important is to change the desiccant from time to time. Don't touch interior parts with bare hands as salt will get on the specimen which will lead to first corrosion.
2. Will long soaks in anhydrous alcohol help individuals, and polished slices?
It does only help if the specimen got wet before. Then, it can help to quickly pull out the water. Otherwise (with a dry specimen) it can even hurt as alcohol is hygroscopic (it will attrack water from the air humidity). Use alcohol only in combination with a postbake in an oven at about 80 deg. C. DONT DO such things with fresh (observerved falls) carbonaceous chondrites like CMs or CIs. The alcohol will remove pristine organic compounds and the temperature can already alter such meteorites.
3. Has anyone successfully used Steve Schoener's iron stabilization formula for individuals and polished slices of ordinary chondritis (i.e., a mix of water, alcohol, and NaOH)?
NEVER use any chemicals, lacquers, solvents, inhibitors, rust removers etc. on (valuable) stony meteorites!!!! All such agents will very likely alter the meteorite. Such a treated meteorite is LOST to science!!! And: if such treatments have been done and this is not known to the scientist who will study/analyse such a meteorites in the future, it creates lots of confusion, puzzling question on measurement results and additional investigations and at the end lot of wasted time.
So, don't even consider doing such things to stony meteorites - just keep them dry and prevent contamination, including fingerprints, dust, etc.!
Best regards, Jörn Koblitz / MetBase
4. Does anybody know of a good online sources where an average Joe can
purchase anhydrous alcohol?
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- Von: Stephen McMann [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Montag, 20. Dezember 2004 17:37 An: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Betreff: [meteorite-list] Sweaty Fingers, Chlorides, and Chondrites
Dear List,
Over the past few years there has been much discussion about preserving
irons, but little discussion about rust prevention in ordinary chondrites.
However, chondrites can of course suffer from the same problems as irons,
presumably exacerbated by the same culprits (internal moisture, internal
chlorides, fingerprints from previous owners, etc.). Unfortunately,
chondritis tend to be more complex chemically and so I'm not certain about
how to deal with these problems in a way that gives display specimens long,
stable lives.
Here are some naïve questions:
1. Can one easily do more than just preventing future assaults from external moisture and fingerprint chemicals?
2. Will long soaks in anhydrous alcohol help individuals, and polished
slices?
3. Has anyone successfully used Steve Schoener's iron stabilization formula
for individuals and polished slices of ordinary chondritis (i.e., a mix of
water, alcohol, and NaOH)?
4. Does anybody know of a good online sources where an average Joe can
purchase anhydrous alcohol?
Sincerely, Stephen McMann ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
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