I suppose it would be possible to artificially blue an iron meteorite. Being a gun collector, I do know a bit about it. This Sikhote is definitely not artificially blued. The black oxide that blues metal is only ~2.5 micrometres thick. This crust is MUCH thicker and only resides in the regmaglypts where less wear would naturally occur. I believe an artificial blue would be easy to recognize for some people, but you never know! As people say, buy from reputable dealers!
Now I'm curious what an artificially blued Sikhote looks like. It is a wonderful preservation technique for gun barrels, but if misrepresented on a meteorite, could be a bad deal! Anyone have an artificially blued meteorite to post? Cheers, Mike -----Original Message----- From: Walter Branch [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, December 04, 2006 3:38 PM To: Mike Bandli; 'Meteorite Mailing List' Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Fusion Crust on Irons Hi Mike, Interesting you should say that. I remember a discussion on the list a few years ago as to whether or not some Sikhote-Alins had been blued to improve their appearance. -Walter Branch ________________________ ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Bandli" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "'Meteorite Mailing List'" <meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com> Sent: Monday, December 04, 2006 5:54 PM Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Fusion Crust on Irons Crust on irons...most definitely! This Sikhote has THICK crust in some of the regmaglypts. Thick enough that you can chip it off. It's like Blued Gun Metal. http://www.astro-artifacts.com/Astroartifacts/Collection/SIKHOTE-296,14g.jpg Kind regards, Mike Bandli ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list Meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list Meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list