Hi Mike and all,

In Richard Norton's new field guide, he lists some house hold chemicals that you can use to preform a nickel test also. I need to look it up and let people know which page. Haven't tried it yet but I am sure that Richard Norton has.

One other problem with the jewlery nickel test kits I think, is that they tend to expire. Don't know if the chemicals have useful life span or not but had trouble with one at a show I was doing to show the nickel test result. All my best.


--AL Mitterling

----- Original Message ----- From: "Randy Korotev" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 2:19 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] question on performing a nickel test


Mike:

I've had the same experience. The problem, I think, is that the DMG test is actually TOO sensitive to nickel. All meteoritic metal is >5% (50,000 ppm) Ni. Metals with only a few hundred ppm Ni will give a positive result with DMG test, however. I think many steels and cast irons may have a few hundred ppm Ni.

This subject came up a few years ago on this list and someone (I forget who) mentioned that in his experience, the swab stayed pink quite a bit longer with a real meteorite metal while the pink faded in an hour with "false positives."

Randy Korotev







At 14:09 19-12-08 Friday, you wrote:
Hi List,

If someone has experience with the Allerderm Nickel test and wouldn't
mind sharing their knowledge of how to do it...

I am attempting to do a nickel test at home here and I ran into a bit
of a snag.  I have a piece of iron that most likely is not a piece of
meteoritic iron that I was using as a test piece.  I sanded a surface
on it, cleaned it with alcohol several times, got out the trusty
Allertest NI test kit from Allerderm, placed a drop each of the
little bottles onto a cotton swab, and placed that on the cleaned
surface of the metal.  Using this piece of iron as a control piece, I
wanted to be sure I wasn't doing something in the steps I was using
that would cause me to get a false positive.  On this test - test,
the swab turned pink quickly.  If I do the exact steps only add in
placing a drop of white vinegar on the cleaned surface, wait a couple
minutes and then apply the nickel test, I get almost a blood red swab
in just the first second.  The first time I did this test and saw
this, I thought I had contaminated the surface so I sanded it again
down to a fresh surface, cleaned it several times again with alcohol
before attempting the nickel test without vinegar.  Second time, same
result.  When using a drop of vinegar again, same result - blood red
quickly.

What am I doing wrong, if anything?  Could I still have contamination
on the metal that the sanding and cleaning with alcohol is not removing?

Mike in CO
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