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Techniques for CollectorsList of magnetic minerals

15th Apr 2019 14:28 UTCHugo Lobo

Hello. It exist a list with the name of the magnetic minerals ? If yes, where can i find it?

Thanks

15th Apr 2019 17:50 UTCDonald B Peck Expert

Hugo,

You might try USGS Open-File Report 99-529; "Magnetic Susceptibilities of Minerals". I am not sure how complete it is, but I believe it would be a starting point. The report was written for a study of magnetic separation of minerals.

Don

15th Apr 2019 18:50 UTCDoug Daniels

Depends what you mean by "magnetic". Attracted to, or affected by a common magnet? Or a powerful neodymium magnet? Under the influence of a high-powered electromagnet (what Don was referring to) ? If the first option (common magnet). only three - magnetite, pyrrhotite, and ilmenite, in order of response. With the other two, things get a bit more complicated.

15th Apr 2019 20:00 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

Doug mentioned the three most common ones, but there are many other highly magnetic species, if you're counting less common ones: maghemite, magnetoplumbite, awaruite, native iron, tetraferroplatinum... (just for starters).

15th Apr 2019 21:49 UTCGregg Little 🌟

Additionally there are the strongly magnetic iron meteorites with the Ni-Fe minerals kamacite and taenite.

You might get a more relevant answer if we knew what you were using the magnet for. If you are only separating concentrates from say gold panning or looking for meteorites then a regular hand-held magnet will do. If, on the other hand, you are doing mineral magnetism tests then you likely need a stronger one attached to a thread or sensitive fulcrum to measure subtle magnetism.

15th Apr 2019 22:24 UTCJosé Zendrera 🌟 Manager

More information about this matter here: Magnetic Susceptibilities of Minerals by Families

15th Apr 2019 22:40 UTCRalph S Bottrill 🌟 Manager

It’s a shame we don’t have this as a formal physical property field in Mindat.

There are various lists about, eg. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Magnetic_minerals, http://www.galleries.com/minerals/property/magnetis.htm, http://www.irm.umn.edu/hg2m/hg2m_b/hg2m_b.html, http://www.alaska-gold.com/RF003p0189.pdf https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/classification-minerals-magnetic-properties-petrovskaya-ph-d- etc. unfortunately fairly inconsistent. The last one is perhaps the most useful for us.

15th Apr 2019 23:02 UTCHugo Lobo

The problem is that i have a lot of magnetic minerals and i dont know what they are. :)

The charts it Will help a lot.

Thanks to all

16th Apr 2019 02:01 UTCFrank K. Mazdab 🌟 Manager

Also several spinels besides magnetite and maghemite are variably magnetic, ranging from minimally magnetic for chromite and franklinite (in part depending on how much Fe³⁺ and Fe²⁺, respectively, are substituting in for the Cr and Zn in those minerals), up to moderately to strongly magnetic jacobsite and strongly magnetic trevorite (which is incorrectly attributed here as being diamagnetic... I'll fix that). And has been also noted above, once you advance from kitchen magnets to the much more powerful neodymium boride magnets, minerals like almandine suddenly become noticeably magnetic.

16th Apr 2019 02:03 UTCPavel Kartashov Manager

Magnetism of minerals is function of strength of your magnet.

For the moment so strong magnet exists, that they attracts not only spinelides or ilmenites, but also garnets, pyroxenes and amphiboles. Even some pyrochlores attracting by them

16th Apr 2019 15:34 UTCAntonio Romano

Theoreticaly, all minerals that contains Fe2+ in their crystalline structures may be attracted by a magnet. This property is used in mineral separation, for example, with a Frantz Separator in wich the intensity of magnetism is variable. Even with a neodyme magnet many minerals may be attracted.

16th Apr 2019 16:47 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

Keep in mind too that not only Fe minerals are attracted to magnets; some Ni, Co, Mn minerals can be attracted too.

16th Apr 2019 17:20 UTCDonald B Peck Expert

I agree with Ralph. Having the magnetic character of a mineral listed among the properties would be helpful.

I hung two neodymium magnets (about 3 x 5 x 1 cm each) from a 27 cm length of video-tape and stuck a 1 cm square mirror to it. Shining a bright light on the mirror, I had an optical lever that would detect magnetism in all ferromagnetic and most paramagnetic minerals. It was good at detecting minerals with iron, manganese, and copper content (except pyrite and chalcocite).

I highly recommend USGS Open-File Report 99-529. It is relatively short, readable, and easy to understand. There is also an accompanying table of magnetically susceptible minerals. Downloading the report, you get the Abstract . . .Click on Report at top left and you will download the report, itself, in pdf .

Those two neodymium magnets together were quite strong. The long dimension is horizontal. I used video tape because it twists easily, but has a very small restoring force (The tape, as it emerges from between the magnets, needs to be reinforced with sticky tape to prevent the magnets from cutting it off. If you make one check the orientation of the magnets as they hang from your book shelf before you stick the mirror in place. The longer the reflected beam, the more sensitive your system. The magnets react significantly as you approach them with some minerals; with others, moving the specimen toward the magnets and away in a harmonic motion causes the magnets to begin to oscillate.

22nd Apr 2019 20:29 UTCcascaillou

https://www.gemstonemagnetism.com/magnetic_index.html

23rd Apr 2019 16:02 UTCDonald B Peck Expert

Cascaillou, Interesting article with a load of good information.

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