[meteorite-list] Largest collection criteria

From: martinh_at_isu.edu <martinh_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 21 22:14:17 2005
Message-ID: <382f25382c68.382c68382f25_at_isu.edu>

Hi Tracy,

When talking about large private collections, in general they really off the radar of what most collectors think is a large collection.

For example I have the catalog of a collecting friend of mine. The collection has well over 1000 location represented with more than 300 of them witnessed falls.

Many of the pieces are over 100g, and numberous drifting up to or over 1kg. There are also many main masses, and rather large pieces of ultra rare types including howardites over 100g and ureilites over 50g. SNCs in the 20-200g size and three eucrites over 1kg mixed in with many others in the 10s to 100s of grams. Twenty-nine carbonaceous chondrites are listed, many over 100g.

Oh,and out of the 1100+ locations, I count only 7 specimens listed as from NWA or the Sahara. I also only count 3 specimens under 1g.

So I guess if you have millions of dollars and loads of time, a private citizen can build a collection competitive with most museums. But for many of us, we wi
ll just have to settle for nice regional collections.

But is all this really the point of collecting? Ok, maybe.

Cheers,

Martin




----- Original Message -----
From: tracy latimer <daistiho_at_hotmail.com>
Date: Thursday, April 21, 2005 6:39 pm
Subject: RE: [meteorite-list] Largest collection criteria

> I'd like to think that I have a fairly good-sized collection from
> sheer
> diversity, despite the fact that almost none of my collection is
> larger than
> 5 grams. I have over 150 unique falls or finds, mostly in micro
> specimens.
> My criteria are very simple: "Do I have a specimen of this find or
> fall?"
> Of course, I'd prefer to pick up a micro of Portales Valley or
> Weston rather
> than an L6 NWA, but other than that, anything goes.
>
> Tracy Latimer
>
> >
> >I'd think that if you are speaking of the "largest", you'd have to
> measure
> >the volume of the collection. I'd think a stone slightly "bigger"
> than a
> >similar size iron would be co
nsidered the larger of the two. That
> could be
> >problematic though, so you could use the weight of two collections
> with
> >simlar stone/iron weight ratios. What was Marvin's...4 tons?
> >
> >Anyone have any idea how much Bob Haag's collection weighs?
> >
> >If you're talking about most diverse, it would be the number of
> unique
> >types of specimens.
> >
> >If you're talking about most valuable, then it would require
> measurement
> >against a common price list.
> >
> >Quality would be much more subjective other than the obvious (a
> ton of
> >weathered NWAs certainly wouldn't compare to a ton of historic
> falls).>
> >Regards to all,
> >Phil
> >
>
>
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Received on Thu 21 Apr 2005 10:14:14 PM PDT