Iron sand

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Iron sand under the influence of a bar magnet

Iron sand is colloquially a sand enriched with heavy minerals , which has a high proportion of iron minerals.

description

The color of the sand is dark gray or blackish. As a result, it heats up strongly when exposed to sunlight, so that skin contact can under certain circumstances lead to burns. The predominant iron mineral in the sand is magnetite Fe 3 O 4 , whereby the pure iron content can be between 54% and 60% depending on the location and quality. In addition, other mineral compounds can also be present, such as. B. titanium (IV) oxide TiO 2 , vanadium (III) oxide V 2 O 3 , magnesium oxide and others.

For example, iron sands from Taharoa , New Zealand in their concentrated form have an iron content of Fe 56.8%, with a simultaneous content of 7.7% TIO 2 and 0.45% V 2 O 3 . Iron sand, which is traded through a company in Auckland and whose origin is not explained in detail, has the following chemical composition:

and more.

Although ilmenite FeTiO 3 or chromite FeCr 2 O 4 also contains iron and can be found in the form of sand in coastal areas, these minerals in their deposit form are known as heavy mineral sands or mineral sands for short.

Emergence

After aluminum, iron is the most common metal in the earth's crust. Due to volcanic activity, it can be transported in relatively large quantities from the deeper areas of the crust or from the upper mantle to the earth's surface, where it becomes part of the lava rock in the form of iron minerals. Millions of years ago, areas with iron-rich rock were created in various places on earth, then eroded over long periods of time and crushed rock material was carried by the rivers towards the sea. The small but heavy stones or grains were deposited in the mouth of the rivers, were distributed along the coasts by wind, waves and tides and, due to their greater specific weight than normal sand, were deposited in a concentrated manner. This is how seabeds, beaches and, in some cases, dunes were created, which today have large amounts of exploitable iron sands.

Word origin and usage

Originally, the term iron sand was also used in German-speaking countries in geological terminology. a. Records and reports of Ferdinand von Hochstetter's participation in the Novara expedition prove it. It is not known exactly when and by whom the term was first used. It can be assumed, however, that iron sand was used as a name for sands containing iron at the latest in the 18th century. In his work A System of Mineralogy - Descriptive Mineralogy , published in 1868, James Dwight Dana uses the term iron sand in connection with menaccanite and refers to literature from 1791, each by William McGregor and Lorenz Florenz Friedrich von Crell . However, the term can no longer be found in today's specialist literature.

Ironsand , or also written iron sand , is not used very often in the English-language geological literature, but is sometimes found in its different spellings. Above all, however, the term is often found in traditional industrial literature. Terms such as titanomagnetite ironsand and mineral sand or, in the German-speaking area, “magnetic iron sand ” can also be identified.

Iron sand (jap. Satetsu ) serves u. a. as raw material for the extraction of Tamahagane , a type of steel that was traditionally used in Japan to forge sword blades, for example.

Occurrence

Iron sand occurs almost everywhere in the world. But economically significant and degradable amounts are only found in Chile , Guatemala , Indonesia , Canada , Japan and New Zealand, with the last three countries mentioned probably having the largest deposits of iron sand in the world.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Iron Sand . Ironsand Java date = 2012-02-22, archived from the original on May 17, 2014 ; accessed on February 8, 2016 (English, original website no longer available).
  2. ^ Story: Marine minerals - Mining ironsands, Taharoa . Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand , accessed June 24, 2012 .
  3. ^ Iron Sand Concentrate . Industrial Sands Ltd. , archived from the original on February 8, 2013 ; accessed on April 8, 2018 (English, original website no longer available).
  4. ^ Iron and steel . Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand , accessed June 24, 2012 .
  5. ↑ Ferdinand von Hochstetter: Geological part - Geology of New Zealand . In: Kaiserlich-Königliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei (Ed.): Journey of the Austrian frigate Novara around the world in the years 1857, 1858, 1859 under the orders of Commodore B. von Wüllerstorf-Urbair . First volume. Vienna 1864, p. 68 ( Online [accessed on June 24, 2012] Quote from Hochstetter: "But nowhere has this titanium-containing iron sand been known in such quantities and deposited in such pure form as on the Taranaki coast and on the entire west coast of the North Island of New Zealand . ").
  6. ↑ James Dwight Dana : A System of Mineralogy - Descriptive Mineralogy . Trübner & Co., London 1868, p.  148 (English, online [accessed February 8, 2016]).
  7. ↑ Agus Yulianto, Satria Bijaksana, Waloejo Loeksmanto, Daniel Kurnia : Synthesis of MnZn Ferrite from Iron Sand . Bandung, Indonesia November 29, 2006 (English, contribution to the symposium of the International Conference on Mathematics and Natural Sciences (ICMNS) ).
  8. ↑ Introduction to New Zealand's Mineral Resources - Mineral Sands . In: Crown Minerals - Ministry of Economic Development (Ed.): Mineral Resources of New Zealand . 2009, ISSN 1836-5752 (English, CD-ROM - Disc 1 ).  
  9. ↑ Anton Pelz: About the Rhodope-Randgebirge south and southeast of Tatar Pazardžik . In: Yearbook of the Imperial Royal Geological Institute (Hrsg.): Year book of the Imperial Royal Geological State Institute . XXIX. Volume, Issue I. Vienna 1872, p. 72 ( Online PDF 29.7 MB [accessed February 8, 2016]).
  10. ↑ Ferdinand von Hochstetter: The geological conditions of the eastern part of European Turkey . In: Yearbook of the Imperial Royal Geological Institute (Hrsg.): Year book of the Imperial Royal Geological State Institute . XXII. Volume IV. Vienna 1872, p. 337,338 ( online PDF 6.9 MB [accessed February 8, 2016]).
  11. ↑ Ferdinand von Hochstetter: Geological part - Geology of New Zealand . In: Kaiserlich-Königliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei (Ed.): Journey of the Austrian frigate Novara around the world in the years 1857, 1858, 1859 under the orders of Commodore B. von Wüllerstorf-Urbair . First volume. Vienna 1864, p. 17,18,51 and so on . ( Online [accessed February 8, 2016]).
  12. ↑ The History of Tatara - Iron Sand . Hitachi Metals, Ltd , accessed June 25, 2012 .