I use them regularly at work (mineral exploration). Hand-held XRF
analysers are great at what they do but the effectiveness is limited by
a couple of factors. They have a very small field of view, only a few
square millimetres, which means they work well on a homogenised powdered
sample but wouldn't be good on something like a grainy alluvial
material. You can get round that to some degree by pattern testing but
that increases the time. They are notoriously bad at detecting nuggetty
material like gold and thus presumably cassiterite grains in a rock or
alluvium sample. Experience suggests to me that the Olympus ones are
asomewhat more user friendly than the Thermo Fisher Niton ones.
WIth XRDs I only have experience of using them to identify discrete
mineral species. Once the sample gets beyond a handful of mineral
species the identfication of the contained minerals can get very
complicated although there is software for that these days.
You can certainly rent them in Australia - in the UK though ? Then
there's all the X-ray user licence/possession licence bureaucracy to
wade through.
Hope that helps a bit
Cheers
Ian
On 19/08/2017 1:33 AM, Phil Newman wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Does anyone have any practical experience of XRF and XRD hand-held
> analysers?
> Can they be used to detect all types of ferrous and NF metals and do
> they give instant results on site?
> I'm looking at detecting unprocessed alluvial tin stone and dressing
> waste in a clay context within an area of post-med tinworks. It would be
> easier to have some idea of what we put in the sample bags before
> shipping them off to a lab for full analysis.
>
> Also, is it possible to hire this kit?
>
> Thanks for any help.
>
> Phil
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