Pyrite
From cornish semiconductor corporation
More actions
- Lustre:Metallic
- Transparency:Opaque
- Colour:Pale brass-yellow
- Streak:Greenish-black
- Hardness:6 - 6½ on Mohs scale
- Tenacity:Brittle
- Cleavage:Poor/Indistinct Indistinct on {001}.
- Fracture:Irregular/Uneven, Conchoidal
Data from the pyrite page on mindat
One of the most common semiconducting minerals, pyrite exhibits high conductivity and easily provides a voltage drop - often in both polarities equally, rectification is harder to find than some minerals. More decayed material seems to perform better than freshly exposed or well crystallised pyrite. The crustiest and worst (massive) crystallisation the better it seems to be for our purposes.