SedimentaryRoadcutCheck List
Format
Title – real specific rock type terms that reflect what is in the cross
section.
Outcrop shape – the standard tapered end roadside rockface.
Scale Bar – rulered in feet or meters to reflect the size of your
outcrop.
Geology
All areas represent rock types with …
-distinct contact lines and,
-filled with rock type appropriate patterning and
-a color shading. (Not colored patterning).
All elongate pattern elements like dashed lines and layers of bricks
-run parallel to the layers that they are in
(if the layer is folded the bricks or dashes need to follow and
show the same folds)
Legend
-single stack of ruler drawn square boxes
-in stratigraphic age order with youngest at the top and oldest at the
bottom.
Each box
-filled with same pattern and color shading as unit in the cross
section
-has text entry to include
-the specific rock type
-geologic time period age and
-an inventive description
(be sure description doesn’t just repeat the standard definition
for that rock type)
Details
Does your cross section clearly show…
-the horizontal erosion surface through the middle of the outcrop as
a
central prominent feature.
-beds below as steeply tilted consistently across the outcrop
(don’t be tempted to make these beds folded as that is a later
topic)
-lower bed contact lines that are truncated at the erosion surface?
-upper beds that are horizontal parallel to the erosion surface.
-the unconformity as a horizontal wavy line (the erosion surface in
cross section) within
the legend separating the appropriate units into upper and
lower sets of beds??
Do your …..
-dashed lines (shale) and bricks layers (limestone) run parallel to
the beds they are in??
-limestone patterning brick layers shown as a brick wall and
not as isolated floating bricks?
-geologic time period age assignments reflect the necessary gap in
geologic time
represented by the unconformity?