jamesp
Cave Dweller
Member since October 2012
Posts: 36,154
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Post by jamesp on Jan 4, 2019 19:00:30 GMT -5
"This is a good advice for a total newbie like me. But just out of curiosity: is there also a way to polish softer stones?
Oddly, hard stones seem to be easier to polish than soft stones. Others may chime in, but it seems to be the way it is.
In a batch of tumbles for instance, Mohs 6 jasper never gets polished before hard agates during the polish stage. call it an enigma
Rings true for soft steel and hard steel too.
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 5, 2019 3:17:47 GMT -5
goatgrinder Hello from cloudy and foggy Slovenia! I used to be into fossils much more, I assembled quite a collection over the years, but now my interest has turned more towards minerals. Somewhere in the middle there was also a period when I was carving stones, even for sale. So yeah, if you don't mind I'm gonna stay just in this group for a while. I got some knowledge about fossils and I've found pretty much all that could be found in the close vicinity - at least one of each. As I said in a previous post: LOTS of them everywhere, but not really that much variety. Thanks! jamesp I know harder rocks are easier to polish to high shine. It's not even that hard to understand, because the particle density is higher, they are smaller and surface can be made more even. I just asked what are the tricks to make softer stones take the same sort of high polish. But 1dave was already really kind and made a thread for me about that topic in the "rock tumbling" section!
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Post by 1dave on Jan 11, 2019 8:50:44 GMT -5
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 11, 2019 12:48:15 GMT -5
I know preshaping, I used to do a lot of rock carving years ago when I was self-employed artist... (although mostly softer rocks, such as shale/slate). I used small chisels and diamond drills.
For example: Thanks for the tutorial, wow, this is really detailed! Up until now I only ever used polished stones as pendants, usually with some engraving or symbol on them - either with a glue-on iron hook or just a hole and a string through. Stuff like those little cats or horoscope signs sold well!
Sheesh, I guess I should try and learn wire wrapping too, eh? Thanks!
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Post by 1dave on Jan 11, 2019 12:54:10 GMT -5
I know preshaping, I used to do a lot of rock carving years ago when I was self-employed artist... (although mostly softer rocks, such as shale/slate). I used small chisels and diamond drills.
For example: Thanks for the tutorial, wow, this is really detailed! Up until now I only ever used polished stones as pendants, usually with some engraving or symbol on them - either with a glue-on iron hook or just a hole and a string through. Stuff like those little cats or horoscope signs sold well! Sheesh, I guess I should try and learn wire wrapping too, eh? Thanks! IMPRESSED!
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 15, 2019 11:59:15 GMT -5
A few more words about my place - As I already mentioned, the whole valley is made of (more or less Jurassic) limestone - hills and rock walls; and glacial deposit - gravel or breccia towards the bottom of the valley or the plains. I live in the very "corner", next to a spring of river which carved this part of the valley, so there are a couple of nice cut-through locations which can show quite a time travel. I already posted a photo of mountains with limestone layers (2nd page of this thread). Now a few photos of locations closer to me.
This is a 180° panorama of the entire valley: I live in the corner, just where it flattens out: The terrain is a Karst area, made of soft limestone so typical Karst phenomena can be spotted pretty much on every step:
I'm not sure what these are called in English. It's a morphological feature of Karst limestone, we call them žlebiči which would roughly translate to "little rain tubes" or "little gutters" or something like that. They can be just several centimeters wide or progressively wider and deeper until you get monstrosities such as Lunan Stone forest in China. Those are just extremely deep crevasses. On the above photo, the smallest ones are about the thickness of a finger. The holes are wide enough to put a fist in.
This is the stream that carved my corner of the valley, it is called Hubelj ("hoo-bell"): It's a typical torrent. There's hardly any of it in the dry weather, but if there is a storm in the mountains, because of the karts terrain full of underground holes and caves it can grow up to 10 or 20 times its size in a matter of minutes. Because of that of course it does a great job carving the walls of the river bed. As you can see it's composed of various layers as previous floods and glaciation deposited the gravel.
This material is extremely soft and crumbly, so scenes like this are not uncommon: When those poor trees started to grow, this was probably all still firm and level ground. But as you can see in the second picture, it is about to topple over any time now. I don't particularly like limestone because it's too young for any really attractive and hard stones which would be good for polishing. I have to drive about 30 km away, out of the valley where two larger rivers make confluence, to find the good stuff from the Julian alps. However in limestone you can find little pretties like this: Enjoy!
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Post by 1dave on Jan 15, 2019 12:21:28 GMT -5
I DID enjoy!
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 15, 2019 13:01:38 GMT -5
*happy* I'm glad you did, thanks!
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Post by mohs on Jan 15, 2019 13:42:34 GMT -5
ya got a good eye Kai that little quartz crystal is very cool your mountainous area , knowledge and crafting is wonderful! grazie, ed
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Post by 1dave on Jan 15, 2019 14:05:34 GMT -5
ya got a good eye Kai that little quartz crystal is very cool your mountainous area , knowledge and crafting is wonderful! grazie, ed It looks like feldspar crystals below it.
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 15, 2019 14:05:37 GMT -5
Aww, come on!! Don't praise me so much, you'll make me blush! (blush2)
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Post by mohs on Jan 15, 2019 15:20:15 GMT -5
there no blushing on RTH !
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Post by TheRock on Jan 20, 2019 12:19:13 GMT -5
To RTH Forum Kai From ~Duke in SW Michigan .
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Kai
spending too much on rocks
Member since December 2018
Posts: 331
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Post by Kai on Jan 20, 2019 14:15:57 GMT -5
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Post by As I in does tries! on Mar 4, 2019 16:10:24 GMT -5
Greetings from Scotland, United Kingdom!
I currently have the following Lortone QT12/66 rotary tumbler, Lortone C300 rotary tumbler, 2x Viking Vibrasonic 2x 14lb and 2x 6lb hoppers (Diamond Pacific) (USA) vibrating tumblers, Hans lapidary 6 wheel rock grinder and polisher, 6 inch blade and wheel combo unit that is currently under redevelopment, with Silicon Carbide grit Fixed80, F220, F600, F1200, with Tin Oxide (1.0 micron) and Aluminum Oxide (0.3 micron) polishes.
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