cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 2, 2009 17:21:42 GMT -5
Hello everyone, this is my very first post here! Let me start off by saying that I'm well educated in terms of gemstones, meaning I've studied gemology for years, and I've had a small import/export business for gemstones for many years, but have never attempted to cab/facet my own rough material, but I've wanted to learn it for years! I've decided to take the "plunge", but to make things more of a challenge (I always do things the HARD way!!) I've decided I only want to do this at this point in my life if I can build the startup equipment myself, mostly due to cost issues of course. So, I purchased a flat round 6" base sanding wheel thingy with the intent of building a flat lap, one of those ones you can mount on an angle grinder or drill of some type, it is hard plastic with a flat surface, and the shaft that comes out of the back appears to be about 1/4" threaded. This one is built to accept a "peel and stick" peice of sandpaper material. I hope my description is adequate for you guys to understand what I mean, basically you mount it on an angle grinder, and stick sandpaper to it! So anyhow, I've read all of the posts I can find on here regarding flat lap construction, and I can honestly say now that I'm more confused than ever, not only about how I should approach building the unit, but if this is actually the device I will need to be able to polish precut oval peices of material into usable cabs from start to end polish. I "actually" use a mastercraft tile saw as a wet rock saw, and find that it actually cuts most rocks and things like quartz crystal quite quickly and easily, it uses a diamond steel cutting blade, it's a bit thick, so you lose about 3-4mm of material in the cut, but it's better than nothing! I purchased a couple 10 packs of 6" carborundum peel and stick sanding disks, a 320 grit, and a 400 grit (it was all they had at the local surplus shop), and some 600 grit water sand paper (emery cloth) which is not peel and stick, I was hoping to use "spray adhesive to stick it to the polishing wheel. I also bought a suitible round tray to catch the dripping water, and I already have a small pump I can use to recycle the water onto the polishing surface, a shaft and 2 mountable bearings to hold the shaft with pully and sanding wheel on it. I'm mounting it all onto a small steel "router table" which seems to be adequate for the job. I already have a brand new furnace motor I purchased at an auction for 10 bucks which is a 1725RPM motor, 15amps or so, will this suffice for the speed requirements of the lap? So, some questions: - do I need to belt drive it? What is the advantage over "direct driven"? - Do I need a speed control? What speed should I require to make cabs? - what kind of sanding disks should I use? Is there a commercially avaliable "sanding wheel" that should be used, or can I get away with using either a "peel and stick" or "velcro" type system with a homemade flat lap? - what grits do I need to use from start to finish to make highly polished gem quality cabs? what grits, and used in what order and with what proceedure do I use them? What are the best "kinds" of polishing or sanding disks to use, and where do I get them cheap? I'm not quite sure of the "actual" techniques used to use what grits when, and what "exactly" all the proper steps are from start to finish in making a cab, other than the initial oval shaping of the stone, which I've already accomplished with the rock saw. - Should I even be making a flat lap? Is it easier to make cabs with something else? What is the difference between a flat lap, and the "dry laps" I see people posting here, just not adding water? Is one of thise "wheel" type polishers better than a flat lap? Is a "verticle lap" better than a flat lap? I've got alot more questions, but this will suffice to get me started in the right direction, I know it's difficult for a newbie to not only start off with no knowledge, but also to attempt to build their own gear at the same time! Thanks for your patience with this newbie, I'm sure with your guidance I will be able to turn out a decent peice of equipment that properly produces, I'll post pictures as it takes shape! Thanks again in advance for your help!! Chris
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Mudshark
fully equipped rock polisher
Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. Will Rogers
Member since December 2008
Posts: 1,083
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Post by Mudshark on Feb 2, 2009 18:02:56 GMT -5
Chris,I was gonna do something like what you have in mind but after doing a lot of research I decided to save my pennies and build a "Genie " type cab machine.I have everything but the wheels and drums and they can be pricey.Reading about how dangerous dry grinding is helped me decide to go the wet route.A wet flat lap is doable and I know there is info on the net on making them.I save everything so I will dig thru my hard drive and see what I can find for you.Maybe someone here has it and will link for you.Good luck with your project! Mike
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cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 2, 2009 18:12:55 GMT -5
Thanks Mike! I appreciate any help I can get at this point! Chris
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Mudshark
fully equipped rock polisher
Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. Will Rogers
Member since December 2008
Posts: 1,083
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Post by Mudshark on Feb 2, 2009 18:30:54 GMT -5
I'm not sure how to post a link but the name of one site I found was Kreigh's Homemade Lapidary Equipment.http://tomaszewski.net/Kreigh/Minerals/Homemade.shtml
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uneekarts
starting to shine!
Member since December 2008
Posts: 42
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Post by uneekarts on Feb 2, 2009 19:42:37 GMT -5
As for the lap, I may not be much of a help other than to say it sounds like you have a lot of enthusiasim but you should really try to find somewhere locally where you can go see a flat lap at work. Then, I think you would get a lot of answers to your questions. As for pasting a link. Don't use the quick reply, use the reply icon at the bottom of the message thread. When you do you will see a lot of small icons with smiley faces etc above the box you enter text in. One of those icons looks like a small globe. Click on that and then paste, or type the full address of the link you are trying to provide a link for. You will see a left bracket url right bracket followed by a leftbracket /url right bracket. Paste the link you want between those middle brackets and it should show up as a clickable link. You should include the http part as well as the .com, etc... part. All of it goes between the center most brackets. tomaszewski.net/Kreigh/Minerals/Homemade.shtml
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Saskrock
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since October 2007
Posts: 1,852
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Post by Saskrock on Feb 2, 2009 21:24:38 GMT -5
Those sound like a lot of the same questions I had when I started building my flat lap. I'll pass on what I found out. I'm pretty new to cabbing so don't take this as "for sure" but its worked for me. The motor sounds fine its pretty much what I used. As far as speed from what I found out its good to have it full speed sometimes and slower sometimes. Some people were using light dimmers to do this but its supposed to be really hard on the motor. You need a proper speed control, these are not cheap. So I ended up using pulleys to take my 8" lap to 600rpm. Not fast enough to be ideal at times and not slow enough at others, but its kind of in the middle so it will work (I have made lots of cabs). I have also seen direct drive ones from others though and they make cabs too. I settled on 600rpm because at that speed I can use it for making spheres too. I tried carbundom disks like you are thinking. They work but wear out really really fast. There is nothing cheap about using them. I also tried dribbling tumbling grit onto a cast iron disk. It flies off almost immediately. I eventualy ended up using premounted diamond disks from here. rocklady1.com/Products.html I have no association with them other than I use their disks because they were the cheapest I found. They seem to work very well. I would recommend getting a 100,360,600 and 2200. Follow that up with a piece of leather set on top of the 2200 with Aluminum Oxide polish on it (moist not wet). A flat lap is probably the easiest and cheapest thing to build to make cabs on, but a multi wheel machine would be nice. It is a pain changing disks. I would not go with a dry machine, silicosis looks like a way too horible way to die en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicosis . I hope this answers some questions for you. Like I said I'm pretty new to cabbing but this is working for me. I know the situation you are in intimately, when I started I had never seen a lap, there was no club any where near me and no where for me to buy equiptment. So almost all my stuff if home made. Here is a video of my lap if it helps. Have fun building. Scott
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UtahRockHound
spending too much on rocks
Sometimes your the Windshield, sometimes your the Rock.
Member since May 2008
Posts: 301
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Post by UtahRockHound on Feb 2, 2009 22:33:42 GMT -5
I echo what Saskrock says. I wasted a lot of time and money on regular methods. It would have been cheaper and easier to just bite the bullet and spend a little more in the beginning and get the diamond disks.
I just paid $14 each from Rcoklady1. They are peel and stick, but once you stick them, you will damage them if you try to remove them. Spend the extra $6 and get the baker disks that they go on.
They have a half inch bore, and you can attach them to just about anything if you decide too. A little imagination will get it done. If the motor you have is threaded on the end, a drill chuck is a possibility.
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drjo
fully equipped rock polisher
Honduran Opal & DIY Nut
Member since May 2008
Posts: 1,581
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Post by drjo on Feb 3, 2009 0:07:56 GMT -5
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cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 3, 2009 11:15:20 GMT -5
This is GREAT information folks, keep it coming! I'm like a "sponge" when it comes to this stuff, the more I read the more I take in and modify the ideas I have in my mind! Once I get "enough" info to decide a definite "direction" I will start building something, but until then I'm just going to wait until I have enough info to make a reasonably educated decision about what is best. There are SO many different types of laps and machines for cutting and polishing it really is hard for the newbie to know firstly what device is most effective and easy to get a good end result with, and second to know how to approach the actual "polishing" hardware choices, meaning "peel and stick" as opposed to the actual "grit wheels" that have been suggested here, which seem to be the most logical choice so far. I do not mind paying a little bit extra once I commit to doing so for something I won't be replacing every 5 minutes! I took a small clear heavily included quartz sphere and cut it in half with the mastercraft wet tile/rock saw I have, it seems to heavily chip the edges of the quartz with the thick blade (about 4mm thick actually, it looks like one of those Sintered Lapidary Saw Blades on the "Roughing It"Lapidary Tools & Supplies webpage you posted) that it has in it currently, although it can be replaced with "any" 4-1/2 inch blade. I suspect the chipping issue will "go away" once a "proper" blade is installed and utilized. I was however actually able to polish the cut surface reasonably well with a 320 grit carborundum peel and stick abraisive paper that I simply "stuck" to the outside surface of the Sintered Lapidary Saw Blade, and since it is configured like a "table saw" I simply polished the rough surface of the cut quartz sphere that way, until the paper gave up the ghost and became worn through. I assume this is what will happen to "most" peel and stick ones that become immersed in water. I will most likely buy some of the diamond Lapidary Saw Blades that are thin on that same "Roughing It"Lapidary Tools & Supplies webpage, along with the 6" Perfect & Sachi Mounted Diamond Laps (the wheel, not the peel and stick ones) as it seems that with a lap, the most important thing you just cannot "micky mouse" is the actual grinding wheel itself, really, it "IS" the actual lap itself, you just need to build something around that polishing wheel to turn it and keep it wet! Thanks again for all your suggestions, I really do appreciate it!! Again, keep them coming, especially the pictures and videos, they are GREAT!! Chris
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Saskrock
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since October 2007
Posts: 1,852
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Post by Saskrock on Feb 3, 2009 12:24:31 GMT -5
On the "roughing it" web site the peel and stick and the premounted are the same thing. The only differance is that the premounted ones come stuck on one of thier aluminum bases. The differance between these peel and the ones you already have is that they are metal not paper or cloth, and the diamond will last way way longer than carbundum.
I use the premounted ones because it costs only a little more to get it with the base and like UtahRockHound says you can not unpeel them without wrecking them, so they need thier own base.
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drjo
fully equipped rock polisher
Honduran Opal & DIY Nut
Member since May 2008
Posts: 1,581
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Post by drjo on Feb 3, 2009 13:14:16 GMT -5
There comes a time when procrastination has to stop and construction has to begin...rocks won't last forever you know ;D
What is best (flat lap vs wheel) is usually decided by what you are first trained on and what you are going to polish (larger objects).
Saskrock unit (especially with direct drive) is as cheap as it goes (and can be used horizontally or vertically plus as a final polish buff), an expando wheel will set you back $50-$60 plus belts & you have to make the arbor from your parts.
So...is it done yet??? ;D
Dr Joe
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Saskrock
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since October 2007
Posts: 1,852
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Post by Saskrock on Feb 3, 2009 13:24:11 GMT -5
Could always build both. You can never have too many toys.
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cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 4, 2009 9:25:23 GMT -5
Funny, that's what my ex wife said....lol
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drjo
fully equipped rock polisher
Honduran Opal & DIY Nut
Member since May 2008
Posts: 1,581
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Post by drjo on Feb 5, 2009 12:27:05 GMT -5
(groan) :nono: ;D
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Post by Jack ( Yorkshire) on Feb 6, 2009 4:21:37 GMT -5
Hi Chris, Lap Construction
Adrian made a good one and there has been a few other good ideas on here contact adrian PM for details Or can some one bump up the relative threads ? thanks Jack Yorkshire uk
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cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 6, 2009 12:34:28 GMT -5
Thanks Jack, and everyone else! I contacted an experienced opal cutter yesterday, asking him what he uses, and what he suggests, he was a good previous supplier of opal to me so I knew his work was good. His name is Norm the opal smith, maybe some of you here already know him, I find these communities are "tight knit" and people who are good business people who supply excellent product while giving excellent customer service like Norm seem to be well recognized within the "community". In fact, you can check out his page located at: www.opalsmith.com/He's a great guy, great prices, (tell him I sent you if you end up dealing with him!!) and has been an inspiration, and a very helpful influence in my yearning to learn about this stuff. I highly recommend him for anyone seeking good opal rough at great prices, and he's honest, that's the main thing! It's not often I meet someone, especially a supplier who is so kind, knowledgable and genuinely interested in helping his fellow man understand and learn his "craft", and that means something to me when someone extends their hand to help like that, and that inclused you guys here, thank you all! Sorry to "plug" someone in here, but I feel I owe him that for taking the time to help me. Hope I didn'tbreak any rules! Just comparing opinions, and want everyone to know where the suggestions come from He suggested I "not" use the "Roughing It" supplies as it wasn't worth the low price to have to deal with the low quality you get by using them basically, and he tells me to use the flat lap wheels from Kingsly North, located at: www.kingsleynorth.com/lapidary.htmlHe didn't really tell me NOT to use them, just warned me about the lesser quality, and the possibility of a lesser end result. I DO need to turn out good work, even if it is amateurish at the beginning, as long as all the proper polishing steps are taken from start to finish, so the "polish" is right, then the rest is up to me to learn how to actually do the work right to give a good end result. Also, he mentioned that there are "concave" polishing disks, and some have a soft pad underneith, making it easier to make the cab "shape" when your doing the polishing, does anyone here think it's better to get one of those instead of the totally FLAT laps? It makes sense to me, and i often wondered just how to get a "dome" shaped cab with a totally flat polishing disk. Which is better?? So does anyone have any input about what is better, and worthwhile to a beginner? I don't mind "lesser quality" than the pros, as long as the results aren't toally crappy or anything, I will upgrade to the pro stuff when I become pro. But then again, there is the argument that if you use pro equipment, you will have "pro" results. Hmmm.....I'm a bit confused at the moment where to shift my hard earned dollars. Cost is always a concern and a deciding factor in what gets purchased, I'm like everyone else and not "made of money" (too bad!), but don't mind spending a LITTLE bit extra to get something that not only is easier to use, but also does not "waste" so much material either in failures, or material that gets polished and grinded away while trying to get everything just right! I understand both angles, and really, with this kind of thing, you really are only as good as your tools are, it's the actual grinding/polishing disk/wheel that IS the lap itself, all the rest is just stuff to turn it or control it! Also, regarding cutting blades, which ones would you guys recommend as a good all purpose 4-1/2" blade with a 5/8 mounting hole on this page?? What thickness of blade should I beafter, I know the thicker the blade, the more waste there is, which is NOT good when polishing expensive rough! www.kingsleynorth.com/lapidary.htmlLapidary Blades: Kingsley North Blades Lapcraft Blades MK Diamond / Barranca Pro-Slicer Blades Raytech Blades These blades are super thin, is there any downfall with using them? They seem cheap enough too: www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/search_results2.php?catID=798This one in particular looks of interest, what do you think?? 3-0150-5/8 4" dia. x .004 core x .007 rim x 5/8" arbor Additionally, when it comes to cutting blades, MUST you use a lubricant such as their "Lubri Kool - Oil" located at: www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/search_results2.php?catID=813If it's "just" mineral oil, can't you just go to the drug store and buy a high quality mineral oil? Is there a certain "viscosity" of lubricant that you must use, making "any" lubricant useable if it has that certain viscosity? For that matter, MUST you use a lubricant at all? Is it ONLY for certain blades manufactured to be used with a lubricant other than water, and some are manufactured to be used with "water only" as a lubricant? If so, what happens if you lubricate a "water only" blade, and don't lubricate one that calls for lubricant? Will the saw blade deteriorate rapidly without the lube, or will it just effect the quality/speed of the cut, or both? I know, so many questions, but you don't learn if you don't ask! Thanks again all!! Chris PS, no, it's NOT built yet...lol.
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drjo
fully equipped rock polisher
Honduran Opal & DIY Nut
Member since May 2008
Posts: 1,581
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Post by drjo on Feb 7, 2009 18:12:19 GMT -5
You seem to have found yourself a Mentor, good luck to you. I hope we get to see some of your work soon.
Dr Joe
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warlax
off to a rocking start
Member since February 2009
Posts: 2
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Post by warlax on Feb 9, 2009 16:14:12 GMT -5
Its definately worth taking the plunge, the results can be very fruittful!
I just wish tumbling didnt cost u so much of ur rocks!
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Feb 9, 2009 19:09:32 GMT -5
About the only thing I can comment on is the need for "Lubri Kool": the conventional wisdom is that on blades 10" or smaller you can use water. Of course, you can use oil on any blade and lots of folks here use the mineral oil available from Tractor Supply that is sold as a horse laxative.
Hope that helps.
Chuck
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cooknet
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since February 2009
Posts: 169
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Post by cooknet on Feb 17, 2009 21:03:42 GMT -5
Thanks Chuck for your reply! I hope people don't think because I have asked elsewhere opinions that I respect anyone's opinions less here! I certainly would never shoot down anyone's advice, I accept all info I can get beleive me! I was previously just letting people here know what "someone else" told me and hoping to get some comments about if their advice was valid or not. Since I didn't really get any responses to all the questions I asked, I assumed that I may have worded things incorrectly to give the impression that I was getting my info elsewhere, but I really am still confused about alot of the questions I asked in my last post, so if anyone has any input about my last questions, I would really appreciate your input!! Thanks! Chris
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