Garnet

[braders]

I know some state parks in Wyoming will let you collect rocks to a certain amount and if ya get the right person in the booth when you pay to enter they will even give you pointers of where to look
And nice new finds Tim , is there any black sand as well in them washes ? If so ya may wanna look deeper into the soil you brought back with ya

[tims]

There is a tiny bit of black sand. The soil is like a layer of fist-size and bigger rock covered by maybe an inch of fine powdery dirt, mixed in spots with tiny quartz gravel / sand. Maybe if you could find a cavity in the layer of larger rock that had filled with dirt and sand you could find some goodies, but everyplace I tried to dig I was only able to scrape up the thin layer of soil above the rock layer.

I'm guessing if you could dredge the mud out of a spot in that creek and get to rock underneath it would be full of small heavy material but that's probably a bigger operation than I want to tackle. I'm hoping maybe in the spring some of the mud will wash out and expose rock and sand in spots but will have to wait and see. I enjoy picking pebbles too much to let it turn into work

[Deleted]

Sept 23, 2016 13:52:32 GMT -5 tims said:

There is a tiny bit of black sand. The soil is like a layer of fist-size and bigger rock covered by maybe an inch of fine powdery dirt, mixed in spots with tiny quartz gravel / sand. Maybe if you could find a cavity in the layer of larger rock that had filled with dirt and sand you could find some goodies, but everyplace I tried to dig I was only able to scrape up the thin layer of soil above the rock layer.

I'm guessing if you could dredge the mud out of a spot in that creek and get to rock underneath it would be full of small heavy material but that's probably a bigger operation than I want to tackle. I'm hoping maybe in the spring some of the mud will wash out and expose rock and sand in spots but will have to wait and see. I enjoy picking pebbles too much to let it turn into work

You can use a shovel and sluice box. Backpack sluice box is what? $50?

Set it up and fill with the garnet sands. You can wash a yard a day if you go slow and persistent.

[gemfeller]

tims, color is the most important garnet quality in terms of faceting. Many red garnets are simply too dark to allow the light transmission necessary to create scintillation and brilliance, which is what faceting is all about. There are 3 basic types of red garnet: pyrope, almandine and a mix of the two species called rhodolite.

Most almandines are simply too dark to make faceting worthwhile. Small pyropes can often be faceted but they tend to grow darker with size because the further light travels through a transparent substance the darker and more saturated it gets. For some reason when pyrope and almandine mix (which garnets love to do -- there's no such thing as a "pure" natural garnet species) the result is often a beautiful red/purplish hue that can be made into attractive gems. And there's a very wide range of rhodolite shades of color because the balance percentage between pyrope and almandine as well as other minor garnet species, varies tremendously.

Size is also very important. As a general rule the finished yield is about 20% of the size of the original rough. That means -- on average -- a 1 carat finished stone requires a 5 carat rough, as an example. The yield can vary upwards or downwards because of the shape of the rough, the cutting shape selected, inclusions and other factors.

I'm a little confused by the images you posted. The first one appears (on my monitor) to show a few lighter-colored stones but your second shows all very dark stones. Are they the same garnets? They would all be too small to be worth faceting IMO but nicely-formed crystals make fun collector pieces.

    





    

[tims]

Hey @shotgunner, i'm waiting on a pan to test some of the material. Did some rough panning today with an old garbage pan lid but it's not very effective. Honestly i'm more interested in kicking shiny rocks than getting invested in chasing gold, but that could change quickly if i actually found some gold ...

gemfeller, thanks for the information. I think the garnet in this area is mostly pyrope. As for the color difference there were 3 factors: I had better light in the first pic, the first batch had been rinsed better, and the first batch was mostly smaller with better color. I mixed everything together now and gave them a good soak and rinse and will get another pic in sunlight if / when i get some sun.

If there's nothing to lose with these i may try polishing up some of the existing facets on the bigger ones. Just dop them on a toothpick or something and start with an intermediate to fine grit? I'm still just a collector with novice experience working stone. With rocks it seems like you either need to specialize, or have a whole lot of time to learn.

[gemfeller]

Sure, go ahead an try polishing; I doubt there's much to lose with such small stones. I don't know what kind of equipment you have but a flat lap would be a good way to do what you have in mind. Polishing small flats by hand can be difficult though. That's why faceting machines were invented. You might be able to cobble up a type of machine called a jamb peg. It's simply a board with holes drilled into it at different angles that sits on an upright next to the lap. Whatever you use as a dop can be inserted into a hole at the angle you want, to maintain accuracy while cutting. Here's a YouTube video of one in action:

[tims]

I might try to shine up the 1/2" one, it's very ugly as it sits and maybe big enough to work with. I broke down and dug out my old WinXP compatible camera and the PC to go with it for a couple better pics:

These do tend to get dark and rough the bigger they are, but there is one big one that's nice and purple and has some smooth natural faces. I'm rained in today but have a couple buckets full of dirt to work through that should yield at least another little pile of smalls.

Garage Rocker how much would be required to use for media? Would a handful of really small garnet do you any good?

[Shannon]

Polishing them can make determining whether or not they're facet worthy easier. Fractured ones will fall apart and all the translucent ones that make it through will show whether or not they're fracture free when held up to a light source.

If nothing else, polished garnets look great!

[Garage Rocker]

Sept 24, 2016 16:02:13 GMT -5 tims said:

Garage Rocker how much would be required to use for media? Would a handful of really small garnet do you any good?

That's how much I throw into my three pound barrels. I don't like using media, unless I'm tumbling something delicate. I use Lakers for smalls often, but would love to see how a handful of those turn out.

I've picked through and used most of the small ones.

I like to keep a handful of this size in each batch. After they shrink a bit, they come out as nice tiny-tumbles.

[tims]

Those little agates are awesome I'm going to pan out my dirt buckets and hopefully have some extra smalls.

[Deleted]

Sept 24, 2016 2:37:48 GMT -5 tims said:

Hey @shotgunner, i'm waiting on a pan to test some of the material. Did some rough panning today with an old garbage pan lid but it's not very effective. Honestly i'm more interested in kicking shiny rocks than getting invested in chasing gold, but that could change quickly if i actually found some gold ...

gemfeller, thanks for the information. I think the garnet in this area is mostly pyrope. As for the color difference there were 3 factors: I had better light in the first pic, the first batch had been rinsed better, and the first batch was mostly smaller with better color. I mixed everything together now and gave them a good soak and rinse and will get another pic in sunlight if / when i get some sun.

If there's nothing to lose with these i may try polishing up some of the existing facets on the bigger ones. Just dop them on a toothpick or something and start with an intermediate to fine grit? I'm still just a collector with novice experience working stone. With rocks it seems like you either need to specialize, or have a whole lot of time to learn.

Garnets are very dense and pan/sluice easily. No gold required. Desired maybe! But not required... Lol

[tims]

Maybe i don't have the hang of it yet, but i'm finding them a pain to pan. The round ones like to roll out of the mix and escape, and i swear something about the shape sometimes seems to make them buoyant. The way the weather's cooling off i may be lucky to finish out my 1 big bucket of dirt.