jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 8, 2018 7:55:56 GMT -5
Glass(and obsidian) can loose polish for sure and possibly pre-polish(in my case anyway). My tumbler/my process has deterioration of polish after 12 to 14 hours. Apparently the AO polish has finished breaking down and material is no longer being removed. The next step appears to be 'hazing' or 'micro-bruising' or 'frosting' or whatever one wants to call it. Seen it happen many times in polishing glass and obsidian in my vibe. Started documenting point of diminishing returns. Again, about 12 hours. Not sure if this is the case for agates and other Mohs 7 materials. It makes perfect sense, once you achieve ~perfect polish where else is there to go ? Sophisticated graphical representation
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Post by Drummond Island Rocks on Oct 8, 2018 8:03:04 GMT -5
Was this study done in your modified vibrasonic or in your Lot-o? All of my obsidian and apache tears run 48-72 (usually only 48) hours in the lot-o polish stage using rockshed AO polish. Just curious if you have tried the two different vibe tumblers and if you came up with the same results on both.
Have you seen the tutorial Tntmom made which includes pictures each day showing progress?
Chuck
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Post by Pat on Oct 8, 2018 8:46:56 GMT -5
Interesting. You can overdo a good thing. While annealing metal, you can anneal-harden it as well. Thanks!
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 9, 2018 7:21:14 GMT -5
Was this study done in your modified vibrasonic or in your Lot-o? All of my obsidian and apache tears run 48-72 (usually only 48) hours in the lot-o polish stage using rockshed AO polish. Just curious if you have tried the two different vibe tumblers and if you came up with the same results on both. Have you seen the tutorial Tntmom made which includes pictures each day showing progress? Chuck This has not happened with the Lot-O Chuck. It appears the longer the glass stays in the Lot-O the more polished it gets if conditions are right. "My tumbler" being the modified Vibrasonic is a totally different animal. The modified Vibrasonic is simply more aggressive than the Lot-O, no doubt. BUT - not too aggressive. A fine line. How do I know this ?: If I use AO 220 in the Lot-O for say 4 days I have AO 220 particles of some reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. If I use AO 220 or even AO 80 in the modified Vibrasonic there is no AO particles left in the bottom of the hopper after a yet shorter cycle of 2 days. However, if I use AO 22 in the modified Vibrasonic for 4 days there is certainly AO 22 particles of reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. That is why I can take glass to a high polish using only AO 220 in the modified Vibrasonic with only 25% pea gravel media. Because it has enough muscle to break down AO 220 to polish with a limited amount of media. BUT, it is a fine line between bruising the glass and polishing the glass. Once the AO 220 is broken down to polish the glass must be removed timely or the micro bruising starts. I choose to use white aluminum oxide for visibility. It can be seen in the bottom of the hopper if water is used carefully to remove slurry. There is a threshold point where the vibe must generate enough force to break down the AO 220 without bruising the glass. (It does not HAVE to, but if it does it makes my life easier by not having to run 500-1000-14,000) Some runs I move the glass to the Lot-O and run AO 14,000 and in ALL cases the Lot-O betters the polish but only very slightly.
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jamesp
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Member since October 2012
Posts: 36,170
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Post by jamesp on Oct 9, 2018 7:23:45 GMT -5
Interesting. You can overdo a good thing. While annealing metal, you can anneal-harden it as well. Thanks! I must have overdone my wife, she is getting meaner Pat.
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Post by Drummond Island Rocks on Oct 9, 2018 8:09:25 GMT -5
Was this study done in your modified vibrasonic or in your Lot-o? All of my obsidian and apache tears run 48-72 (usually only 48) hours in the lot-o polish stage using rockshed AO polish. Just curious if you have tried the two different vibe tumblers and if you came up with the same results on both. Have you seen the tutorial Tntmom made which includes pictures each day showing progress? Chuck This has not happened with the Lot-O Chuck. It appears the longer the glass stays in the Lot-O the more polished it gets if conditions are right. "My tumbler" being the modified Vibrasonic is a totally different animal. The modified Vibrasonic is simply more aggressive than the Lot-O, no doubt. BUT - not too aggressive. A fine line. How do I know this ?: If I use AO 220 in the Lot-O for say 4 days I have AO 220 particles of some reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. If I use AO 220 or even AO 80 in the modified Vibrasonic there is no AO particles left in the bottom of the hopper after a yet shorter cycle of 2 days. However, if I use AO 22 in the modified Vibrasonic for 4 days there is certainly AO 22 particles of reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. That is why I can take glass to a high polish using only AO 220 in the modified Vibrasonic with only 25% pea gravel media. Because it has enough muscle to break down AO 220 to polish with a limited amount of media. BUT, it is a fine line between bruising the glass and polishing the glass. Once the AO 220 is broken down to polish the glass must be removed timely or the micro bruising starts. I choose to use white aluminum oxide for visibility. It can be seen in the bottom of the hopper if water is used carefully to remove slurry. There is a threshold point where the vibe must generate enough force to break down the AO 220 without bruising the glass. (It does not HAVE to, but if it does it makes my life easier by not having to run 500-1000-14,000) Some runs I move the glass to the Lot-O and run AO 14,000 and in ALL cases the Lot-O betters the polish but only very slightly. I do wonder how much difference there is between the Loto, thumblers and vibrasonic. I do not know if they all behave the same way even if the same recipe is used in each. Each has its own motion. I have the loto's and a mini sonic which both have just about the same size barrels. I ran two identical batches using the same recipe and run time in both and liked the loto results better. It may be a case of needing a different recipe or different run times in the vibra sonic. I just never put anymore effort into it. Chuck
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 9, 2018 9:11:27 GMT -5
This has not happened with the Lot-O Chuck. It appears the longer the glass stays in the Lot-O the more polished it gets if conditions are right. "My tumbler" being the modified Vibrasonic is a totally different animal. The modified Vibrasonic is simply more aggressive than the Lot-O, no doubt. BUT - not too aggressive. A fine line. How do I know this ?: If I use AO 220 in the Lot-O for say 4 days I have AO 220 particles of some reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. If I use AO 220 or even AO 80 in the modified Vibrasonic there is no AO particles left in the bottom of the hopper after a yet shorter cycle of 2 days. However, if I use AO 22 in the modified Vibrasonic for 4 days there is certainly AO 22 particles of reduced size in the bottom of the hopper. That is why I can take glass to a high polish using only AO 220 in the modified Vibrasonic with only 25% pea gravel media. Because it has enough muscle to break down AO 220 to polish with a limited amount of media. BUT, it is a fine line between bruising the glass and polishing the glass. Once the AO 220 is broken down to polish the glass must be removed timely or the micro bruising starts. I choose to use white aluminum oxide for visibility. It can be seen in the bottom of the hopper if water is used carefully to remove slurry. There is a threshold point where the vibe must generate enough force to break down the AO 220 without bruising the glass. (It does not HAVE to, but if it does it makes my life easier by not having to run 500-1000-14,000) Some runs I move the glass to the Lot-O and run AO 14,000 and in ALL cases the Lot-O betters the polish but only very slightly. I do wonder how much difference there is between the Loto, thumblers and vibrasonic. I do not know if they all behave the same way even if the same recipe is used in each. Each has its own motion. I have the loto's and a mini sonic which both have just about the same size barrels. I ran two identical batches using the same recipe and run time in both and liked the loto results better. It may be a case of needing a different recipe or different run times in the vibra sonic. I just never put anymore effort into it. Chuck There is a big difference Lot-O to Vibrasonic. Ask me ? I will say the Vibrasonic is tuned for Mohs 7 rocks along with the other brands you mentioned EXCEPT the Lot-O. Lot-O does both. And that makes sense that they are tuned for Mohs 7. Most common tumbles are Mohs 7, less that 7 is trickier to polish. The modifications I did to the Vibrasonic(adding mass to the hopper and moving the CG of the hopper closer to the vibration source) was to reduce vibration travel distance. Reducing distance travelled = reduced acceleration/decceleration. It is the acceleration/decelleration that kills. I know for a fact that China made industrial rock vibes utilize the same concept and so you see imported polished calcite/flourite commonly. Adding mass to something vibrating reduces amplitude in almost every case known. Moving mass closer to excitation reduces amplitude in almost every case. Those are rules of physics. Looks like the Lot-O is the first factory made vibe that was built to do softer materials. Granted the Vibrasonic is adjustable, but at lowest settings it barely shuffles the rocks. Adding mass and and increasing excitation force is a totally different situation in a physics outcome and just happened to work on the Vibrasonic. my lucky day ! I would say the most accurate vibe test is the breaking down of AO 22-AO 80-AO 220 as those are visible in the bottom of the hopper. Because that is a time lapse test. Finer than AO 220 is invisible to my eyes anyway.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 9, 2018 9:16:45 GMT -5
And if I were to build a vibe there would be 2 adjustments added that are not on any other US made vibe.
1) Ability to add weight to hopper. 2) Ability to adjust hopper closer to exciter.
I am a bit surprised that no US vibes have one or both of these adjustments. Some basic vibration principles and easy to do.
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Post by grumpybill on Oct 9, 2018 15:30:54 GMT -5
And if I were to build a vibe there would be 2 adjustments added that are not on any other US made vibe. 1) Ability to add weight to hopper. 2) Ability to adjust hopper closer to exciter. These might be possible with a Lot-O: 1. Add heavy magnets to the metal frame that holds the bowl? 2. Move the wood dowel rod?
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 9, 2018 16:57:10 GMT -5
And if I were to build a vibe there would be 2 adjustments added that are not on any other US made vibe. 1) Ability to add weight to hopper. 2) Ability to adjust hopper closer to exciter. These might be possible with a Lot-O: 1. Add heavy magnets to the metal frame that holds the bowl? 2. Move the wood dowel rod? Yes and yes. Magnets, or bolt more weight on, etc. BUT, if you add weight on a point furthest from the vibration source it can aggravate the situation. In my case, I added the weight as close to the vibration source as possible. Sort of like bouncing on a diving board on the very tip end as opposed to bouncing on a diving board 5 feet in from the end. A partially similar comparison. I never moved the pivot point when doing the modification on the Vibrasonic. I believe that dowel shifts the pivot point ? Or does it stiffen/soften the spring ? I never changed the "spring constant" either. Not sure what impacts those would have Bill as I only made the changes 1) and 2) stated above. Added mass, and moved hopper CG closer to exciter.
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Post by grumpybill on Oct 9, 2018 18:49:26 GMT -5
Over the winter, when I can't be sawing, I'm going to experiment with the Lot-O. The advantage to using magnets for weight = easy to move the weight to different places. I don't know what moving the dowel does, but I plan to move it around and find out. <evil grin>
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tkvancil
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since September 2011
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Post by tkvancil on Oct 10, 2018 9:02:57 GMT -5
I find it odd that you are having this experience. When I first started using my Thumlers UV18 I ran the polish for 7 days because the instructions said to do so. These days 48 to 72 hours is run length, after that to my eye they don't get any "shinier". Never experienced the negatives you describe however with longer run time.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 10, 2018 20:05:42 GMT -5
I find it odd that you are having this experience. When I first started using my Thumlers UV18 I ran the polish for 7 days because the instructions said to do so. These days 48 to 72 hours is run length, after that to my eye they don't get any "shinier". Never experienced the negatives you describe however with longer run time. I have only observed this with polishing glass. Invariably I will let the glass run a half a day too long occasionally. I have to move 2 stages back and start again. It has happened enough to have certainty that this is what is happening. But this happens with my Vibrasonic and my slurry.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Oct 10, 2018 20:09:42 GMT -5
Over the winter, when I can't be sawing, I'm going to experiment with the Lot-O. The advantage to using magnets for weight = easy to move the weight to different places. I don't know what moving the dowel does, but I plan to move it around and find out. <evil grin> I got where I needed to get. Tickled to not be performing any more experiments. The modifications done on the Vibrasonic were time consuming and required a lot of labor. Glad it is all over.
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