ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 18:57:14 GMT -5
Lots of greenstone nodules in that matrix! Now, how to get them out? We have reached that bridge and crossed it. Greenstone removal pics coming.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 11:58:15 GMT -5
We started off day two by heading directly to the Cliff mine. We got out our pick mattock and rock hammers and sat down to dig. Hubby pulled out a rock with a mess of native copper attached. Then I found an old miners copper chisel tip. After digging a while the mosquitos started attacking and we gave up to surface search for Prehnite. We found quite a bit. Below is a pick of some of the almost 100 lbs. collected in three days at various mine piles. While at Cliff mine we also searched for amygdaloid basalt holding greenstone. We found a mess. We spent most of the day at Cliff mine but when we left we went to a mine pile out behind the highway patrol station off route 41. After not finding much there, we went to Calumet Waterworks park where the beach is full of nice looking rocks. Kept a few. We neglected to take photos there, sorry. By then it was getting dark and we headed back to camp for the night. That was it for day two in Houghton/ Keweenaw.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 11:14:00 GMT -5
Jasper Knob is very hard to find. It took me 15 minutes to find the very overgrown stairs to the top. But once found it was an easy climb to the top We actually ended up finding it on the way home. Both me and hubby have COPD. I waited in the car and let hubby go up. He didn't find the climb easy. You must be in great shape😉
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 23, 2017 21:04:01 GMT -5
Hubby and I did our Upper Peninsula rock hounding trip. As all of our UP trips start out, our first pic is of course the Mackinaw bridge. Here we go heading north. Our destination......McLain State Park campground. We reserved a campsite for three nights and drove straight through with total road time of around ten hours from our home in Whitehall Mi. We wasted about an hour searching in vain for Jasper knob in Ishpeming. Hubby forgot to get a screenshot map ahead of time and we drove around aimlessly until we gave up. Below is a shot of our campsite. And a selfie of us in front of the campfire. First day we started off by visiting the Wolverine #2 mine and checked the poor rock pile for copper included agate but came up empty handed. It looked to me like the main #2 poor Rock pile has been removed and the old shaft that used to be surrounded by poor rock is now sitting there next to what is left of the pile. Below is the wolverine #2 shaft. Below is one of the old mine building remains Next we went to the Objibway mine off highway 41 where we found some decent Prehnite. Next we went to Delaware mines poor Rock pile where we were hoping to find some datolite, but all we came away with was some nice gemmy Prehnite. Next we went to the Clark mine. The old smokestack looks out over the poor Rock piles that have seen better days when it comes to finding the highly sought after Clark mine datolite. The place is heavily dug through and actually the most disgusting minesite I've ever been to. After seeing the mess left by previous diggers, I saw little chance of finding my dream datolite. Below are some pics of the mess. Some one should be ashamed. Stuff was everywhere.... That ended our first day. It's getting late and I still have three more days to write about. Check back tomorrow for details on day two.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 15, 2017 12:30:15 GMT -5
Always working on softer stuff here mostly. Never have had any problems with stones burning. I use the most water with low grits and less with the finer grits, but always at least enough to keep the wheel free of any sign of buildup and keep things cool. With yours being basically a clone of my hubby's design, it also sits at about the same height. I usually sit and do cabs. I also find the 5 gallon jugs to be a bit of a tight squeeze as far as hand room goes, and I basically do all my cabbing with no dop stick. Other than that your cabber should be awesome especially for what it cost.
Are you able to use a stick?
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 8, 2017 19:46:20 GMT -5
My hubby found his first ever Michigan puddingstone at, of all places, Point Betsie. Then, yesterday and the day before, I found my own first couple of them at, of all places, Piers Cove. Pictured below are three cabs from hubby's first find. Two are groove wrapped and the third is about to be. Below is a shot of the groove and wire fit.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 26, 2017 16:19:26 GMT -5
Industrial strength build, it should serve you well. Thanks Lee. My shaft is bent..... Can it be straightened? Is it a bearing grade shaft? Your best bet is to get a high quality shaft and then roll it on a surface plate (inspection quality granite plate) before actually buying it. Most steel suppliers have one in shop usually. If it doesn't roll perfectly, it is bent. If you had threads cut into it there is a chance that the threading process warped it some. If it uses coarse threads there is more chance that the threading process caused the warp. Fine threads will torque the bar less when being cut than coarse ones do. Hubby got around that by inventing a setup that allows running without threaded ends.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 26, 2017 8:41:24 GMT -5
One question about the pump being on when the motor is on. I always heard/read that I was supposed to run the wheels with the water off for awhile when I finished using them. This aids in drying them. Supposedly, water left on the wheel after use all goes to the bottom of the wheel (gravity) and the wet area is bad for the wheel? Maybe the real cabbers here can chime in on wheel drying. I don't use mine often enough to have personal experience on such. But I do run them to dry after I do use them. Love the build, very creative. Thinking you are going to want shut off valves though so you can wet one wheel at a time. Never had any issues with wet bottomed wheels.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 26, 2017 8:37:18 GMT -5
Looks a lot like mine. Our water supply has individual shut off valve for each wheel. That way we only need one wheel getting soaked at a time. The valves also can adjust the flow to supply only the water desired. Don't forget to mount some sort of spray stopper over the wheels. We just use some denim strips. The rock snot is getting thick on ours. Good thing clean up is so easy. Of course it does. I stole the idea from you!! Ha! I'm running a recirculation system.for the water. All wheels will be wet. Pump wired to the same switch as the motor. If needed I will put a denim curtain to retard splashing. Thanks Ziggy I knew where the design came from, silly. Does your recirculation have some kind of filter? You probably don't want to try to polish on 8000 or 12000 grit wheels with gritty water full of other size particles. Might get some less than spectacular finishes that way. With all six wheels spinning spray all over the place, you will be re-filling your reservoir often. The spray leaving the system will be copious and will empty it out in no time. The wheel spray cover is as much for keeping water in the system. Not as important as not getting soaked in my systems case (because my water never gets too dirty) but I guarantee your water will go away faster than you think and it will be like standing in the shower when cabbing. Due to the fact that I am always using clean water, I don't have issues with final polishing. I find that 5 gallons lasts me about 10 cabs. Water leaves the cabber and ends up in a catch jug, then the mineral rich water goes to water plants in the yard.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 25, 2017 16:57:30 GMT -5
Update: Here you can see his smartly engineered plumbing system better! Just electrical left! Yay!!!😊😍😊 Looks a lot like mine. Our water supply has individual shut off valve for each wheel. That way we only need one wheel getting soaked at a time. The valves also can adjust the flow to supply only the water desired. Don't forget to mount some sort of spray stopper over the wheels. We just use some denim strips. The rock snot is getting thick on ours. Good thing clean up is so easy.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 13, 2017 15:11:56 GMT -5
Three places really stand out for collecting beach Petoskey. One is Peterson beach, but the 120 or so stairs going to the beach is a bit much for senior citizens like me and hubby to handle except on maybe a really pain free day. Then there's Fisherman's Island. Really picked over most of the time. Then there's Government Pier in downtown Petoskey. Lots of Petoskey stones there are more easily found in the high and dry grey rock because most people only search the waters edge and never even look in the dry stuff, in the process leaving the shorline pretty much devoid of any specimens because of heavy use at this site. Last time we were up there was early spring. The bay was iced in still and there was ice creeping over the waters edge and onto the shore making looking for wet ones impossible. We just searched the dry rocks on the beach and found a mess of nice stuff.
Yep on the unakite. Unfortunately, we are all unikited out with more than we'll ever cut and polish just sitting in our rock stock.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 10, 2017 8:59:03 GMT -5
Pretty sweet ziggy , your husbands machine seems to be preforming great. How is he liking it? Any tweaking? No tweaks needed. It works as planned. Cuts a nice even depth groove in probably like two minutes.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 9, 2017 20:20:18 GMT -5
Very nice! I really like the delicate patterns of the Petosky. They remind me of an old model T. You can get them in any color as long as it is brownish grey.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jun 9, 2017 7:12:24 GMT -5
Here's four completed pendants made from some of the Petoskey stones we found on our last trip up that way. We love working with this stuff. There's tons of this stuff on the beaches in the Leelanau and Petoskey areas. It takes a trained eye to find it though. The good rocks for slabbing don't always show the pattern before being cut. On the beach they look like all the other grey pebbles.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 30, 2017 16:26:29 GMT -5
He did nice work....will he do wraps now? He wants to do the wraps too. Got to get the wire first. Got to get the money before that.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 30, 2017 16:24:27 GMT -5
Liking all the stones ziggy . Have you ever cut the lighning stone with oil? I don't have a dedicated saw for water but seem like they might soak up the oil. I have never used oil for cutting. They are soft (mohs 3) and made of mud and calcite. They might soak up the oil but not real deeply I would guess. The ones I find aren't usually real porous.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 29, 2017 19:09:50 GMT -5
Very nice! I especially like the first one. Are they are grooved? Yes they are grooved. Ran out of square wire. Hope to get more on the third of June.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 29, 2017 11:05:11 GMT -5
One super contrasting lightning stone with bright white calcite and three prehnite, matrix, and native copper piece's.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 24, 2017 15:59:43 GMT -5
OK, I have one stupid question- only because it looks so precarious in the picture... how do you get that water jug to stay up on that stand? The stand is a 4x4 screwed into the plywood machine base. Screwed on top of the 4x4 is a steel plate roughly the same size as the water jug. The two are further held together with Velcro.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on May 24, 2017 11:31:12 GMT -5
I mostly like it.....however after many years in industry and industrial safety/hygiene, would you please have your talented husband fabricate a guard for the pulley on the buffer? Then he would also need to make another one for the saw (which never had one when new.) One advantage of using stuff you built is you instinctively know what is and what isn't going to happen if you pay attention and use it properly.
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