|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 17:27:09 GMT -5
A very fractured one:   I have only tumbled crazy lace once and it seemed like every piece had major and many cracks. I was wondering if this is because of the way they take it out of the ground (explosives or heavy machinery) or is it naturally that way? The pieces with more tubes (from etsy) are less cracked. The pieces from rockshed have more interesting bands and fortifications but could be quite cracked. I need to take good care of them and be lucky to have a great tumble (for example this one). When the layers of the bands are not perpendicular to the surfaces of the agates, they are vulnerable to tumble and could form new dents that take very long to remove in the later stages. The cutting roughs I got a while ago are high quality and seem to be less fractured, but to cut them and tumble is too much work. |
|
|
|
Post by chris1956 on Apr 27, 2024 17:42:59 GMT -5
I have only tumbled crazy lace once and it seemed like every piece had major and many cracks. I was wondering if this is because of the way they take it out of the ground (explosives or heavy machinery) or is it naturally that way? The pieces with more tubes (from etsy) are less cracked. The pieces from rockshed have more interesting bands and fortifications but could be quite cracked. I need to take good care of them and be lucky to have a great tumble (for example this one). When the layers of the bands are not perpendicular to the surfaces of the agates, they are vulnerable to tumble and could form new dents that take very long to remove in the later stages. The cutting roughs I got a while ago are high quality and seem to be less fractured, but to cut them and tumble is too much work. The ones I tumbled were from the Rock Shed. Looked very nice but lots of cracks. |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 17:59:38 GMT -5
The pieces with more tubes (from etsy) are less cracked. The pieces from rockshed have more interesting bands and fortifications but could be quite cracked. I need to take good care of them and be lucky to have a great tumble (for example this one). When the layers of the bands are not perpendicular to the surfaces of the agates, they are vulnerable to tumble and could form new dents that take very long to remove in the later stages. The cutting roughs I got a while ago are high quality and seem to be less fractured, but to cut them and tumble is too much work. The ones I tumbled were from the Rock Shed. Looked very nice but lots of cracks. Yeah the crazy laces from the Rock Shed are among the first rocks I tumbled since the start of this thread. Love them and hate the cracks. |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 18:14:05 GMT -5
Some different tumbling material. I bought these as unpolished/defected preforms and let them run with my other rocks. The donuts polish fine. I will try the gourds with another polishing cycle but they probably need much smaller fillers go into the deep concaves.  |
|
dillonf
fully equipped rock polisher
Hounding and tumbling
Member since February 2022
Posts: 1,622
|
Post by dillonf on Apr 27, 2024 18:19:16 GMT -5
Those are real cool!
|
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 18:29:14 GMT -5
|
|
|
|
Post by Son Of Beach on Apr 27, 2024 18:31:42 GMT -5
|
|
nolasean
having dreams about rocks
Member since March 2024
Posts: 58
|
Post by nolasean on Apr 27, 2024 20:24:52 GMT -5
I have some crazy lace from the rock shed in my rotary for stage 1. Tomorrow makes 3 weeks. I'll do a clean out and post a picture. Also, I finished a batch of various rocks from nat geo Friday in the vibratory but left town before I could photo and post. Will do that tomorrow as well.
|
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 20:40:37 GMT -5
I have some crazy lace from the rock shed in my rotary for stage 1. Tomorrow makes 3 weeks. I'll do a clean out and post a picture. Also, I finished a batch of various rocks from nat geo Friday in the vibratory but left town before I could photo and post. Will do that tomorrow as well. Looking forward to your pictures! |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 21:00:03 GMT -5
|
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 27, 2024 21:04:53 GMT -5
Swazi agates. For some of them I want the bands to be more defined:   This one has well-defined bands but the cracks are quite deep:   I considered continuing tumbling this one, but also don't want it to get much smaller while still not guarantee to be fracture free. |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 28, 2024 1:24:21 GMT -5
Gobi Agates.  Some interesting close-ups:   This one reminds me of Moai.  Looks as if there is a candle wick in the candle.  All the natural pink Gobi Agates are full of these so called strawberry dots. This one is less than 1 inch wide.   Small Gobi Eye.  A purplish Gobi Eye Agate. After tumbling, it doesn't have any eye but has some interesting inclusions.  |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on Apr 28, 2024 1:34:28 GMT -5
A Gobi Vein Agate. I tumbled it to see how it looks under the hood. Also smaller than a quarter coin.  I don't normally tumble Vein Agates. High quality ones would better be left alone:  |
|
|
|
Post by Starguy on Apr 28, 2024 12:43:16 GMT -5
Those are all beauties. I’m really impressed. I have to say, that final picture of the vein agates really made me drool. Thanks for sharing your work. They all look amazing.
|
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on May 6, 2024 16:43:37 GMT -5
Had another finished batch last week. These back-to-back-to-back batches challenged me on catching up with the photos. I have to enjoy them one my one, and see if any of them is worth taking a closeup picture. This one is the new tumbling material called 'Plum blossom Jade' 梅花玉 from China. As expected, the black part mostly doesn't polish, but the red and green patches are sort of shiny.  The golden/silver veins reminds me of Kintsugi - a Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum.   I have seen some wine cups (made with such rock) having a better shine on the market. As for drinking I don't think the sellers would have applied wax or oil or resin onto the surface of a cup, so I still have hope for my tumbled rock to improve its shine. This will be among the rocks that I will try a dedicated polishing cycle (to not mix them with the normally hard jasper/agate for pre-polishing and polishing) later. |
|
|
|
Post by rockjunquie on May 6, 2024 17:02:19 GMT -5
Had another finished batch last week. These back-to-back-to-back batches challenged me on catching up with the photos. I have to enjoy them one my one, and see if any of them is worth taking a closeup picture. This one is the new tumbling material called 'Plum blossom Jade' 梅花玉 from China. As expected, the black part mostly doesn't polish, but the red and green patches are sort of shiny. The golden/silver veins reminds me of Kintsugi - a Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. I have seen some wine cups (made with such rock) having a better shine on the market. As for drinking I don't think the sellers would have applied wax or oil or resin onto the surface of a cup, so I still have hope for my tumbled rock to improve its shine. This will be among the rocks that I will try a dedicated polishing cycle (to not mix them with the normally hard jasper/agate for pre-polishing and polishing) later. Damn that is cool!!!! I opened in new tab and blew it up. What a treat and sooooo unusual. |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on May 6, 2024 17:17:37 GMT -5
|
|
|
|
Post by rockjunquie on May 6, 2024 17:22:26 GMT -5
Yeah, I DO like! The cup in the second link on the bottom left is amazing!!! Hmmm.... I wonder if I can find some to cab? Thank you for sharing.  |
|
|
|
Post by pebblesky on May 6, 2024 17:39:21 GMT -5
Yeah, I DO like! The cup in the second link on the bottom left is amazing!!! Hmmm.... I wonder if I can find some to cab? Thank you for sharing. I only see them selling very big roughs or very small crushed rocks (about quarter size), and finished products such as cups and large pendants. There doesn't seem to be a market for slabs. I will sift through my tumbling roughs to see if there is any slightly larger piece. I am also curious to see how far the polish could go on a cabbing machine. |
|
|
|
Post by rockjunquie on May 6, 2024 17:40:58 GMT -5
Yeah, I DO like! The cup in the second link on the bottom left is amazing!!! Hmmm.... I wonder if I can find some to cab? Thank you for sharing. I only see them selling very big roughs or very small crushed rocks (about quarter size), and finished products such as cups and large pendants. There doesn't seem to be a market for slabs. I will sift through my tumbling roughs to see if there is any slightly larger piece. I am also curious to see how far the polish could go on a cabbing machine. I think I have seen it on eBay in the past. It was called that, anyway. Didn't look that good, though. |
|
... to the New Guys from The ChatBox V.2 Crew