wseaton
starting to shine!
Member since January 2024
Posts: 30
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Post by wseaton on Jan 20, 2024 20:50:39 GMT -5
My Rebel 17 has a date with this beast, and I'm not leaving the porch light on :-) Some kind of Jasper picked up in the backyard of the Gem Shop in one of their drums.  |
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Post by Starguy on Jan 21, 2024 3:26:40 GMT -5
That looks like a tight fit. Do you have a picture with it inside the barrel? Big rocks are fun. That one looks really solid and interesting. It may go faster than you think. I’m looking forward to your progress.
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zebra61
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since January 2024
Posts: 161
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Post by zebra61 on Jan 21, 2024 9:51:32 GMT -5
Beautiful stone! The photo makes it look like a very tight fit for the Rebel. I'm curious how it will roll in there.
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Post by jasoninsd on Jan 21, 2024 9:51:52 GMT -5
My first reaction to the ID was Serape Jasper...but don't hold me to that! LOL I agree with Brent...looks like a tight fit...so fingers crossed!  |
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dillonf
fully equipped rock polisher
Hounding and tumbling
Member since February 2022
Posts: 1,622
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Post by dillonf on Jan 21, 2024 14:49:48 GMT -5
My Rebel 17 has a date with this beast, and I'm not leaving the porch light on :-) Some kind of Jasper picked up in the backyard of the Gem Shop in one of their drums. That looks like OBA jasper - AKA one bad ass jasper!  On a serious note that is really cool. Can't wait to see how it comes out! |
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wseaton
starting to shine!
Member since January 2024
Posts: 30
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Post by wseaton on Jan 22, 2024 13:22:08 GMT -5
I was also going to say Sarape. I have a problem with my new Rebel 17. Just set the empty barrel on the rollers and it's making a scraping noise, I think from one of the metal lips against the roller guide or something. Anyone else have this issue or a solution? The barrel on a 17 only goes on the roller one way. You might know this already, but if you flip it the wrong way it will scrape. Due to the perspective of the picture it looks bigger than it is, but there's room. Rock maybe goes 2/3 to the top. As long as the gravel / media has some room to flow my experience is it will work, albeit slower than a smaller rock free to roll, but it works. Running it 2/3 full with river gravel and #46 grit which seems the best combination for big boulders and grinding. I'll pull it tonight and post a picture of progress if it's moved along. Think it's been in there 3 days. The orkc is already pretty smooht and doesnt seem to need much shaping, but you know how that goes :-) I have a another chunk of serape a bit smaller and much darker, but similiar patterns and it's next. Gem shop has about a hundred 55gal drums in their back yard full of everything you can imagine. |
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Post by velodromed on Jan 22, 2024 15:43:55 GMT -5
It’s amazing once polished. It also shapes rather quickly. I’ve come across two types in the 5lb batch I bought from Richardson ranch. One is like below and looks almost like crazy lace. The other has less detail and more pastel-like shading. All I know is I’ll be getting more of this amazing rock in the near future.  |
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wseaton
starting to shine!
Member since January 2024
Posts: 30
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Post by wseaton on Jan 24, 2024 22:14:15 GMT -5
Quick Update.
Rocks is slowly starting to smooth and is now on it's 3rd dose of 1/2cup of #46 blasting grit. But, it's very slow. The good is that the color and patterns are starting to deepen and improve quite a bit as the outer oxidation is removed. Quite a bit actually. The bad news is this might be another week and a half or longer.
It takes the Rebel17 about 3 days to break down 1/2 cup of grit and turn it to sludge. And that's aluminum oxide blasting grit which tends to hold up longer than silicon carbide. This is also using 1" river gravel. I've switched it out to larger stones, roughly walnut size and filled it slightly less than half full. It's noisy as hell, but I've found this improves rough grinding speed a bit vs big rocks because those bigger rocks bang harder and slows down grit consumption given there's less grit consumption. The downside is it's noisy. That's actually better because it indicates there's more kinetic action at play, but sounds like a cement mixer ready to explode :-)
Once the rough grinding is down the cool thing about the 17 is the next phases only take a few days each.
Saw a youtube vid awhile ago where a guy uses a dremel to smooth out the rough spots with bigger rocks, then tumbles and then polishes in a vibe. Saves an immense amount of time and resources because your aren't tumbling just to remove a few rough spots in a rock.
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