syfun
noticing nice landscape pebbles
Member since January 2009
Posts: 85
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Post by syfun on Jan 8, 2009 9:35:21 GMT -5
Well, it stayed running all night. Looks like it's a go.
Yeah, when I got my grit there was a small ziplock type bag with 5-6 pieces of candy. My kids thought that was way cool!
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NorthShore-Rocks
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since December 2008
Posts: 1,004
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Post by NorthShore-Rocks on Jan 8, 2009 10:21:59 GMT -5
I got candy with my grit and tumbler too! Kids were all over it.
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uneekarts
starting to shine!
Member since December 2008
Posts: 42
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Post by uneekarts on Jan 8, 2009 13:05:39 GMT -5
The grit discussion is interesting but get to the real important issue, what kind of candy? Kids? I see no kids here. A serious question, what do you think it would do you twist the glued in splines so that they give a rifled barrel effect? I was thinking it may pull the rock from end to end as it rolls and polishes? I'm not sure if that added action would make much of a difference or not or if it would even work or not. Any comments or thoughts on that? Now back to the candy.
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docharber
has rocks in the head
Member since October 2008
Posts: 716
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Post by docharber on Jan 8, 2009 14:20:27 GMT -5
ROCK CANDY, maybe? Back to the grit substitution question. I have wondered if coarse sand wouldn't do well for rough grinding soft materials like calcite or malachite or rhodochrosite, or maybe even as hard as fluorite or apatite or sodalite? Anyone try this? Builders sand for concrete is sharp sand. Beeck sand or windblown sand gets rounded and probably wouldn't work as well. They have to import sand in Saudi Arabia and other gulf states to make concrete for this reason. I'm building a tumbler, too. I'm using ball bearings, 1/2 inch a;luminum rods from HD, which don't rust and don't cost much more than steel, and vinyl tubing from the plumbing department over the rollers to get the needed dia meter and quiet the operation. I have a 1/13 hp continuous duty fan cooled motor rom eBay with a 5/16 shaft and I'm having trouble getting a shaft pulley fot in the needed small diameter. The Lortone QT tumblers have a similar drive pulley, I think, but I haven't found one listed anywhere, even in the Lortone catalog- I probably need to call them. I am using Lortone replacement parts for the final drive pulley (1/2" bore on the QT drive pulley) and a Lortone belt. This will be a 15+ pounder. I'm also considering options for barrels. It's made to accomodate a gallon-jar size barrel. I could use PVC pipe but the smaller diameter pipes won't give me the capacity I want. Larger pipes are pricey and pose problems with the seal. A rubberized interior gallon glass jar is easy but fragile. I have a home wood shop set up and thought about making a thumbler's style barrel from plywood with a waterproofed interior, but that could be challenging to construct. Any ideas would be appreciated. So far I have the chasis completed except for the drive pulleys. I will probably try to make a motor shaft pulley from a thread spool if I can't buy one and turn a groove in it for the belt. I found when assembling the chassis that you have to pay close attention to the bearing installation on the roller shafts. It's a tight fit, and I actually had to sand the rods to get the bearings on without undue force. If the bearings aren't square, you get noise and wobble. My bearings aare inset in the 3/4 MDF end supports . I used a 1" and 1.125" spade /forstmer bit to create recesses to hold the flanged bearings securely in place. I had to hammer the bearings in place,, They needed a few taps to get them perpendicular to the shaft But when they were true I had very smooth rolling. I'm sort of proud of this thing and I'll post pics when I'm done and can figure out how to post pics.
Speaking of rock candy, wouldn't some pieces of colorful stone, shaped and wrapped in cellophane to look like hard candy be a cool conversation piece? I feel an inspiration coming over me.....
Mark H.
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syfun
noticing nice landscape pebbles
Member since January 2009
Posts: 85
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Post by syfun on Jan 8, 2009 14:51:02 GMT -5
docharber: You could use a bushing on the pulley to size it up to 1/2 in. As for the barrel, we have 1 gal plastic containers just like the glass ones. They came full of pickles from GFS. If you're going to line the inside with rubber, they should hold up for a little while anyway. I like the thumbler style barrel idea. I was tossing around some thoughts on one of those too. I would make the ends sealed and fixed permanent. Have one of the panels on the side be the door. I don't think glass would hold up at all, even with the rubber on the inside. Sounds like a nice tumbler, I can't wait to see some pics of it.
Steve
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docharber
has rocks in the head
Member since October 2008
Posts: 716
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Post by docharber on Jan 10, 2009 18:30:04 GMT -5
Hi Steve- I thought of using a bushing- we have a local Ace Hardware that's one iof the few "real" hardware stores around. I probably could get a bushing there to serve the puyrpose but the Lortone belt is very small, only about 1/4" wide, and I would need to groove or flange the bushing. I'm still thinking I can get a motor pulley through Lortone or elsewhere, or iuse a thread spool turned to accomodate the belt. I'll have to check it out. I could use larger pulleys but the drive pulley would have to be huge to step down the RPM of the motor with a a motor pulley over an inch in diameter. Standard v-belts don't work so well wwhen the puylley is really small. The rubber lining material I was referring to is actually the vinyl tool handle dipping stuff I erote about some time back. I think it would work well over glued in strips of wood or PVC, providing abrasion protection and cushioning for the barrel- I have a gallon glass pickle jar, in fact, waiting for me to finish the contents. I think I could build a thumbler's typ[e barrel without the faceted sides, using glued in wooden strips under the linig. I could use grooved 1/4" plywood for the sides, 3/4" MDF or plywood for the round ends, and cut a 4" hole in the center of one for access. I could seal it with a test plug If the load is right and the diameter large enough, the liquid level wouldn't reach the hole. Dr. Joe brought up an interesting idea- using a polyester material like the spray in RHinoLiner stuff to line barrels. I bet a shop that does this sort of thing would be happy to do a small project like a barrel. If the glass jar breaks, it's rigid enough to hold its shape! I saw an idea on ebay for a PVC tumbler using stacked barrels of4" pipe. The guy who built it had the 4 barrels stacked in a diamond cionfiguration in a framework that supported the lot. Pwer was applied to the bottom barrel and it turned the others. I couldn't tell what sort of guide rollers, wheels, or whatever he used but the whole thing looked pretty doable. Take care and happy neew year!
Mark H.
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DeanW
has rocks in the head
Member since December 2007
Posts: 721
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Post by DeanW on Jan 14, 2009 9:33:46 GMT -5
uneekarts: your idea of rifling at first sounds interesting. But what would happen when all the rocks get pulled to the target end of the barrel? Wouldn't they tend to get stacked up on one end? But then again, the inside of a cement mixer has angled metal mixers that are in a twist, like rifling.
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Post by Jack, lapidaryrough on Jan 14, 2009 10:04:02 GMT -5
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drjo
fully equipped rock polisher
Honduran Opal & DIY Nut
Member since May 2008
Posts: 1,581
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Post by drjo on Jan 14, 2009 11:24:05 GMT -5
Rifling (reverse actually) effect would cause the material to pile at one end and then would fold over staying at that end. The cement mixer analogy has to take into the account that the barrel is angled to allow for this effect.
You can alternate rifling so that they mix the contents back and forth (a kind of cross-mixing).
Still, unless the rifling strips are tall they're mostly going to channel grit and sludge and make the rocks tumble.
Dr Joe
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