carloscinco
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since July 2008
Posts: 1,639
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Post by carloscinco on Jul 12, 2009 9:04:48 GMT -5
I have tried recyling dewatered polish mud along with tile spacers in the polishing step to provide a slurry to help reduce impact velocities during the first few days of polishing. My first batch with this mixture turned out with no impact chips. This was mostly agates and jaspers which are close to the same hardness.
Is there a downside to recycling the mud? I still add the recommended amount of new polish to the barrel.
I haven't tried other thickeners such as syrups or grains because I worry about generating gasses and blowing the lid off a tumbler.
Impact chipping seems worse on rocks with crystal quartz in the matrix like jaspers and agates. I suppose the quartz is more brittle and more prone to fracture.
I dewater the mud by letting it set a few days in a closed jar and then decant the water.
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snuffy
Cave Dweller 
Member since May 2009
Posts: 4,319
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Post by snuffy on Jul 12, 2009 9:52:04 GMT -5
I dont see a drawback to using old polish mud unless it gets contaminated with grit somehow. When I got my q12 Lortone,I discarded the polish after the cycle. Then I happened to read in old posts about reusing "dirty" polish. Since then I have reused the same polish well over a year now with excellent results. The only new polish I use is in my lot o vibe,2 tsps. It has really saved me a lot of money. I dont remember if it was roque trader or yorkshire jack that posted about dirty polish,maybe they will chime in with more input.
snuffy
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Post by wizardofthestone on Jul 12, 2009 9:52:51 GMT -5
This has been a growing concern of mine as well.. In my case I have collected many "water" bottles filled with the slurry under my work bench.. Perhaps someone needs to create a "how to dispose of the slurry" forum topic.. or I'll do some research on this now and report back as soon as I discover something. Update: After doing a quick search.. (not sure I can post these "other" tumbler sites) silgro.com/RockTumbling/03_MoreAdvice.htm#ReusePolishand geology.com/rock-tumbler/rock-tumbler-instructions.shtmlThe only thing that I was able to read at both of these site.. is the fact that one must never pour the slurry into a sink or drain.. which I was well aware of.. So does the land fills take this slurry?.. or are there more restrictions going to be placed on our hobby because of "safety issues" when using the polish compounds or the fact we are storing them for an indefinite length of time. |
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snuffy
Cave Dweller
Member since May 2009
Posts: 4,319
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Post by snuffy on Jul 12, 2009 10:06:53 GMT -5
wizard ,the slurry disposal topic has been covered many,many times in older posts on here,however,this post was not about slurry disposal at all,it was about reusing polish mud.I am only addressing the post topic.
snuffy
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carloscinco
fully equipped rock polisher
Member since July 2008
Posts: 1,639
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Post by carloscinco on Jul 12, 2009 18:53:10 GMT -5
That silgro posting has some good info on polish recyling. Thanks
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chassroc
Cave Dweller
Rocks are abundant when you have rocktumblinghobby pals
Member since January 2005
Posts: 3,586
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Post by chassroc on Jul 13, 2009 8:05:37 GMT -5
Carlos...No dowside to recycling the mud...I have reused polish for a long time without any issues.I do not usually add a full recharge of polish to the slurry ...just a spoon or two. I use plastic pellets...should be very similar to tile spacers
csroc
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Post by frane on Jul 14, 2009 21:40:17 GMT -5
I don't know about the reuse issue but with quartz I usually make sure there are pellets as well as spacers in the load. Really does cut down on the impacts and quartz is more susceptible to those fractures right at the end it seems.
I have also tried early on using lots of sugar in the load when I got to the final stages. It helped but sugar is sticky and costs more in the long run. Syrup is even more costly and truthfully, I think the combo pellets and spacers do the job.
Fran
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Post by LCARS on Jul 14, 2009 22:35:11 GMT -5
Anybody else tried corn starch as a thickener yet? I tried it once and it seems to work well to increase the apparent viscosity of the slurry. The only drawback is that it's messy and necessitates throwing out the slurry afterward as it does not take well to recovery or storage.  |
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