In a vibe?

Those will "work" in a vibe but you may not be happy with the results. Vibes don't alter exteriors much so any defects will end up as polished defects. If you sort out only the best of it you will end up maintaining original shapes for the most part. If you could locate water worn (river or beach rocks) rock you could end up with nice rounded pebbles.

Just so I'm clear, you used that batch in a vibe tumbler?

If so what grit did you start with and how often did you have to recharge it?

Also, you brought up another question for me - there is a great mix of stones in the bag, am I able to tumble them all together or do I have to try to separate them out?(I mean when rockshed sells a bag can you just basically dump it straight to a bowl or is there some other work involved?)

I'm ok with less rounded stones. I really do prefer more of a natural look, but obviously I'd like the surfaces to be able to take a good shine when I'm done with them.

Oh, another question just popped up - when you guys 'recharge' a stage do you take the rocks out and wash them first or do you just dump in another scoop of grit right to the running mix?

Thanks again for the help folks - you guys(and gals!) are an awesome resource.

- Beau

the rockshed rocks can be tumbled together. the hardness is matched close enough. Some, like the soadlite will round quicker. You can pull them out early if they start getting too small. Sometime the terr agate has pits that are problematic, but when you get some good pieces nothing is prettier. some of the quartz and adventerine will have internal cracks or crazing that no amount of grinding will eliminate because they are through and through. But, some of the rose quartz and advanterine may yield cleaner finished pieces.

But consider size. the medium are 3/4 to 1.5 inches. You will need a lot of ceramic pellets to make up the small end of the load, and you may need to hold out some of the 1.5in if you get too many.

I would also get some small and mix it with the medium.

A few pieces with long pointy bits or possibly a deep crevasse will not do so well. But most will do just fine. You can break them up before you begin, or wait and pull them out when their progress lags behind.

If you want each rock to become a very perfect rounded egg, this will require many many weeks in a rotary. ... AND sacrifice of about 60% of the rock volume.

However, with just a few extra 120/220 charges in the vibe, you can get considerable perfection of the surface, albeit not quite as egg shaped. If you have 220 exact grade, this is not strong enough to shape up fresh rocks in a reasonable time. A 120/220 grade is cheaper and stronger. Many vibe users are starting with pieces of broken slabs, or even cut preforms, so they do not want a lot of gross shape change. These tumbled stones tend to have more uses than tumbled nuggets.

When you break rock with a hammer and chisel, you get many splintery pieces where length, width, and height are very discrepant. This geometry will do less well in a vibe because it needs so much shaping. But the rockshed has quality crushed rock, and it has been screened. You get more uniform sizes and more congruency of length, witdth, and height. This kind of quality crused rock will generally require less shaping. For this reason alone, I strongly endorsed your original plan to get some rockshed rock. It is just good stuff.

So if you are OK with smooth edges, some polyhedral (as opposed to spherical) shapes, just run a few extra 120/220 charges until you are happy. Maybe instead of the usual 2-4 recharges, do 6-9 recharges before moving on to a finer grit (typically 500).

I think I have some pics of Apache tears done completely in a vibe. If I find them I will post what they looked like at each stage.