herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 14, 2012 14:54:01 GMT -5
UPDATE: I soaked these fro >5 months and the results are fairly conclusive, although not entirely! Here is the batch of slabs. The one pictured below did lighten a bit, but all of them stayed brown so that must be the color of the stone: END UPDATE I have some slabs I have cut from material that was sitting in rusty water for years, and now the pretty white bands have rust in them. Is there a way to soak in something to remove the rust? It is clear and white agate with red rust stains in the layers inside the rock.
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Mar 14, 2012 15:06:41 GMT -5
Try Super Iron Out (available at Home Depot) or Oxalic Acid (also sold as wood bleach). Wear gloves if you use Oxalic Acid; it's not terrible, but it will dry out your skin.
Chuck
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 14, 2012 15:07:26 GMT -5
will it hurt the agate?
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Mar 14, 2012 15:08:37 GMT -5
No, it will just bleach out the iron.
Chuck
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 14, 2012 15:12:23 GMT -5
any sense of how long that takes? hours? Days? Weeks?
And THANK YOU for your help!
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Mar 14, 2012 15:20:26 GMT -5
They both work better warm, but you'd want to do oxalic outside for certain. Over night should do it, but it may take a couple of days.
You're welcome! Chuck
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 14, 2012 15:39:19 GMT -5
Chuck, thank you so much! I am excited to see how these come out.
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Post by deb193redux on Mar 14, 2012 19:41:46 GMT -5
I don't think that is rust from the water. Possibly ancient iron. You might rust a slab like that soaking in water, but you are not going to rust a nodule like that soaking in water.
also some of the denser agates that were less permable would have shielded the ared just beyond. You would not get that uniform of coloration.
I could be wrong, but I think that is trace iron that has reddended over geologic time.
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 14, 2012 20:12:25 GMT -5
I actually saw "before" photos of this stuff and it was all white. I will cut a few more pieces but the color inside and outside are identical so I'm pretty sure it is 5+ years of soaking in rusty water. I will check a few more and see though.
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 15, 2012 13:52:28 GMT -5
Well I've had everything soaking in Super Iron Out for ~12 hours. The rust on the outer surfaces has definitely lessened, but the rust in the stones is still there. I'll let it soak another day and see if that helps.
Since I have mixed up a gallon or so, can I pull these slabs out and put more in if it works? Does it "go bad" (release active ingredients into the air) or will it keep working for a while?
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Mar 15, 2012 14:48:14 GMT -5
It should keep working, especially if you're not diluting it too much with iron. I would put a lid on it, though, just to keep the water from evaporating.
Chuck
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jspencer
freely admits to licking rocks
Member since March 2011
Posts: 929
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Post by jspencer on Mar 16, 2012 23:03:57 GMT -5
Have you tried CLR? I had one guy tell me that they would drop tigerseye in a bucket with some rusty metal and soak it in the rusty water to enhance the red tones in it. He said he had done other stones as well. I haven`t heard about undoing the process though.
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 17, 2012 12:09:31 GMT -5
At this stage my goal was to remove the rust, but after 3 days of soaking I can't see any real difference within the bands of the stone. The outside is white again, but the banding may just stay rust-colored.
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Post by drocknut on Mar 17, 2012 13:04:48 GMT -5
It may just be that it is permanently stained. Maybe someone else will have another solution for you but aside from dyeing it another color which might not work I think you are stuck with the rust staining. I did do a google search for getting dye out of agates since that is sort of what the rust did and came up with www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,15,129959,page=1 The part that was interesting was that reply by Alfredo Petrov about a man who is removing rust stains from Amazonite. Might be of help to you.
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
Posts: 3,360
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Post by herchenx on Mar 17, 2012 14:11:48 GMT -5
Thanks Diane, I read that thread and it was interesting.
My dilemma is that I bought 20# or so of cheap "junk" agate knowing it was not high grade to begin with. As I slab it though, it is worse than I had imagined. I will try slabbing a couple more pieces and if the color is consistently rust-stained I will probably just abandon the effort.
Thanks for your help
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Post by catmandewe on Mar 17, 2012 19:01:29 GMT -5
I am with Daniel, I really don't think the rust will penetrate into the agate like that. I think that is the color of your agate and not rust staining. I think it looks good the way it is.
Tony
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Post by Pat on Mar 17, 2012 21:15:56 GMT -5
I, too, have used Iron Out a lot. After the water gets really, really dirty, I make a new batch. Good luck! P.S. Don't store rocks in coffee cans!
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Post by geoff on Mar 18, 2012 12:56:56 GMT -5
For really bad stains I use HCl. I have some topaz sitting in some right now. It came from a river somewhere and was stained pretty bad. When it comes out it looks beautiful.
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herchenx
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2012
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Post by herchenx on Sept 10, 2012 23:29:24 GMT -5
bump for ~6 month update
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fwfranklen (Mike)
spending too much on rocks
Rock-ON--Have you kissed your rock today?
Member since August 2012
Posts: 379
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Post by fwfranklen (Mike) on Sept 10, 2012 23:51:43 GMT -5
These were in a metal 5 gal bucket (no plastic buckets in those days) and the bottom had rusted real bad. All of these rocks had a rust stain and had been in the bucket since 1970 outside. So at times it was in water and at times the water would have evaperated out (in my opinion) so I threw them into a 1000 AO and polished with AO for 2hrs on 100ao and 1 day on AO polish. It really cleaned them up. So they did not soak in to deep. Mike
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