jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 8, 2017 18:19:08 GMT -5
Jim, that is an amazing article. Tells us what happened,leaves out the 'how'. Theory unexplained. Sad. pH is so important. Otherwise your corals wouldn't exist. If acids dissolved silica, then the tannic rivers would wash them away. The base chemistry is alkali solution dissolved silica, then heat or pH change cause the silica to make the end product. Quartz crystals, morganite, chalcedony, chert, flint whatever. All alkali based water chemistry. The question of the source of the alkali is the puzzle. You can do this yourself. In a stainless vessel place water, caustic lye solution,and broken glass,coral, diatoms. Heat it up. Watch silicas dissolve. Try same with acid. Nothing. Is alkaline 8.2 water alkaline enough ? That is a common water alkalinity in Florida. Says process takes millions of years, so very slow. Pure calcium carbonate is 9.0. There it is. Lots of calcium carbonate in Florida. Am I missing something ? These guys were dissolving quartz and moganite with PH 3.5. So I am confused. www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703796004097These guys doing basaltic glass with PH 3.0 www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703713003712 So more confused. I think I am happy with the fact silica simply dissolved and replaced or formed casts.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 8, 2017 18:32:00 GMT -5
Jim, that is an amazing article. Tells us what happened,leaves out the 'how'. Theory unexplained. Sad. pH is so important. Otherwise your corals wouldn't exist. If acids dissolved silica, then the tannic rivers would wash them away. The base chemistry is alkali solution dissolved silica, then heat or pH change cause the silica to make the end product. Quartz crystals, morganite, chalcedony, chert, flint whatever. All alkali based water chemistry. The question of the source of the alkali is the puzzle. You can do this yourself. In a stainless vessel place water, caustic lye solution,and broken glass,coral, diatoms. Heat it up. Watch silicas dissolve. Try same with acid. Nothing. Is alkaline 8.2 water alkaline enough ? That is a common water alkalinity in Florida. Says process takes millions of years, so very slow. Pure calcium carbonate is 9.0. There it is. Lots of calcium carbonate in Florida. Am I missing something ? Yeah, actually it's 8.25. I'm not convinced this is high enough. Acidity is 9.0 but that isn't pH. Your coral is crazy. You should send some to Donald Kasper for IR spectroscopy. He will tell you about moganite content.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 8, 2017 18:33:07 GMT -5
In fact I will try to do that. I have UR coral here!
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 8, 2017 18:39:25 GMT -5
I would be interested. Dissolving silica is rather unorthodox. Has to take serious acid or alkaline. But time was on Mrs. mother nature's side. Long periods of time can alter a lot of things with minute forces.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 8, 2017 21:04:43 GMT -5
I would be interested. Dissolving silica is rather unorthodox. Has to take serious acid or alkaline. But time was on Mrs. mother nature's side. Long periods of time can alter a lot of things with minute forces. There are studies showing petrified wood forming in under a decade. I doubt any metamorphic stones take hundreds of millions of years like everyone says. The earth is only 40x 100,000,000 years old. Conditions are simply not stable for those kinds of time.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 3:10:45 GMT -5
I would be interested. Dissolving silica is rather unorthodox. Has to take serious acid or alkaline. But time was on Mrs. mother nature's side. Long periods of time can alter a lot of things with minute forces. There are studies showing petrified wood forming in under a decade. I doubt any metamorphic stones take hundreds of millions of years like everyone says. The earth is only 40x 100,000,000 years old. Conditions are simply not stable for those kinds of time. Those chalcedony coatings on broken up tubes make one wonder about the time. Strange feeling that botryoidal coating may happen faster than scientists think. Under optimum conditions. Like stalagtites form in older man made mines. Another subject, coral that is in the river bank where a seep from a high acid(from organic matter) spring has been flowing over it many years has rich colors. Coral buried deep in ancient organic matter in the bottom of a river turns black and blue. Or variations if it was colored by shoal water before getting buried in organic debris. Coral wedged in bed limestone with fast shoal water impinging on it for many years can have crazy colors. Most coral is dead boring grey. Only exposure to above changes it's color, add clay that it may have incubated/formed in. BUT, all of the above sources of salts/minerals never seems to effect the color of the botryoidal chalcedony formations. They always form in below color: And often have this white coating on them Except when you occasionally run up on one of these. Is this calcite ? scratch test would tell in a jiffy Chalcedony everywhere in this one. I remember finding 4-5 bushels of these way down stream where even no idiot would go at low water. All in the whitest clay pocket. That whiskey chalcedony overdosed in every coral I pulled up
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 9, 2017 9:50:02 GMT -5
Jim, that is an amazing article. Tells us what happened,leaves out the 'how'. Theory unexplained. Sad. pH is so important. Otherwise your corals wouldn't exist. If acids dissolved silica, then the tannic rivers would wash them away. The base chemistry is alkali solution dissolved silica, then heat or pH change cause the silica to make the end product. Quartz crystals, morganite, chalcedony, chert, flint whatever. All alkali based water chemistry. The question of the source of the alkali is the puzzle. You can do this yourself. In a stainless vessel place water, caustic lye solution,and broken glass,coral, diatoms. Heat it up. Watch silicas dissolve. Try same with acid. Nothing. Is alkaline 8.2 water alkaline enough ? That is a common water alkalinity in Florida. Says process takes millions of years, so very slow. Pure calcium carbonate is 9.0. There it is. Lots of calcium carbonate in Florida. Am I missing something ? These guys were dissolving quartz and moganite with PH 3.5. So I am confused. www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703796004097These guys doing basaltic glass with PH 3.0 www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703713003712 So more confused. I think I am happy with the fact silica simply dissolved and replaced or formed casts. I guess I should be too... 😎
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Post by Deleted on Jan 9, 2017 9:51:50 GMT -5
Interesting your botroydal ones always look like "almost" fire agate!
We do have clear botroydal ones on land. No red iron in the formations
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 10:17:04 GMT -5
Interesting your botroydal ones always look like "almost" fire agate! We do have clear botroydal ones on land. No red iron in the formations Well, between you me and the wall there is tons of silica available there. Some of those corals are 4 feet across and dead solid silica clean thru.
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Post by 1dave on Jan 9, 2017 10:48:37 GMT -5
Jim, that is an amazing article. Tells us what happened,leaves out the 'how'. Theory unexplained. Sad. pH is so important. Otherwise your corals wouldn't exist. If acids dissolved silica, then the tannic rivers would wash them away. The base chemistry is alkali solution dissolved silica, then heat or pH change cause the silica to make the end product. Quartz crystals, morganite, chalcedony, chert, flint whatever. All alkali based water chemistry. The question of the source of the alkali is the puzzle. You can do this yourself. In a stainless vessel place water, caustic lye solution,and broken glass,coral, diatoms. Heat it up. Watch silicas dissolve. Try same with acid. Nothing. Is alkaline 8.2 water alkaline enough ? That is a common water alkalinity in Florida. Says process takes millions of years, so very slow. Pure calcium carbonate is 9.0. There it is. Lots of calcium carbonate in Florida. Am I missing something ? These guys were dissolving quartz and moganite with PH 3.5. So I am confused. www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703796004097These guys doing basaltic glass with PH 3.0 www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016703713003712 So more confused. I think I am happy with the fact silica simply dissolved and replaced or formed casts. That also left me confused until I finally examined a term they were using - "Dissolution". Here is a Ph Chart I like: Two Paragraphs caught my attention: By "dissolution" they mean -Coming out of solution, or precipitation. So the acid makes them (moganite and quartz) crystallize.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 11:48:09 GMT -5
1dave, ph in river flood plains and adjacent swamps are often ~4.0. The ground water 8.2 with ton of inorganic phosphates, fertilizer components and micros. The mixing of the two makes crazy plant growth. So in this silicification process where does the ph stand ? The science is climbing higher than pea brain can interpret.
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Post by Garage Rocker on Jan 9, 2017 11:56:31 GMT -5
This discussion gives me that knot in my stomach, like I'd get walking into chemistry lab in college. I'm just glad that 'stuff' happened and time went by and now we have pretty rocks. I'll leave you guys to figure it all out.
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Post by 1dave on Jan 9, 2017 12:10:43 GMT -5
1dave , ph in river flood plains and adjacent swamps are often ~4.0. The ground water 8.2 with ton of inorganic phosphates, fertilizer components and micros. The mixing of the two makes crazy plant growth. So in this silicification process where does the ph stand ? The science is climbing higher than pea brain can interpret. KISS. High ph dissolves SiO 2. Low ph precipitates SiO 2As ph and temperature fluctuates SiO 2 is forced to change from opal to mogonite to chalcedony to agate to quartz to . . .
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 12:11:13 GMT -5
This discussion gives me that knot in my stomach, like I'd get walking into chemistry lab in college. I'm just glad that 'stuff' happened and time went by and now we have pretty rocks. I'll leave you guys to figure it all out. Been waiting on that Kentucky peanut gallery. Mr Master Photographer/Tumbler. Just another tech nurd category.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 12:14:48 GMT -5
1dave , ph in river flood plains and adjacent swamps are often ~4.0. The ground water 8.2 with ton of inorganic phosphates, fertilizer components and micros. The mixing of the two makes crazy plant growth. So in this silicification process where does the ph stand ? The science is climbing higher than pea brain can interpret. KISS. High ph dissolves SiO 2. Low ph precipitates SiO 2As ph and temperature fluctuates SiO 2 is forced to change from opal to mogonite to chalcedony to agate to quartz to . . . Explaining in simple terms = ultimate understanding of subject matter. Is silicification by way of precipitation or dissolving ? It never stops Dr. Dave.
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Post by Garage Rocker on Jan 9, 2017 12:23:52 GMT -5
This discussion gives me that knot in my stomach, like I'd get walking into chemistry lab in college. I'm just glad that 'stuff' happened and time went by and now we have pretty rocks. I'll leave you guys to figure it all out. Been waiting on that Kentucky peanut gallery. Mr Master Photographer/Tumbler. Just another tech nurd category. It's all fascinating. Nature, in general, amazes me and I love to learn. Chemistry gives me a headache though. I always preferred studying a little higher on the organizational chart, at the organism level. Biology can't be separated from chemistry though, still had to learn the Krebs cycle, sodium/potassium pump, etc.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 9, 2017 12:32:11 GMT -5
Been waiting on that Kentucky peanut gallery. Mr Master Photographer/Tumbler. Just another tech nurd category. It's all fascinating. Nature, in general, amazes me and I love to learn. Chemistry gives me a headache though. I always preferred studying a little higher on the organizational chart, at the organism level. Biology can't be separated from chemistry though, still had to learn the Krebs cycle, sodium/potassium pump, etc. Chemistry and blood never jived w/me. Mechanics and plants no problem. The only chemistry I know is related to plant fertility, metals and recently tumbling abrasives and clay. Never have wanted to know what a mixed batch of rocks creates from a chemical standpoint. Dave is laying down some rock chemistry, some of the most basic, silica. Even silica is kicking my tail.
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Post by adam on Jan 12, 2017 20:19:39 GMT -5
Quick question, jamesp.
I pulled some mixed tumbles out of an aluminum oxide slurry after letting them run two days. It seems the polish left a white residue in the cracks of the quartz tumbles. Will burnishing help remove the AO particles? And, how long should I burnish? Maybe a day?
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Post by 1dave on Jan 12, 2017 22:48:31 GMT -5
The cracks have to get gone unless you want them.
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jamesp
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Post by jamesp on Jan 13, 2017 1:50:47 GMT -5
Quick question, jamesp. I pulled some mixed tumbles out of an aluminum oxide slurry after letting them run two days. It seems the polish left a white residue in the cracks of the quartz tumbles. Will burnishing help remove the AO particles? And, how long should I burnish? Maybe a day? Did your tumbler dry out ? The only time I ever had aluminum oxide get caught in cracks was in a vibe or rotary that had dried out while running. A rotary when a leak occurred and the water/slurry leaked out. A vibe that simply dried out because I forgot to add water every 1-3 days. In either case I usually re-run them over starting with coarse grit. I never had any luck burnishing or running them in soap. Unless the pressure washer removed it individually. Even the pressure washer would not remove it if it ran really dry. It's a bad day, aggravating.
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