Win
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2017
Posts: 336
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Post by Win on Feb 18, 2020 12:58:22 GMT -5
A friend does a lot of rock/fossil hunting in my area of SW Utah. He's found some pretty cools stuff, including Septarian Nodules, Dinosaur Bones and Tracks, even a fossilized reef. He brought me some rough to look at and asked if I could tumble it. I finally got a knowledgeable person to identify it as Malachite with Chrysocolla, interesting. I tumbled it with Obsidian finishing in a Lot O. Very interesting to see the end result. Rough that I started with, only tumbled three pieces: After a week in 60/90 with Obsidian: After finishing in the Lot O, has a silvery green color:
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Post by joshuamcduffie on Feb 18, 2020 13:02:06 GMT -5
Those are gorgeous!
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Member since January 1970
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2020 14:39:45 GMT -5
I suspect that your pieces are chalcopyrite that had weathered to form outer crusts of malachite and/or chrysocolla. Interesting experiment.
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mrhomescientist
having dreams about rocks
Member since October 2019
Posts: 51
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Post by mrhomescientist on Feb 18, 2020 15:21:02 GMT -5
I agree! Definitely has that metallic sulfide look. Definitely was not expecting that result!
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Post by Starguy on Feb 18, 2020 16:07:13 GMT -5
I also agree. Malachite and chrysocolla would me more or less the same color all the way through. You could check the streak to help confirm. Personally I think they look really cool. Nice job and thanks for sharing.
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Win
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2017
Posts: 336
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Post by Win on Feb 18, 2020 20:23:05 GMT -5
Thanks for the information. It's amazing how much you can learn by posting a few pictures. My friend picked them up today, was really surprised. He did a little more research and found that these are probably Pyrite, which I never pictured smooth. He did have other pieces showing the cubist Pyrite. Tumbling and cutting rocks is so interesting, never know what's under there!
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Post by RocksInNJ on Feb 19, 2020 0:41:30 GMT -5
Those turned out really cool. Thanks for sharing with us.
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Post by rmf on Feb 19, 2020 3:45:43 GMT -5
Absolutely it is chalcopyrite
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Win
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2017
Posts: 336
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Post by Win on Sept 30, 2020 11:32:16 GMT -5
I tumbled the remaining pieces that you see above. I tumbled it again with Obsidian, that seemed to work out really well.
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Post by TheRock on Oct 4, 2020 12:28:28 GMT -5
Lookin Good!
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Post by drocknut on Oct 4, 2020 16:45:41 GMT -5
cool
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polaszko
having dreams about rocks
Member since August 2020
Posts: 58
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Post by polaszko on Oct 21, 2020 17:43:29 GMT -5
I tumbled the remaining pieces that you see above. I tumbled it again with Obsidian, that seemed to work out really well. Ehh... well that doesn't look like chalcopiryte for me. Chalcopiryte should be more golden than this sample. It looks like chalcopiryte mixed with other copper mineral that's more silvery, maybe it's chalcocite?
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