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Post by rmf on Jun 24, 2022 14:51:52 GMT -5
over the years I have reclaimed grit. I tend to use 46-70 split for coarse and 120-220 for medium. I was tumbling a lot then and using a flatlap. The flat lap used 220 as coarse. I also had purchased that had a lot of used grinding wheels. I had run the grinding wheels through a hammer mill and used them for grit as well. What I found is that the 46-70 grit is easy to save by putting the hose in a 5 gal bucket and it swirled the water the mud went off in the over flow and the usable coarse settled to the bottom. the key is the water speed and you have to figure it out each time.
With the flat lap there was a lot of wasted 120-220 because it splashes and gets on to of the rocks and sides so I scrape/wash the pan and rocks and recovered about what I figured was 50% of what could be recovered but in the end the waste must move even slower or the 120/220 floats off with the mud.
I decided for me saving 120/220 grit was not practical for the time used to save it. However, the coarse I washed the rocks in the wheelbarrow and that allowed the grit to settle then the mud that was in the bottom when I was done and the grit would be dumped in a 5 gal bucket and swirled the water with the hose until clean, being careful to adjust the water flow if I saw too much grit float away.
I was using big drums 80# each and tumbling for a month in coarse so I was adding a lot of coarse to start. reclaiming is helpful if you have more time than $$. This may not be worth it for a 3A tumbler. However, for the small drums save and reuse the polish until it quits polishing. This works best on small tumblers and wastes too much time on big tumblers.
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waterboysh
spending too much on rocks
Member since April 2021
Posts: 369
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Post by waterboysh on Jul 11, 2022 14:48:35 GMT -5
I do what several people here have already mentioned. I do my cleanouts in a 5 gallon bucket each Saturday. Just before the cleanout, I use a little cup and scoop out the relatively clearish water. Do this until the bucket is about 1/3 full of slurry. This is a mixture of rock dust and any grit from all 4 stages. Then I move the bucket into the garage and switch to using my second 5 gallon bucket for rinse outs while the first bucket dries out completely.
Once it's dry, I dump it into a plastic storage bin. Is it enough grit to not need fresh grit? Definitely not. I do notice a slight sparkle to the slurry once it dries out, but I feel like it's 99% rock dust. I mainly use this as a slurry starter. I put in equal amounts of fresh grit and dried slurry. So in my 3lb barrels it's 3 Tbsp of grit and 3 Tbsp of dried slurry. In my 6lb barrel it's 10 Tbsp of each. I only run coarse in rotary and the rest in my Lot-o. I like that it helps to immediately provide some cushioning. For most hard stuff, like agates and jaspers, I don't think it matters much to be honest. But it's literally almost no effort to collect the dried slurry instead of throwing it away. But for material that fractures or bruises easier, like quartz or obsidian, I feel like it definitely helped. But I have no proof.
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