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tumbled rocks 2.jpg

Rock Tumbling

When we were young (my siblings and I), my father bought us a rock tumbler.

Fantasia Mix Amazon.jpg

It would be great to be able to hunt for rocks out in the wild, but when that's not possible, there's always Amazon. I bought 12 pounds of this "Fantasia Mix" on the left for $75.

For $80 (plus $20 shipping), I bought this 20 pound bag of "Super Rough Mix" (on the right) from RockTumbler.com.

Super Mix Rough.jpg

I bought other mixed rocks sets on eBay from Sister's Rocks.

From eBay, I bought 1/2 pd mixes from India, Brazil, Africa, and Mexico, and a 1 pd bag of Tree Agate for $45.70 plus $4.59 shipping.

 

I then went directly to their online store where each bag of rocks was almost half the price of their eBay store.

I ordered the same sets for just $22.05 That was great until shipping cost $14.70 and there was some "processing fee" of $5.41.

It was still cheaper than eBay ( 42.16 vs 50.29) and then the seller sent me a shipping credit of $6.16,

so buying direct ended up saving me $14.29!

India Mix.jpg
Brazil Mix.jpg
Africa Mix.jpg
Mexico Mix.jpg
India Tree Agate.jpg

The tumber (Lortone 3A single barrel), an extra barrel, four bags of grit, and ceramic filler cost $183.

Lortone 3A tumbler.jpg
Lortone 3A extra barrel.jpg
tumbling grit.jpg

I've spent about $500 for this project/ experiment in teaching, so let's hope it turns out well.

(I'll add pictures of the actual rocks when we start tumbling, a month-long process.)

Batch 1 choices.jpg
Batch 1 selection.jpg

6/30/19

One thing I've read over and over is to NOT mix rocks of different hardness. The softer ones will get ground away before the hardness can get smooth.

However, I want the students to be able to pick whichever rocks strike their fancy rather than limiting them to choosing all the same type.

So I picked out 25 rocks from this batch, added four tablespoons of ceramic filler pieces, put in two tablespoons of coarse, stage one, grit ("60"), and turned on the tumbler. 

Batch 1 in tumbler.jpg

© Mr. Skipper dot Com.

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