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Guess The Rock.


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I went away with the family across to the Lake District for a few days. Walking up the hills I find myself looking at the rocks thinking "I wonder what glaze ingredient that one is" I started seeing whiteish what I assumed were feldspars or possibly quartz so picked up a few to melt in the kiln.

 

Any ideas what they could be? Sorry for the slightly bad quality, I am slowly learning how to use a camera. 

Turns out I can't link so many photos to my post so there are two more in the gallery - http://community.ceramicartsdaily.org/gallery/image/5048-img-6761/

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It's a really beautiful place to go.

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Whereabouts in the Lake District did you find the rock?  It's a pretty diverse place geologically.  There are sort of three bands running along a sw-ne axis. The first is the Skiddaw group, the second the Borrowvale volcanic group, the third the Windermere group. Skiddaw and Windermere groups are sedimentary, Borrowvale igneous.  Granite underlies the whole thing and outcrops in various places.

 

It looks like granite, but that's just a guess. 

 

Further reading: http://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/171188/factsheet_geology.pdf

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_District#Geology

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:D Thank you for the pdf.

 

I was in the middle of the Lakes up the Langdale Pikes, they are actually in the picture above. I walked up the part that looks like her face :D That was where I found these.  The Langdales is Borrowdale Volcanic Group. It says "The BVG lavas are mainly ANDESITES, with some BASALTS and RHYOLITES."

 

 

Some of the samples are a darker rock but most being made up of some sort of crystalline rock.

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High Bridge - you should look up Mathew Blakely of Lode, Cambridgeshire who embarked on a project in 2011 - collecting various samples of rocks and minerals from across the UK which he then tested and researched before devloping them further and making some unique pieces. Take a look at his website - matthewblakely.co.uk. I'm sure you'll find it interesting. Matthew is a really lovely man and I'm sure would be happy to chat with you if you contact him.

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I will keep you updated :D first I need to find a way to crush the rocks. I just broke my mortar and pestle   :angry:

Calcine in a bisque load then crush.  Maybe in a lidded bisqueware container, sometimes crystalline rocks like that get water trapped deep inside.  After calcining, it should hould be much easier, though still hard on the mortar and pestle.

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High Bridge - you should look up Mathew Blakely of Lode, Cambridgeshire who embarked on a project in 2011 - collecting various samples of rocks and minerals from across the UK which he then tested and researched before devloping them further and making some unique pieces. Take a look at his website - matthewblakely.co.uk. I'm sure you'll find it interesting. Matthew is a really lovely man and I'm sure would be happy to chat with you if you contact him.

 

:D yes having a quick look over his website he looks like the kind of guy I need to have a chat with. Thank you very much for the tip :D

 

 

Calcine in a bisque load then crush.  Maybe in a lidded bisqueware container, sometimes crystalline rocks like that get water trapped deep inside.  After calcining, it should hould be much easier, though still hard on the mortar and pestle.

 

 

Ok, I will have to make myself some forms to start calcining in.

 

I am looking at my old wheel motor and it is probably going to be re-purposed into a ball mill motor. Been looking at a few simple designs with a rubber belt going from the motor round a PVC barrel that sits on some castor wheels.

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Looking at the last image in the series, the parallel ovate shapes look remarkably similar to igneous/granite formations (stateside) near High Falls State Park in Georgia. The formations are called "feldspar eyes". The lighter colored minerals surrounding the eyes (in High Falls) are neoincreased biotite and microgranoblastic quartz.  My inner-geek loves the way that micro-gran-o-blastic just rolls off the tongue .

 

@High Bridge Pottery Please keep us posted on the re-purposed wheel-motor, ball mill idea.

 

-Paul

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You certainly gave me something to google there :D not sure I really know much more after reading a bit about micro granoblastic quartz. I think its more a Rhyolite but they seem to be the same except one cools underground and one cools above ground.

 

Took the motor out the wheel, looks like it will work a treat if I can get the cone off the end. Seems well and truly stuck. Need some oil to help it on its way.

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If you want to,use native materials in your glazes or clay bodies have a look at Ian Curries website. His approach is purpose built for that kind of testing. Much of the information, including his main method and calculator, is on line. Would be interested in talking to you about your results if you go down this path.

 

To crush native materials of all kinds, including rocks, he just gets a small, short tin can like a tuna tin, cuts both ends out, and puts the stuff inside and hits it with a common house hammer until it is dust! I have done this plenty with my native materials and it works fine as long as you wear safety glasses. You don't need that much material to do testing, i got plenty in about 15 mins.

 

Yes I know, not as elegant as turning an old wheel motor into a ball mill but it will get you started while you study up to become a mechanical engineer!

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Yes, I understand.  Processing/cleaning native materials can be time consuming. 

 

The key will be getting stuff to integrate into the melt, which will mean either 

 

a) adding it into an existing glaze (you might get lucky you might not) or

 

B) building a new glaze around it (the more exciting and ultimately rewarding path in my view). 

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Ive ground down a stone before and it ended up in some pretty fine dust. I used a cheap tile cutter with a diamond blade and just ran the stone through it one line at a time. The catch underneath the tile cutter will trap most of the cut stone in a water slurry. Pour it off, dry it, and it crumbles to dust. I did this a year ago but never got around to testing it in a glaze. Im sure theres possibly a level of metal "contaminating" the dust just from wear and tear on the blade. Either way it beat pounding with a hammer and dealing with a container bouncing around as you hit it.

 

Oh and because you have to remove the guard on the blade you are bound to get a little wet so wear a face mask.

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  • 9 months later...

Sorry to revive an old topic, did you get anywhere with this Joel? I walk these hills regularly and see plenty of interesting mineralisation about, though I'm not the best at recognising what things are.  I wish I had studied geology!

 

The old Coniston copper mines are not far off to the left of your picture.

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The rocks still sit in a bowl in my studio waiting for me to make a ball mill so not too much progress with this. I probably have the same lack of geology knowledge too :D picked up anything that was whiteish crystals and looked interesting.

 

Not tried identifying them by cleavage planes or anything like that. Have watched some good geology vids on youtube for very basic knowledge.

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I was going with rose quartz, but little hard to make out from the pics. I have some rose quartz from the Black Hills, SD area. Typically much more rose color-hence the name. However, I think I am seeing a rose tint to the samples, but hard to make them out.

 

Nerd

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  • 4 months later...

Your idea inspired me so here's some bits I collected recently, also from the Lake District. The left one is from near an old copper mine high up on the west side of the Old Man of Coniston, and the other one from near an old lead working (I would only consider processing the copper, and no real plans to do so at the moment anyway).

Joe

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