Other rocks to encase besides opals?

[IrieGuy05]

I was looking at a site that sells lapidary supplies and I noticed a bunch of nice looking stones and I was thinking I might be able to encase some of the smaller ones. I was looking at amethyst and chrysophase parcels, does anyone know if these might be compatable enougth with boro to encase a small one for a marble? I know its a long shot but I thought it might be possible because I saw some opals in the parcels catagory too.

I'm also wondering what type of stones people are putting on the side of peices by glass claws. The ones that just have to survive the kiln not mix with the glass.


thanks


charles

[Heidi von Frozenfyre]

Well you *do* know that the opals that work for glass are Gilson Created Opals? They are actually glass. I'm not sure of the c.o.e. anymore but they work great with boro.

You can also encase cz's (cubic zirconium) they come in any color you can imagine and lots of gals put them into flower beads in soft glass.

[The Bigles]

You're going to want to talk to Nate Dizzle about which rocks can be trapped (don't know about encased). He's done quite a bit of that. Big ass rocks. You can check his gallery on glasspipes.

I haven't seen him around in a while. I think he's moving or something.

Anyways, good luck.

[T Lewis Glass]

What about tectite, muldavite(sp) , I tried it in a marble a while back and the thing broke clean in half but I have seen it work .


~Todd

[T Lewis Glass]

Just to add ............


Holy shit was that Heidi posting .





~Todd

[skip]

nice tits heide

[gypsea]

hey, heidi's back! where ya been?

[Greymatter Glass]

so far I have had success with the following being encased in boro:

Gilson Opal (Synthtic, silica based)
Quartzites of all forms (shatters and creates a bright white puff, looks kinda cool)
Herkimer Diamond (A double terminated quartz crystal, not real diamond)
Cubic Zirconia (scuzzes and turns brownish/gray but doesn't crack)
Watermelon Tourmaline (puffs up, looks like greyish/silver pop-corn clouds)
Tektite (not really _FROM_ space, just glass created from comet impact, usually compatible encased or on the surface)
Moldavite (same thing as a Tektite, from the Molda River valley, has a green cast)
Trinitite (slightly radioactive fused silica from Trinity, NM. Location of the first atom bomb tests. Green crumbly stone that encases well,)
Mica Flakes (scuzzes up and has to be deep encased)
Crystal Cyanite (pure alumina silicate, damn near natural boro)
Synthetic Ruby (goes cloudy, not worth the $$$)
natural Emerald (looks like quartz)


Anyways, that's my list so far. I do a bit of research on stuff first, so I havent tried many I thought wouldn't work... the really obvious ones were natural opal, jade, agate, etc... because of water content. Also, haven't tried a real diamond because it would probably just turn to CO2 in the heat. I can get a real diamond for $5 tho, might be worth a try.

Have fun, and please feel free to add to the list.

-Doug

[Julian]

I've seen a piece of tiger's eye encased. It looked all scuzzy, though.
We get beads of Kyanite (how bead peopole seem to spell it). I'll try to encase some, my girlfriends has a a ton! That stone is weird!
I've been thinking of trying the boro-opal stlye trick with some soft glass and big CZs... Seems like that would work?

[glass4est]

you can also encase small gemy kianite, it will turn white, but sometimes the blue holds.

[Paxton]

What does a Herkimer diamond look like encased?

Paxton

[Greymatter Glass]

herks look like any other quartzite.... it explodes into a prismatic white cloud.

a 2g herk is $20+ and a 5lb quartz boulder is $2....,

[WORLD FAMOUS]

Ever get Obsidian to work? I tried alot of small chunks as well as the herkermer (sp?) diamonds with no luck, but that was before I had a digital annealer too, which was most likely the problem.

[CliffsideGlassworks]

Obsidian- water content is gettin ya probably...

http://www.obsidianlab.com/book_effects_of_fire.html

[CliffsideGlassworks]

http://www.swxrflab.net/blmpaper.pdf

obisdian fuseing/melting between 940C and 1080C whew thats hot!

[wfdon]

ive tried tihis 1 out of 4 i got encased if i could get a pic uploded i will post it.

i encased a good size peice nickel size arrowhead peice. it didi not seal up at first i think moisture had to have a way out so it was worked like a implosion wich left the peice of arrowhead sitting on a explosion on air bubbles after it was fully encased. i have droped it a few time and semes to bet pretty hard and strong i fig it would pop but it didint.
d

[Spider]

Per GreyMatter post - mica flakes scuzzes up and requires deep encasement.

I really like some of the older marbles with a lot of mica. Was a scuzziness a problem back then and that is why so many of these are very "busy" onionskins? Most of these Ive only seen by old photos where you can't tell the clarity of the marble too well.

Anyone re-creating some of these styles today?

[somberbear]

silicon... works nice

[LTD]

What about tectite, muldavite(sp) , I tried it in a marble a while back and the thing broke clean in half but I have seen it work .


~Todd
Moldavite works well if you just weld it to a bit of glass then weld the bit to your piece :D

[LTD]

Also, haven't tried a real diamond because it would probably just turn to CO2 in the heat. I can get a real diamond for $5 tho, might be worth a try.

Have fun, and please feel free to add to the list.

-Doug
Real diamonds turn to a cloud of bubbles w/ sparkles in the middle

[Paxton]

I'd like to see that five dollar diamond. The only thing I could think it might be is record needle grade. Occasionally, someone will take a big piece and sell it. Jewelers refer to them as crystal spit....I thought that was kind of funny.

Paxton

[Mr. Wonka]

Herkimer diamonds are beautiful when they're encased. What's so cool about them is that they're already faceted. I've never had any luck with them (cracking issues), but I've seen Chris Rice and Jesse H. get some incredible results.

[john madden]

pyrite(fools gold) works good. hardly any bubbles. looses its gold color turns silver. it smells like sulfur though. someone encased a piece of coral recently and it looked awsome, i tried it it just stinks and burned up

[HippyJayM]

Maestro does alot of work with incaseing stones/minerals. Give him a shout to see what works for him.

[BigTeasel]

peridot works. it tends to shatter on the inside (tho not always) and leave a bunch of tiny shattered green bits with bubblecracks. ive made up to 1 inch marbles with them with no problems with cracks or checks. typically i'll use a piece no bigger than 1/4 inch which looks pretty huge magnified. try it out!!

[Sol]

how are you gutys doing your encasing?
are you dropping it in a tube( the oONLY way i do it) or are you tring to cover it with clear...cause none of these stones are gonna do well in the flame...i figure your all using the tube way cause your results would all be blah if ya didnt..and id suggest blowing a thin bubble on the end of some 10-12 mill for the best restule and encase supa dupa quick..

[Firekist]

maria pickups work best for things that don't hold up to the heat (motion?) it takes to tube encase.
z---seth

[shelton13]

AMEN Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I figured that is how all did it already.

[Skye Perry]

so far I have had success with the following being encased in boro:

Gilson Opal (Synthtic, silica based)
Quartzites of all forms (shatters and creates a bright white puff, looks kinda cool)
Herkimer Diamond (A double terminated quartz crystal, not real diamond)
Cubic Zirconia (scuzzes and turns brownish/gray but doesn't crack)
Watermelon Tourmaline (puffs up, looks like greyish/silver pop-corn clouds)
Tektite (not really _FROM_ space, just glass created from comet impact, usually compatible encased or on the surface)
Moldavite (same thing as a Tektite, from the Molda River valley, has a green cast)
Trinitite (slightly radioactive fused silica from Trinity, NM. Location of the first atom bomb tests. Green crumbly stone that encases well,)
Mica Flakes (scuzzes up and has to be deep encased)
Crystal Cyanite (pure alumina silicate, damn near natural boro)
Synthetic Ruby (goes cloudy, not worth the $$$)
natural Emerald (looks like quartz)


Anyways, that's my list so far. I do a bit of research on stuff first, so I havent tried many I thought wouldn't work... the really obvious ones were natural opal, jade, agate, etc... because of water content. Also, haven't tried a real diamond because it would probably just turn to CO2 in the heat. I can get a real diamond for $5 tho, might be worth a try.

Have fun, and please feel free to add to the list.

-Doug

no one is shure how moldavite tektite is formed check this out www.ozarkrockexchange.com/ore_features/2000/moldavite.shtml

[mistahead]

i just bought some rock off martinez, he was hangin out in front of the local guns and liquor mart, he said to just drop um in a peice of nine mill tube and it should work great!! cant wait to try...wish me luck!!

[Udai Hussien]

i just bought some rock off martinez, he was hangin out in front of the local guns and liquor mart, he said to just drop um in a peice of nine mill tube and it should work great!! cant wait to try...wish me luck!!
I heard it incases well in choreboy

[dnug42]

i made two pendants one with moldivite and one with tectate...they both came out super tight and i always get interest in them from people who see em...green glowish look great in the sun......

[Greymatter Glass]

no one is shure how moldavite tektite is formed check this out www.ozarkrockexchange.com/ore_features/2000/moldavite.shtml

Um....yeah.... I think I'll take the word of geologists and other scientists about the origin of Moldavite. This site is trying to sell moldavite as a mysterious / spiritually charged stone so it's in their interest to be vague and say even scietists don't know the truth, but that's not correct.

I don't think anyone knows exactlly which metorite formed the bulk of the molda river tektites, but it's obvious from ground and arial observation that there was a major impact in that region some time in the last 10,000 years or so.

The crystaline structures in moldavite / tektites give the stone away. It was created by fusing silica and the regional impurities into a glassy matrix similar to fulgarites (frozen lightning) and Trinitites (fused glassy product of ground level nuclear detonations).

There are a limited number of events in the natural world that could make such a "stone".

tektites and modlavites are found exclusively in regions that are known to be locations of metero impacts.

They're not found in unrelated seismic / volcanic regions.

They're fused silica of terristrial origin, this has been proven with SEB microscopy and chemical analysis. There is a chance that some "space dust" is present as trace impurities but is not the primary matrix former.

They're found on or near the surface, proving they're not the product of deep subduction zones, like diamond.

the only rational explaination is that they were formed as the product of the heat and pressure of a meteorite impact.

Unless you want to say faries poop them out on Valentines day or something equally spiritual for ther origen....

-Doug

[schmoinkel]

Did you ever give the $5 diamond a shot Doug?

[ScurvySee]

Where do you guys get your minerals from? Any favorite companies? Encasing rocks has always seemed fascinating and I'd like to give it a try.

[Izzy Spun]

pyrite(fools gold) works good. hardly any bubbles. looses its gold color turns silver. it smells like sulfur though. someone encased a piece of coral recently and it looked awsome, i tried it it just stinks and burned up

I encased some pyrite one time. It did look cool, but The amount of sulfur that it produced was immense. Not only did it run everyone out of the shop, but it actually settled sulfur dust on alot of things in the shop. I had ventilation, but not enough obviously. I spoke to a friend who owns a mineral company, and he told me to be very careful when trying new minerals. Some put off very bad gasses such as arsenic and such...

[Udai Hussien]

gall stones are COE 35

[Greymatter Glass]

nope, havent tried the diamond yet. Every time I am at Rio Grande I forget.

A $5 diamond is about the size of the smallest cut diamond on a cheap $99 diamond ring in a mall kiosk. In a $99 gold and diamond ring you might get $10-15 worth or diamond and $20 worth of gold. They're sub carat diamond but they're not "chips" yet. They're used a lot in larger more exspensive jewelry in Pave (PAH-vey) settings, where you want a mechanical grid pattern texture rather than the random pave set you get with chips.

-Doug

[jeh glass]

i just had a request to encase a diamond...not a cheap one either. from a broken engagement. so has anybody ever tried a real diamond yet?

[Sable]

i have encase a faceted topaz stone in boro. The stone held up perfect, the boro checked all around the topaz due to an incorrect ramp down cycle. I have a aquamarine stone that i want to try, but i need a ramp cycle that would work.

-j

[harpentuan]

Tektite 'veins' are produced when lightning hits the ground. Of course the earth that is hit with the lightning must be of some particular composition.


This is what I have read and been told. It could be false though!

[somewhere]

Back in the day we had the pleasure of working with lightning. One of my early students Pete Goldstien who now works with space age materials that would blow your mind. "Materials engineer" So the opportunity to work with the lightning research institute here in FL was to good to pass up. We have more lightning strikes here then anywhere on the planet. They send rockets up with copper wire connected to control the strike and direct it to the test. Mostly airplane type research for bowing.
So we contacted Paul Troutman and he sent us 5 gallon buckets full of frit and powders. We successfully made fulgurites. "Hey Paul do you still have your fulgurite " Great stuff I still have some fulgurites from the tests.
In 1999 there was a great article that came from the GAS conference in Tampa. Read about it here:
http://plaza.ufl.edu/rakov/Gas.html

I don't remember if our names made the print but we definitely had our part in the project. Just a good read not sure of it's relevance but interesting to say the least.

[susheke]

so far I have had success with the following being encased in boro:

Gilson Opal (Synthtic, silica based)
Quartzites of all forms (shatters and creates a bright white puff, looks kinda cool)
Herkimer Diamond (A double terminated quartz crystal, not real diamond)
Cubic Zirconia (scuzzes and turns brownish/gray but doesn't crack)
Watermelon Tourmaline (puffs up, looks like greyish/silver pop-corn clouds)
Tektite (not really _FROM_ space, just glass created from comet impact, usually compatible encased or on the surface)
Moldavite (same thing as a Tektite, from the Molda River valley, has a green cast)
Trinitite (slightly radioactive fused silica from Trinity, NM. Location of the first atom bomb tests. Green crumbly stone that encases well,)
Mica Flakes (scuzzes up and has to be deep encased)
Crystal Cyanite (pure alumina silicate, damn near natural boro)
Synthetic Ruby (goes cloudy, not worth the $$$)
natural Emerald (looks like quartz)


Anyways, that's my list so far. I do a bit of research on stuff first, so I havent tried many I thought wouldn't work... the really obvious ones were natural opal, jade, agate, etc... because of water content. Also, haven't tried a real diamond because it would probably just turn to CO2 in the heat. I can get a real diamond for $5 tho, might be worth a try.

Have fun, and please feel free to add to the list.

-Doug

I know this is an old thread but I'm curious. Did you use cast in place cz's? They are designed to withstand high heat for metal torch work and hold up better. Although, aquamarine cz's will turn citrine yellow.