Rock Tumbling- How I get mine to shine

here are my temblors this is what I use I use the double-barrel tumbler from lower tone it's the model 33 B and I have these because I like to have a barrel for each stage of grit once the coarse medium fine and polished yes there's one missing that's just because I reran a course which kind of messed that up but anyway they'll be back on track here in the next week but you do not have to have four separate barrels I just do it because it eliminates possibility of cross-contamination between grits between the stages but you can definitely get a great polish with just using one barrel you'll just really really have to clean it really good in between stages to make sure there is no grit left behind and I do have kind of a trick that I use to do that and we'll I'll show you that here as well but these are what I use for my tumbling let's start with how we load the barrel how full do you load it this was a problem I'll tell you what that I had when I first started is I was loading the barrel way too full but first off I should say you want to start with rocks of the same hardness very very important do not put rocks of different hardnesses together it will not tumble right rocks front on the Mohs scale of six to seven of hardness is the best anyways I'm just using these as an example so these are a bunch of Jasper's that I got here and those are just ones I kind of had already as you can see here there oh it's about 2/3 full not quite but almost there's still a little bit more room in there so I actually have a little bit more room to go but not much I was loading it up to about here which was about three fours and I was not getting a good tumble I mean I would just have to reach humble reach humble cuz it just wasn't shaping them right or anything so you definitely don't want to overload that's a big here you're gonna be tumbling those and for a while to get the where you really want it to get and this is just about right and I also use different size different size rocks are very very important now this is about the fullest you're gonna want your barrel no fuller than that absolutely no fuller than that that's about two-thirds not and I had in my head 3/4 for some reason note 2/3 full that is it now if you do not have enough to fill your barrel then you can use filler and what I use in my if I need filler for coarse or medium I usually use poly plastic ceramic me media this is a mixture of different sizes I like that because we need different sizes to really get the best tumble so this really works really well but you do not use absolutely do not use these in polish if they are brand new because I'm not going to pull them out the bag but if you could see they got very sharp actually edges so you want to pre tumble these in a coarse or medium once or twice before you use it ever in a polish but I still I haven't been daring enough to use this Sena in a Polish so instead I have I don't have the original bag but I have plastic beads that I use so these are very good to cushion your rocks so they don't bang them around on each other and possibly crack or fracture it also helps the grit adhere to these and your rocks to get it better you know sanding or or grinding of them I guess I should I say sanding of them but these are great to use you could use these in coarse medium fine polish but I usually use these in the last two stages if need be or if I need to refill fill this up to my 2/3 level that's what I'll use now I have let me just move this I have this this box full of my different grits I mean my grits fillers that I use for four different grits I never ever use the same plastic beads that I used in Polish and fine I have my own I have even them all out here I have just plastic that's used in course I have a mixture also I will mix them as well and use them together the ceramic and the plastics so this is you know used course that will never be used in anything other than course I have used a medium and so on and so on so I never ever cross contaminate even my filler in another batch and I even have a special one with plastic for burnishing stage which by the way I saved one of my old Harbor Freight tumblers which I do not recommend but I you anyway just work out the money for the lord's own it's worth every penny split that way but I use one of that they're the barrels from that tumbler that I got for my burnishing run so even so I actually have five barrels total that I use so once you have that all filled up now it's ready to put some water in now I will go put some water in it and show you how high I put my water so as you can see here this is how high I put my water level just barely any of the tops of my rocks are showing over the water line most of them are under but just a little bit of the top is not covered in water and that's just about right you want your water level just under the top of the top layer of rocks so this is just about perfect level after this you'll get your grit which I use Lorton grit it's the best grit I have used other grits and from different companies and I don't want to name names but I just haven't had that great look with a finished result when I started using strictly Lorton grit I have come out with just the brilliant brilliant shine so I recommend buying Lorton grit [Music] it's it just it's the best but you start with your coarse obviously in coarse one and all you need is three tablespoons now I am only using a three pound tumbler so if you use a bigger tumbler you will need more but you only need three tablespoons pretty well almost no matter what how much rockins in there three tablespoons of coarse then on your medium you're going to want to put three tablespoons as well of quart of your yeah grit three tablespoons of medium then when you move to your fine you want to do three tablespoons of your fine but I also put one tablespoon of borax with it and that's just a tip that was given to me I've started using the borax with these last two stages and it comes out spectacular so as again you want to use one tablespoon of borax when you go to your polishing stage but with polishing stage you want four tablespoons so you'll have three tablespoons in the first three stages of grit and then the last stage is when you'll use for and polish can be reused but I I just I don't anyway but I've been told you can I just do not know how well it comes out when it's been used again I don't know but anyways that is what you all you need is four and that's it it it's perfect perfect amount and also in between each stage a trick and a tip that was given to me that I use and I've been using and it's also produced this beautiful help to produce this beautiful shine I believe is in between each stage you want to tumble your rocks once you once they're done for say you know you run this for a week and they're done and do a Poorman your you know colander however you guys do it you want to once you rinse off all the grit and all that you want to put all your rocks and filler if you used it back into the same Erol and use one and a half tablespoons of borax and then tumble it for 15 to 20 minutes and that really cleans the grit off cleans your rocks cleans your filler cleans your barrel and kind of gets it ready for the next stage and it's a lot less cleaning of your rocks in between each stage even though it I still after I run the you know the cleaning run for 15-20 minutes I will still clean off my rocks and if it has any pitting you want to take a toothbrush really get into the little pits and get any grit out otherwise you want to just rerun it again in course if you want those pits out but borax man I'm telling you is a big huge huge key to helping clean a clean off the grit out of your off your rocks and in your barrel in between stages and I also for burnishing I use borax as well this is the borax it's very very cheap you can get a big huge box of it for like 2 or 3 bucks that your look in the cleaning section or the laundry section at any like Walmart Walgreens any kind of store like that they will carry it and this is what I use I just a scoop for for burnishing I use one and a half tablespoons not one not two one and a half tablespoons of borax and I run it for an hour and a half to two hours after my polish and it turns out great so from here I'm just going to show you how I empty my bare after it's done a run I have myself a little bucket and my colander and my hose and I just dump it in there and rinse it off and then it goes back into the barrel to be ran with borax for 15 to 20 minutes one other thing if you use a metal colander make sure it's not gonna leave scratches on your rocks because I use the metal colander to start with and I kept seeing these little silver you know streaks like when you do a scratch test and anyway I'm like what is on my rocks well it was from the colander I was using so I switched to a plastic colander and I have not had that problem I'm doing this one-handed to buy waste this is really hard to videotape at the same time so bear with me this is a course where I just did I don't have any filler in there are usually if I have enough stones I don't need this use any filler [Music] [Music] I just pour the bucket on the side of my house where I don't care agates I've been running in course know what I want to say about about the course run because this is really important if you are not getting it rounded as you want you're gonna want to rerun them in course like this ones I've been running this one probably this is the third or fourth week to try to get the pitting and this this outer layer off to get to all the really good stuff of this beautiful carnelian so you know what look I probably will run this again and I got this tip from Michigan rocks he has been a great help I've gotten many tips for many people but his on course you know he runs some of his up to 12 weeks to get them rounded and shaped the way he wants them to to be before he moves them on and that was something I was not doing I just did the seven to ten days like it always says and and running in the medium and then and I just wasn't getting a good shine I wasn't I mean it it really really makes a difference you guys on how long you run in course this one is rounded beautifully it's definitely ready for the next stage some of these just have an outer layer on them that if you don't want it on there you're gonna have to run it in course again and again and again until it's as rounded as you'd like it to be no pitting but just because it has pitting as well doesn't mean it can't be run you're just gonna have to take way better care and make sure you get into each little pit and make sure there's no grit in there but the course I would say is probably the most important stage if you do not run it long enough in course and get those those edges round it out you're not going to have a good result in the end I just I just guarantee you you're not going to so just make sure they're there they're where you want it to be so anyways these I will go through pick out all the ones that are ready for the next stage and I will move them along or put them in a bag until it's filled up and up or use filler if I don't want to wait for enough rocks to fill up another batch but also I do not like my rocks to get dry it's important as well to keep your stones wet because if you let them dry especially if they have not been cleaned then it can harden just you know the grit kind of hardens like concrete does and it gets stuck in the each little crack and pit and and it'll be really hard to get them out so that is why people say keep your stones wet it's just so that if they don't dry out with any previous grit from from the stage you just used to cement in those cracks you don't want that to happen or you'll have to rerun rerunning min course till you get those scratches or pits out or you can even use a saw to cut cut pits out or you know a lot of people like to pre shape their rocks by cutting them with the tile saw and it really helps in the end if you cut off all those all those pits and valleys that you don't want or the the outer layers that you don't want on there but uh anyways whoo well I think that's about it for you if you guys have any more questions comment below and I'll try to help out as best I can answer any questions but this is what I do to tumble my stones and I've gotten pretty good results by using this method so I hope this helps all you guys out

Channel: Marlaina Atkins

Views: 24,777

Rating: 4.894875 out of 5

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Id: RM-5WJkPyGA

Length: 20min 8sec (1208 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 12 2020