NEW STONE! Harquahala Mountain Shattuckite

[Redrummd]

Okay all - This is the new find from Rodney Frisby who was the miner who found the Vulture Mountain Shattuckite vein. This guy has a very rare ability to search out and find rare copper stones psuedomorphed with Quartz. His latest find is for the Harquahala Mountains in Arizona and this Shattuckite is nearly 100% silicated to Quartz. There are several significant differences from the Vulture Mountain stone.

1) This Shattuckite is hard and has less pits, vugs and lines that the Vulture Mountain stone.

2) The Shattuckite has inclusions of Chalcocite that are nearly fully silicated. These show up as black spots when viewed from one direction and as a bright silver metallic spot from the opposite direction.

3) There is a lot less Chrysocolla, Cuprite and Malachite in the pieces I got.

Rodney indicates that this appears to be a very small find. All of what he found fit into one flat rate box and I bought all of it. After getting my assessment of the stone he will be going back to see if he can pry out some more pieces large enough for knives.

Here are some photos of test cuts through the vein.

 

[Redrummd]

One of the test cuts is a piece that was cut across the vein and then parallel to the pattern of the Shattuckite sections in the vein. My test cut indicates that the end pieces that will be used for knives will have a much higher concentration of the Shattuckite with Chalcocite on some of the slabs. This will reduce the stone useable for scales to probably about 50% but worth the very rare look this stone will have on a knife.

Her are photos of the same very small piece cut across the vein and then parallel to the vein. I see just a very few tiny pits that I would fill with Hxtal (Museum grade UV stable polymer) before polishing and it looks to me that there will be very little if any "texture" to the final polish of even a large scale such as on the Buck 110.

 

[Redrummd]

There were a few small pieces in the box that are way too small for use on knives. I took one piece that was a fractured scarp from where Rodney pried the vein open so it is not up to the grade I will use on knives. The piece was given a fast test polish and this is what it showed about the Shattuckite color and the play in the Chalcocite from appearing as black spots to silvery metallic.

 

[Redrummd]

It takes about three months from the date I get a new stone until I start selling knives with scales cut from them. I first need to adhere blocks of wood to each piece I plan to cut and that needs to align with the pattern I want to cut through. I started this today so by tomorrow I could be cutting pieces. I always start with the smallest pieces as I need to see how my pattern is turning out; how the blade is responding to the composition of the stone and does the stone hold together as I expect.

I need to put each cut stone into its own soapy water filled container so that I can later put the slabs back in the order they came off the stone so that I can have scales that match on each side of the knife.

I usually soak the slabs for weeks to get every bit of the mineral oil used in the saw out of the stone.

I then do layouts for small test knives and see how the stone grinds, sands and polishes. This is where I see how much texture the stone has and determine if I need to fill the small blemishes with Hxtal.

The final part of this involves the polishing methods to use for getting a polish as close to perfect as the stone will allow. Based on my fast test I think it is going to polish like a really good Jasper and easily take a glossy polish.

I will keep this post up to date through the stages I note as I did for the Vulture Mountain stone. I believe I am the only cutter who has this stone for commercial use.

 

[myday]

Thanks for the update on Rodney and his current find. I for one love that Shattuckite at the Vulture Mt site especially the stabilized slabs I purchased fron your wife's ebay site. I hope Rodney finds a larger vein at the Harquahala Mt site. Nice material especially not have having to be stabilized.

myday (39don)

 

[testdw]

Mike,
Congrat's on getting Rodneys new find of Shattuckite. It is very nice and with the Chalcocite showing as a silver tone in one direction, I'm sure it will make some premium looking scales. Thanks for all the pictures and the mining information. It is very interesting to know the whole story. Looking forward to seeing the final outcome of your new Harquahala Shattuckite stone art.
Dennis

 

[Redrummd]

myday - 39Don -

If you will cut and polish a few cabs and post the pictures here and on the Lapidary site I will send you few decent sized slabs. I had a couple of the test cut preforms break and a few slabs too small for knife scales that I would like to get a good test polish on. This would save me time to use to continue the slabbing of the Harquahala Mountain Shattuckite. Just PM me your mailing address.

I will be the only way to get this stone as I bought all Rodney was going to sell and his last note indicates he cannot retrieve any more productively from the vein due to how it is running through the matrix stone.

 

[Southerly]

I love the way you seek out rare finds and micro mine production, makes your knives truly unique and collectible the the stone alone.

David

 

[Redrummd]

Today I made a deal for what will probably be the last of this rough.

Rodney believes that the pale yellow green in the stone is Conichalcite that had blended with something else but it may be something more exotic.

Here is most of what he had to say about these last two pieces:

"Hi Michael,
Got back from the digs late last night. Spent three days digging and searching. I found some material but most was substandard so I think I am done with this material with the exception of the green stuff. I think I got all there is to be had but I will probably go back to it one more time. I think I put a few small pieces in your last box. I did get two bars that are indescribable so I will just show you the pics. There was no more showing and the bars are tough with only the matrix on either side being softer. I semi polished one end and saw that there is little rivers of gem silica. It is some of the finest material I have seen. So just to keep my word I offer them to you first. They weigh just under 5 lb each with all the (95%) waste removed."

 

[hohenstreetroa]

Gorgeous stuff, Michael! I can't wait to see it on a knife!

 

[Tbaggin]

This stuff is super cool. I was wondering where i can find some of this stuff in small(golf ball sized in dia.) polished up for just collecting? Ive always admired natures rocks! thanks!
and thanks for sharing

 

[myday]

Michael, Redrummd, asked me if I would like to cab and polish some of Rodney's new material from Harqualla Mountain. Michael had purchased all what Rodney had mined. Due to the complexity of the vein there won't be anymore.

I received the material last Saturday late. Sunday I cabbed one cab, Monday I cabbed 5 more. This material is rather unique with the higher quartz/silica qualitys than the Vulture Mountain material. It does not require stablizing but does have some weak veining of the chrysocolla mix.

It polished extremely quick with a excellent polished surface.

Thanks again Michael for sending me some of your rejects.

39don

 

[Redrummd]

Here is a link to the stone site where I spend time. I sent another bit of Harquahalla Shattuckite to another person I know who has exceptional talent in polishing stone. Her piece is really worth taking a look at. I am working on three knives with this stone now.

http://gemstone.smfforfree4.com/index.php/topic,12780.0.html

 

[testdw]

Mike,
The cabs look exceptional. Krystee sure did a great job. Really like the green blended with the blues etc. Like Lance, I'm sure anxious to see the three knives that your working on.
Dennis

 

[Redrummd]

Well, you all may not be as excited as you think when you see two of them. It seems I made a slight error. If you look at the slab photo you will see an area that is just a mix of the blues and greens and then almost like a line was drawn a section of the mostly quartz and Shattuckite. So, I had made a set of scales with one set of the blues and greens and one with the mostly quartz and Shattuckite.

Now as a general rule I never glue scales of the same stone in a group. I glue 3 to 4 knives in a group. I made a mistake and put the two Buck 110 Harquahalla knives in the same adhesion group. So, any guess as to how I ended up gluing them? Yep, like they were on the slab with one side the mostly Quartz and Shattuckite and the other side the mostly blue and greens.

It will be interesting to see how they look when polished. I will now have to decide if I should give them a PCS or CS rating too.

I may post the photos after I get them polished to see what you think about the rating and look.

 

[hohenstreetroa]

Here is a link to the stone site where I spend time. I sent another bit of Harquahalla Shattuckite to another person I know who has exceptional talent in polishing stone. Her piece is really worth taking a look at. I am working on three knives with this stone now.

http://gemstone.smfforfree4.com/index.php/topic,12780.0.html

These cabs are intense! The green looks electric!

 

[Redrummd]

Well I decided to go with a CS rating as there are two minor issues with the single slab scales that do not match well front to back and a tiny bit of texture too.

Here is how they both kind of look which is pretty darn nice but not what I expected. $250. if you want to carry and use! SOLD

 

[Redrummd]

Here is the other one of the two which also looks great but at $250. if you want to carry and use - not a bad piece of work! SOLD

 

[hohenstreetroa]

Don't be so hard on yourself, Mike! These are gorgeous!

 

[testdw]

I still like both of these Harquahala Mtn Shattuckites.......beautiful and interesting. I could carry one on each hip.
Dennis