Rockin out at the beach!

Still lookin.....

Beach rocks, Ona beach, Beaver Creek, Oregon coast.

5 rocks, good lookers all....

This is familiar by now. DMT XF diamond to start.

30 seconds using a diamond nagura slurry to start yields.... Not much. Some polishing action.

Different stone, same result.

This one seemed to work well. I lapped 2 small areas to test.

Last stone and the most likely looking one..... and the worst performer. The slurry is light in color because the particles are not abrasive enough. There is no metal in the slurry to turn it dark. Just stone particles.

So I went back to the best of the bunch, lapped a larger section and worked for about 2 minutes. What happened?! Almost no action and sloooooow! You can see a bit of slurry developing.

As a control, the GSS hard gray shale. 30 seconds, full even scratch pattern. FAST! I love this stone! Soooo easy.

As usual, most of the stones that I selected are too hard and don't release their particles fast enough. I think that I am subconsciously choosing the stones that I WANT to work.... "If this one works, I'll have a lifetime supply!", that sort of thing. Still, it's not like I am just picking up any old rock. These are songs that look and feel right, but obviously there is still a finer quality, something that still eludes me. I did notice that none of these stones gave me that gritty aluminum foil tingle that I am beginning to associate with good performers, even though they ARE gritty and have small quartz particulates that are visible using a hand loupe lens. Funny/strange.

Still, it's fun to go to the beach and NOT look at the ocean. I never noticed how many people are out there looking for stones. They are the ones that look at you out of the corners of their eyes, thinking that you must be stealing all of "their" agates.

Addendum.......

So one week later, I keep thinking...."But what about that....". So. Grabbed 2 more.

A small remnant of a too fragile stone but....

It worked quite well. T=30 seconds, made it's own slurry and felt like it was working. Looks very scratchy, not sure if it really is, though.

This MAY have been the parent rock, the composition seems similar. Not at all like the other stones that I see at the beach. Elongate crystalline structure... trying to recall geology 210.

This didn't work as well though. It felt slightly sticky, a nagura might have helped. Maybe another day.