rock tumbling/polishing

RobertN · Mar 11, 2019

Anyone tumble/polish rocks?

Got a Thumbler A-R6 from a friend who used to used it for tumbling brass. I have vibratory tumblers to use for brass...

Of all places, Harbor Freight had some Thumbler media kits when I was there this weekend, so I bought some.

Now looking for info on how full to fill the tumbler with rocks, and how much water to use? We have some rocks we collected at the beach that will use.

Industrial Toys · Mar 11, 2019

I always remembered seeing those things in the Christmas Toy catalogues.

A friend made a big one to tumble laser or plasma cut parts. It did a great job making them burr free.

Fuddy1952 · Mar 11, 2019

My brother is a geologist. As kids he took an old bicycle wheel and wire-tyed maybe 12 cans around the perimeter. Then mounted a coffee can to the center, fabricated a bracket so it would clamp over our lake overflow pipe. In can he had it half filled with stones and sand.
It was simple and worked great.
You could electric motorize one or have it water or wind powered.
My guess is different media or kinds of sand would polish stones finer.

Industrial Toys · Mar 11, 2019

You could always just put the stuff in your hub caps. Didn't some pranksters used to do that?

RNeumann · Mar 11, 2019

Thumbler has ratings for the tumbler. It depends on rock size and media added. Then top with water. Seems I fill the thing about half way with “stuff”, add my media and top with water. The media company may have some suggestions as well.

RobertN · Mar 11, 2019

It's a 9lb capacity barrel/tub

RNeumann said:
Thumbler has ratings for the tumbler. It depends on rock size and media added. Then top with water. Seems I fill the thing about half way with “stuff”, add my media and top with water. The media company may have some suggestions as well.

Doofy · Mar 11, 2019

Wife got me a tumbler for Christmas...been thinking about setting it up too. My kids had one 40 years ago but I've forgotten how to use them.

Egon · Mar 12, 2019

Usually go through a range of media sises when polishing. Oils such as kerosene can also be used for polishing. Save the media for the next polish. Try and keep rocks of approximedly the same hardness in each polish batch.

Have lots of patience.

oosik · Mar 12, 2019

The smaller rocks ( 3" to 4" ) get some unusual inclusions around here. I've alway thought of taking these two and having them cut and polished.

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