❓Your Mineral Identification Questions answered here

Thus is the local stuff, which is brought to surface in the same way during basalt eruptions (Camperdown and Mortlake peridot).



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN7Ww-p9Ii0

Nearby, zircons at Lake Bullen Merri are not gem quality, but can be up to 17 mm diameter and well crystallized

Disappointing not knowing exactly what it is, but I like the name...real happy to go with that. Yes 'Ziviscarlite Olivine' has a nice ring to it :Y:

A bit tricky is a bit of an understatement Lonewolf. Between the contributions from everyone on the forum to tests for radioactivity (Ekanite possibility) to Qld museum and QUT Laboratory its kept me busy. I could have just forked out for analytical testing straight up but where is the fun in that.
...Yes Im hearing you Dihusky I havent actually exhausted all avenues of enquiry. I may still consult with someone from QUT Central Research Facility but she is not available until next week.
Stay tuned, the until someone tells me otherwise moment is probably just around the the corner.
We just need to cut a Ziviscarlite Olivine before the unofficial name gets reclassified. :gemstone:
Regardless of any outcome this has been a really useful educational experience for me. A bit like the antiques roadshow, the material object may be one thing but the story behind it is what makes it so interesting.
Thanks again for everyones input.
Marty

Picked this up in the Stannifer tin mining area, very very heavy,
approx 60 to 70 kg, the silver petal inclusions covering part of rock
reminded me of molybdenum? Asking around it was mentioned
by some that they did mine it in that area. A magnet sticks to it.
There are some vugs that have very small crystals in it.
What do you think goldirocks?

Perhaps a sharply-focussed close-up of the silver inclusions. I imagine the dark stuff might be magnetite.

maybe the black is Wolfram??

The red mark, top right photo, is paint off the trolley i carted it out on.

Hi yall,
Pretty sure this is galena... it also has visable copper, iron pyrite etc. showing through it and I assume there be lead/silver and the likes in there but after a closer look on the corner that was knocked off with the pick after digging it up I can see some "gold" looking specs that don't seem to "tarnish" like the visable copper does.

Can gold be found in galena like this?

It was found detecting in an area know for silver.

Measures about - 2.5" x 1"
Weights - 401g (cleaned)
SG - 7.1
Streak - grey

Hi all, not sure if this stone is a sapphire or not, found at the willows gem field.The stone is yellow though looks a bit orange in the pics,the SG of the stone is 2.65,doing the scratch test, the 9 hardness pick will scratch the circled area only (pic 4)but will not scratch the stone anywhere else.In the circled area the 8 pick will not scratch the stone,i have been told that some sapphires can have a soft spot, but the SG is not right for a sapphire, any idea's on what it is thanks :beer:

The SG is probably the most reliable test which would indicate a Quartz, the colour would swing it to possibly be Citrine. With hardness I find stones can vary, when cutting they can be harder that expected in some areas and softer in others. Currently cutting some quartz and it's cutting more like a Sapphire, very hard and slow.

Dihusky said:

The SG is probably the most reliable test which would indicate a Quartz, the colour would swing it to possibly be Citrine. With hardness I find stones can vary, when cutting they can be harder that expected in some areas and softer in others. Currently cutting some quartz and it's cutting more like a Sapphire, very hard and slow.

Click to expand...

Hardness rarely varies in things like quartz - my suspicion is that its "toughness" is related to some other property like grainsize (e.g. fine grains will disaggregate from each other and perhaps be easier to cut than a single crystal for example). Just guessing....

Good photo but unfortunately the mineralogy is so variable at Stannifer that I can't help a lot. Silver, zinc, lead, copper, tin (even minor antimony minerals) and some lodes have a lot of magnetite. You can see the problem by comparing the colour in earlier and later photos - colour often doesn't help a lot in photos because it is not "true".

SCC said:

Hi yall,
Pretty sure this is galena... it also has visable copper, iron pyrite etc. showing through it and I assume there be lead/silver and the likes in there but after a closer look on the corner that was knocked off with the pick after digging it up I can see some "gold" looking specs that don't seem to "tarnish" like the visable copper does.

Can gold be found in galena like this?

It was found detecting in an area know for silver.

Measures about - 2.5" x 1"
Weights - 401g (cleaned)
SG - 7.1
Streak - grey

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845140_20190525_141035.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845165_20190526_133536.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845192_20190525_163356.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845268_20190526_143354.jpg

Click to expand...

Second last photo appears to have the well-developed cubic cleavage of galena. Galena is around SG 7.4 so in the right ball-park. The clincher is hardness - you should be able to scratch it with a dollar coin.

SCC said:

Hi yall,
Pretty sure this is galena... it also has visable copper, iron pyrite etc. showing through it and I assume there be lead/silver and the likes in there but after a closer look on the corner that was knocked off with the pick after digging it up I can see some "gold" looking specs that don't seem to "tarnish" like the visable copper does.

Can gold be found in galena like this?

It was found detecting in an area know for silver.

Measures about - 2.5" x 1"
Weights - 401g (cleaned)
SG - 7.1
Streak - grey

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845140_20190525_141035.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845165_20190526_133536.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845192_20190525_163356.jpg

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/12440/1558845268_20190526_143354.jpg

Click to expand...

The first pic looks like Arsonopyrite and Yes it can contain Gold... Looks exactly like some I have here...

Wash your hands after handling too...Galena is in the top 10 most Toxic Minerals...

LW....

Hi Dihuski,you might be right but does not look like quartz,not that i know a lot about gemstones,might have to take it to the lapidary club,they may know what it is thanks for your input :Y:

I picked this quartz rock up when it caught my eye by sparkling in the sun.

It has a glittering effect on parts of it. Heaps of small specks that shine in the right light.

What does this quartz rock tell you ? Quartz with colour like this means it may have come from a gold bearing reef ,doesn`t it ?
I got no signal from it ,but i thought it looked interesting enough that it could tell a story.

I have cleaned it and the pictures show a rock that is completely dry ,so the shine is totally from the rock and not a reflection of any water.
My pictures don`t pick up the full glitter effect of what i can see with the naked eye ,but it is there.




Any advice is most appreciated. I am here to learn.

Thanks .
FOZ

Excellent example of Leverite quartz. Love the froth factor, more learning \experience will help.

Gimp said:

Excellent example of Leverite quartz. Love the froth factor, more learning \experience will help.

Click to expand...

I'm assuming leverite quartz comes from leave 'er write where it is?

So what you are saying is it is a sex rock ?

Just another ...... rock ?

I was told colour in the quartz is an indicator of gold from the reef it came from and quartz that is just white with barely any colour to it won`t bare gold .

Is this likely to have come from deep in the ground or closer to the surface ? I am just trying to understand how to read the quartz.

Thanks .
FOZ

Hi all, I found a stretch of quartz veins in a major faultline in greywacke bedrock (exposed after a big flood). One of the veins is large, about 1m thick in places and pretty much pure white. I panned out some of the decomposed parts and discovered fine.. pyrite powder (perhaps). other veins vary in colour, from rusty/rose coloured to green and I've found pyrite (chunks and powder) and small amounts of what I think is calcopyrite based on the colours. Theres a lot going on there.

My background in mining/prospecting/geology is zero - I've been googling as I go

I had a crack at melting some panned out samples to see what would happen and the results werent what I expected.

I made a little clay crucible and mixed in a sample 3/1 with borax and melted it with a mapp blowtorch - sadly it didnt manage to melt it fully, but the top image shows what cracked out of the crucible (image is looking at the base with some unmelted borax visible). As far as I know pyrite couldnt behave like this - do you think thats gold?

I tried a few other attempts melting the 'pyrite' from a few other veins without flux to see what would happen (outside and wearing a gasmask) - the material is very difficult to melt, doesnt spark up much and I end up with a nugget with the following characteristics:
- glossy, silver,
- magnetic
- doesnt scratch with a nail
- dunked in salt water then left on windowsill, no sign of oxidation after 3 weeks
- seems light, but could be misleading as its bubbly
- red oxidation in the bottom pic suggests at least some iron?

Any idea what I may have here?

Thanks!