FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[Cesar M. Salvan]

Trtlman, you're kidding, right?

Some more home grown crystals. This crystals have been developed using the technique of gel crystallization. Is very useful to study the role of impurities, for example, in habit or crystal growth. The slow evaporation or cooling of saturated solutions are only two methods for "home" crystal growth. There are some strategies, including those for the growth of crystals of the less soluble salts.

[Mark Beregszaszi]

"I assume home grown silver is not real silver, otherwise people would grow their own silver instead of buying it. "

Daniel that is a really touchy subject you are poking into now.
I am not supposed to tell you this...but...
Home-grown silver is real silver...
But very very few know about this. Very few know that you can actually grow silver at home...
This is a secret only the initiates of the Guild of the Ancient Alchemists know about!
This is why just a very few people grow silver at home. The ancient method is passed down through the generations in great secrecy.
If everyone knew about this, then people would start mass producing silver at home, the price of this precious metal would drop fastly and global market would crush. That is something we would not want to happen.
I hope I will not be expelled from the Guild for telling you this, so please keep this a secret, alright?

[trtlman]

I figured it was real silver but knowing nothing on chemistry always wondered if it was the same as pure silver. About an hour of searching online I found out it is but the ingredients cost more than the silver, lol. I have never taken a chemistry lesson in my life so I am still uneducated in that subject. The acetate needles are cool and look like a fun project.

[Mark Beregszaszi]

Sorry Jordi, I could not resist...

[trtlman]

[Mark Beregszaszi]

[Pierre Joubert]

[Tom Tucker]

Three decades ago I collected several pounds of NATRON powder from the dry bed of a small pond in Wyoming. This hydrated sodium carbonate is available in markets as "washing soda". It is readily soluble in hot water and precipitates as a variety of large crystals overnight. The crystals were in at least two different forms - perhaps different hydrates ???
Unfortunately these manmade crystals begin to dehydrate almost immediately after being removed from the solute, and become more delicate. Fortunately, the resulting pile of white powder may be reused repeatedly to explore creating more crystals under differing conditions. I did preserve one two inch long stubby crystal by sealing it with paraffin inside a large "Perky" plastic box.
The small lake bed did yield several natron crystal pseudomorphs that have remained intact.

[Riccardo Modanesi]

[trtlman]