FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[Forrestblyth]

Only in the UK could we dump a cement factory in the middle of so scenic view.

I walked up the Rake and collected some nice Fluorite (blue John). Calcite and some fan like shaped mineral I think may be witherite but I am not sure as it is not listed at this locality. Perhaps someone recognizes it.

Interestingly the bands of Blue John sits on limestone well-formed Crinoid fossils

[Roy Starkey]

The bladed / columnar material is calcite.

[Forrestblyth]

A couple of closer shots of the unknown mineral structure

[Roy Starkey]

The bladed / columnar material is calcite.

[Forrestblyth]

Thanks Roy for the ID. I was posting same time you replied. That is understandable with that cement factory on the doorstep. Just open the door and bulldoze the calcite in. Out Cement lol.

That is 3 forms I have found there. The dog tooth, bladed, and fan spray versions

[James Catmur]

I used to collect there back in the 1960s before we moved to Mexico!

[Kevin Schofield]

I collected here with my father in the early seventies. Lots of galena, fluorite and calcite, but the prize pieces that I still have were the pink and white banded barites, of which I include a few pictures here. The old dumps along the rake were cleaned out in the eighties and the barite pillaged as a weighting agent for drilling mud in the North Sea oil business.

[Forrestblyth]

Very nicely prepared specimens Kevin.

fantastic in photographs and know from experience how even more spectacular in person'

This banded Blue John and Barite slab is on display in Castleton. Spectacular

I am currently working on a restoration of a 1960 vintage slab saw that I hope to try a bit of slabbing and mineral prep. I was going to buy a new one until I found they are costing more than my first car LOL

If you want a trip down memory lane, I can recommend these two books focused on that area

[Forrestblyth]

Zooming in on picture number 8 Kevin is Fascinating. The bladed crystal Barite crystals look superb. Too be able to see from your slice how the pipe formation cemented together is an eye opener for me

[Kevin Schofield]

Hi Forrest...yes, that one has always intrigued me too.

It looks for all the world as if the original cores with the beige colour concentric growth and "coxcombe" barite surfaces were somehow deformed in a plastic manner before the whole thing lithified with the later generations of coarser barite crystals. No clue how that would happen though!

[Forrestblyth]