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BUNDY GEM AND MINERAL NEWS
WINTER 2012
Session Supervisors 2012 MON GENERAL- The Huths TUE am SILVER WIRE WORK & BEADING
Cyril Budgen, Sandra Jensen TUE pm GENERAL - Lester Rogers WED am SILVERWORK – Rex Wells & Phyllis Bujayer WED pm GENERAL- G&L Rogers SILVERWORK – Mae Geddes WED night FACETTING- Ian Jenkins assist. John Groundstroem THU SILVERWORK – J. Foster FRI GENERAL – Paddy Peckover
SAT GENERAL – these are subject to change July 21st R. Ehrlich– G&C. Stirrat 28th G. & L. Rogers –J. Cosgrove August 4th R. Ehrlich – V. Young – S. Leigh 11th G&C. Stirrat - J. Cosgrove 18th G. & L. Rogers - P. Peckover 25th G&C. Stirrat – S. Leigh
CASTING John Foster, Ian Jenkins, Kerry Dunn, John G. PATRONS Mae Geddes and Rex Wells
Session times Mon 7:00 - 10:00 p.m. Tue 9:00 – 12:00noon Tue 1:00 - 5:00 p.m. Wed 9:00 - 12:00 noon
1:00 – 5:00 p.m. 7:00 - 9:30 p.m.
Thu 7:00 – 9:30 p.m. Fri 7:00 – 10:00 p.m. Sat 9:00 – 12:00 noon
DATES TO REMEMBER
Club General Meetings every 3rd Tuesday at 7:00 2012 AUGUST 4th - WIRE WORK DEMONSTRATION
21st - GENERAL MEETING SEPTEMBER 1st - SPHERE DEMONSTRATION 16th - CAR BOOT SALE
18th - GENERAL MEETING OCTOBER AGM & COMPETITION
Gemfair
For more details on all shows see QLACCA calendar or
current Metal Stone & Glass magazine.
PO Box 386 Bundaberg, 4670
2012 Committee CLUBROOM – 41551500
www.bundaberg.lapidaryclub.com.au PRESIDENT Robert Ehrlich – 4152 9907 SECRETARY Sherry Leigh -4159 7248 TREASURER Judy Cosgrove -41599709 EDITOR Judith Hopwood
Thanks to the Office of Jack Dempsey for
their assistance with photocopying.
DEMONSTRATIONS 4
TH August – WIRE
WRAPPING & CHAIN WORK – Gloria Gray &
Sandra Jensen
1st September –
SPHERE MAKING –
Robert Ehrlich
Presidents Report Here we are with another report. Firstly I must thank all the members who helped at the
Gemboree; which was a great success. Without your help it would not have happened. A big
thank you to Trish & Sandra who did most of the planning. A big job but well done.
Congratulations to the winners in the competitive sections, the ones that did not win keep
trying. A job well done. .As I was not at the meeting I don’t know the final figures. But I am
sure it made the club a good profit.
Thanks also to those who volunteered at the Show. The next thing on the agenda is the
Gemfair; which will require more volunteers. So it has been a busy six months. The club is
still growing in strength which is good to see. Welcome all the new members and I hope your
stay with us will be rewarding. There are a lot of members away on holidays this month.
Most of them are chasing agates. So you will see the saws will be busy. I hope they have a
safe trouble free holiday. To all the members not feeling the best I hope you recover soon. I
have one request it is unfortunate we are losing our newsletter editor. So I am calling on
someone to put their hand up and fill the position Thank you Judith for filling the position.
While we are on filling positions we still need a publicity officer. Also give some thought to
taking up a supervisor’s position as Confucius say many hands make light work. Well that
winds me up for this time hope to catch you all around the club.
Robert
Youth Members .did very well with their entries in the show with the Champion
Junior this year Rachael Hill. Rachael is doing so well she is even competing (and winning) in the Open Sections. Rachael won an open silverwork prize with her Graeme World pendant. This shows the club’s skill level has improved after our training with Graeme. Now it is time to get your entries ready for the AGM competition for a chance to have your names on the Club Trophies displayed in the cabinet.
MONTHLY DEMONSTRATION SESSIONS Members with expertise in various fields are starting an exciting series of demonstrations and lectures. To start Gloria & Sandra will demonstrate wire wrapping and chain work on Saturday afternoon on 4th August. Robert Ehrlich will follow this with a field many club members have been keen to find out about; Sphere Making. If you have expertise in areas and would like to give a demonstration or lecture please contact President Robert Ehrlich so we can keep these going.
CAR BOOT SALE To be held on Sunday the 16th of September between 8am and 12noon. If
anyone is interested in booking a site it will cost them $5.00 inside the building or outside with a table size of 6ft. We will also hold a sausage sizzle on the day. Public is also very welcome to attend.
Agate Creek Trip with the Cosgrove’s
For those of you who have not had the good fortune of visiting Agate Creek I will give you a small portrayal
of the area. As most of our readers are aware Agate Creek is world renowned for Agates of superb colours
and patterns. The predominant colour is red (or variations of this) but other colours include yellow, green
and blue. The agate is often multi-coloured and usually banded. Quartz, citrine and amethyst crystal can also
be found in this area as well as thunder eggs.
The fossicking field is situated approximately 70klms south
of Forsayth (Forsayth is 415 km south-west from Cairns), on
Robin Hood Station. The owners the Terry Family run
around 10,000 head of Brahman cattle on their 1284 square
kilometre property, (often cattle will wander through the
camp site at night munching on butterfly pea plant that
grows along the border of the camp). The Newcastle Ranges
flank the eastern boundary with sandstone escarpments in
the west, a rugged but picturesque county. The water supply
in the area is kept at a constant level by several springs that
dot the property. Also on the property you will be able to
experience The Cobbold Gorge Tours. I have been told by
those who have had the opportunity to do the tour that it is a
truly awesome and unforgettable experience. Even if you are not interested in fossicking, the out-back
camping experience in the open bush setting with its scenic views and wildlife is certainly recommended.
But now finally the time for us to depart for our fossicking trip was here, I have patiently waited for two
years, (might be a fib about the patient bit) now the car and the caravan are packed and away we go.
Tuesday the 22nd
of May we left and arrive home on Monday the 11th
of June.
We took our time travelling taking the opportunity to
visit friends on the way up and also on the way home. Of
course with all the rain that fell over Queensland we did
not miss out on rainfall and had a slippery drive from
Forsayth into the camping grounds at Agate Creek. All
the little gully’s and Agate Creek itself were running so
we took the time to wash the caravan at the last gully
before the Safari Camp Grounds as the car had
practically covered the van with mud.
Jack and Myra Bleijie and their friends had arrived
earlier, so after catching up with them we started making
our camp. Reg and Nola Huth arrived the next day and
had also a slippery drive into the camp. But thank
goodness the rain gave away to cloudy days for the first
week and then beautiful days after that. The nights were very cold and we joined the camp bon fire each
night to warm up and to trade stories (some of them were very tall) and check out what
the others had found throughout the day.( If they wanted to divulge what they had
found that is). Reg and Nola have a love of crystals and Reg spent a lot of time
looking for these. With all the rainfall that had fallen over the north I made the
decision to do a lot of specking in the gullies and creeks to hopefully dig up agates the
easy way and that is by what had been exposed from rainfall gushing down the
gullies? Reg and I did have some luck this way but as yet have not cut these agates to
discover what quality we found. We spent a fortnight here and I am already looking
forward to our return in another 2 years.
Jack and Reg and family and friends went onto the Einasleigh Crossing from Agate
Creek to do a spot of fishing and supposedly red claw feasting. Wonder how they
went? Stay tuned for the next edition and hopefully Jack or Reg will give us some
insight to just how good the fishing was?
Judy Cosgrove
AGATE CREEK – North Queensland Club members have been going to Agate Creek fossicking since the 1960s. Many of the prize-winning
cabochons have come from these stones.
The fossicking areas are in a basin-shaped area of volcanic rock from the Permian age (280 to 230 million
years ago) underneath are granitic rocks. There are 3 formations; Big Surprise Tuff, Black Soil Andesite and
Thunder Egg Rhyolite. During the Jurassic age (Dinosaurs ruled, 181 to 135 million years ago) the
volcanoes were covered by Sandstone which has mostly weathered away. Agates can be found as amygdales
(gas filled bubbles) in the basalt lava flows of the black soil area and Thunder Eggs in the Rhyolite area.
Agate in the area was originally mined for Industrial usage but Tourism is the main focus today.
Facts about
AGATE Agate is a microcrystalline variety of silica, chiefly
chalcedony, characterised by its fineness of grain and
brightness of color. Although agates may be found in
various kinds of rock, they are generally found in
volcanic rocks and can be common in certain
metamorphic rocks.
The stone was given its name by Theophrastus, a Greek naturalist, who discovered the stone along the shore line of
the river Achates sometime between the 4th and 3rd centuries BC. Colorful agates and other chalcedonies were
obtained over 3,000 years ago from the Achates River, now called Dirillo, in Sicily
Most agates occur as nodules in volcanic rocks or ancient lavas where they represent cavities originally produced by
the disengagement of volatiles in the molten mass which were then filled, wholly or partially, by siliceous matter
deposited in regular layers upon the walls. Agate has also been known to fill veins or cracks in volcanic or altered rock
underlain by granitic intrusive masses. Such agates, when cut transversely, exhibit a succession of parallel lines, often
of extreme tenuity, giving a banded appearance to the section. Such stones are known as banded agate, riband agate
and striped agate.
In the formation of an ordinary agate, it is probable that waters containing silica in solution—derived, perhaps, from
the decomposition of some of the silicates in the lava itself—percolated through the rock and deposited a siliceous
coating on the interior of the vapour-vesicles. Variations in the character of the solution or in the conditions of
deposition may cause a corresponding variation in the successive layers, so that bands of chalcedony often alternate
with layers of crystalline quartz. Several vapour-vesicles may unite while the rock is still viscous, and thus form a
large cavity which may become the home of an agate of exceptional size; thus a Brazilian geode lined with amethyst
and weighing 35 tons was exhibited at the Düsseldorf Exhibition of 1902.
Many agates are hollow, since deposition has not proceeded far enough to fill the cavity, and in such cases the last
deposit commonly consists of drusy quartz, sometimes amethystine, having the apices of the crystals directed towards
the free space so as to form a crystal-lined cavity or geode.
On the disintegration of the matrix in which the agates are embedded, they are set free. The agates are extremely
resistant to weathering and remain as nodules in the soil or are deposited as gravel in streams and shorelines.
Category - Quartz variety
Chemical formula - Silica (silicon dioxide, SiO2)
Mohs scale hardness – 6.5 to 7.0
Luster – Waxy
Streak - white
Fracture – Conchoidal with very sharp edges. Info from Wikipedia
‘AUSTRALIA’S BIGGEST MORNING TEA’ On Sunday 17th June we hosted a “Biggest Morning Tea” to raise funds for the Cancer Council Queensland. A very pleasant morning was enjoyed by the 20 people who came along to support this
worthwhile cause. The table was almost groaning under the load of goodies brought along to be shared. The Club kindly provided the tea, coffee, milk etc. Many thanks to all who helped organise, set up and clean up the Morning Tea. It was a real team effort and we shared a lot of laughs together along with the work.
Our fundraising raffle was very generously supported by donations of prizes by Club Members. We had major prizes of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd and then a continuous draw for the remaining 15 items – winner’s choice. A list of winners will be displayed on the Club Notice Board. Lucky Door Prizes were also awarded. The raffle raised $167. The Donation Box yielded $86.50. Donations were bolstered by the sale of the excess morning tea goodies at $1 - $1.50 a mixed plate.
The total raised on the morning was $253.50. A wonderful effort all Club Members should be proud of. Thank you all for sharing your time and generosity. Gloria
SILVERSMITH HINTS FROM BRAD SMITH
SHEET & WIRE STORAGE
The more you work with jewelry, the more problems you have finding the piece of metal you need. My
pieces of sheet were generally stored in various plastic bags, and the wire in separate coils. Few were
marked, so it often took me a while to locate that piece of 26 gauge fine sheet I bought last year, especially
since I usually take my supplies back and forth to classes.
A tip from a friend helped me organize everything. I bought an expanding file folder from the office supplies
store (the kind that has 13 slots and a folding cover) and marked the tabs for each gauge of metal I use.
Then I marked all my pieces of sheet with their gauge, put them in plastic bags, marked the gauge on the
bag, and popped them into the folder. I usually store coils of wire loose in the folder, but they can also be
bagged if you prefer. I use one tab for bezel wire and one for the odd, miscellaneous items.
The resulting folder is really convenient when I want to take my metal out to a class or workshop. It's also
colorful enough for me to easily find in the clutter of the shop!
LITTLE BALLS
I often use little balls, silver and gold, as accent pieces on my designs. They can be made as needed from
pieces of scrap. Just put the scrap on a solder pad and melt it with a torch. Then throw the balls into a small
cup of pickle.
The only problem is if you need to make all the balls the same size. For that, you need the same amount of
metal to melt each time, and the only way I know to do that is to clip equal lengths of wire.
But there's an easier way to get a supply of well-formed balls. Simply pick them out of your stash of casting
grain. But before you grab for your magnifying glass and tweezers, you may want to do what I do.
Just pour the casting grain out onto a baking pan, tilt the pan a bit and watch all the round ones roll to the
bottom. Then pick out the good ones and pour the rest back into your bag for casting.
BUTTERFLIES
There's an exquisite collection of butterfly brooches on display now at the Natural History Museum in Los
Angeles http://nhm.org/site/research-collections/mineral-sciences/temporary-displays More Bench Tips by Brad Smith are at groups.yahoo.com/group/BenchTips/ or facebook.com/BenchTips
EDITOR’S NOTE Columnists and contributors required! It would be great if other members of the Club who have fossicking stories or expertise in
particular areas would share their knowledge and experiences as those who took time to contribute to this Newsletter. It’s better if
it’s not too long and pictures add interest. It can be a series of articles or a one-off.
A new Editor is also required.
Judith
A.G.M COMPETITION
Competition Closes – to be notified when date set for A.G.M, but is usually late October.
Entries other than Novelties to be delivered to club rooms a week before A.G.M, between 12pm and 1pm.
Novelties to be brought on the day of the A.G.M and setup before commencement of meeting.
LUSTRE PRIZE – Elliot Hannay Memorial
Single cab Min. size 25 x 18 must have back polished. Any natural material
TOOTELL JUNIOR
Single cab in commercial mount, min size 25 x 18, any natural material.
TOOTELL SENIOR
Single cab in commercial mount min size 18 x 13, any natural material. Plus a standard cab A.A. min size
25 x 18, any natural material.
PERCY NEGUS OPAL
Solid opal, freeform, any size.
KEITH & FLORA BARBER TROPHY – Restricted to members with two years or less Bundaberg club
membership.
Single cab in commercial mount, any natural material, min size 25 x 18
NOVELTY ITEM – Fred Horton Memorial
Any novelty or utility item incorporating rock. Rock must predominate
WIRE WRAPPED JEWELLERY
Wrapped, not chain mail, with lapidary item either hand or commercial cut
SILVERSMITHING
One jewellery piece, handmade with stone. Stone can be commercial or hand cut, natural or man made
material
SILVER CASTING – Roy Wruck Memorial
Once piece cast jewellery with commercial or hand cut stone, natural or man-made.
WIRE WORK – Other than wire wrapping
One jewellery piece not intended to have lapidary
WIRE WORK – Other than wire wrapping
One jewellery piece with lapidary item/s commercial or hand cut, natural or man-made material.
RON LINDEMAN MEMORIAL - Facetted stone,
Standard brilliant, continuous girdle, min size 4mm diameter. Any material, natural or man-made.
From Bundaberg Gem & Mineral Soc. Inc.
PO Box 386
Bundaberg
4670
