Posted 11 years ago
BHock45
(807 items)
Hi all. I found this on my property while cleaning up. I am not sure what it is.... I do not think it is obsidian, looks like glass, but I have no clue. Any ideas?
Glass, mineral, ??? | ||
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Kind of looks like volcanic glass. Is it heavy by volume?
we used to find lots of glass which looked like this around the very old factories where i grew up in new england. we used to call it 'slag' and were always worned to be very careful handling it because it was often very sharp.
Probably silica slag from the fluxing process. When metals melt, most impurities float to the surface & are skimmed off. Silica is a common light substance that floats.
hey blunder, it is actually heavy. 1 pound, and is 4 1/2 by 3 inches. Would not float. Looks like the "slag" glass I have seen in the pictures. It is not all too sharp. Thanks blunder and ho2culcha for the help. Thanks sean tom and moonstone for the loves.
That is light when you compare to most metals & would float to the surface.
interesting, so this is a byproduct of the metal making process? could have been making steel or copper or something like that?
Sure. I'm most familiar with fluxing lead for casting bullets but also know a bit about other metal casting. A fluxing agent is put in the molten metal that brings impurities to the surface & it is skimmed-off. The slag is usually melted & lighter than the base metal & dumped to the side. Silica is one of the most common. Lead is simply fluxed with paraffin but there are diff. agents used for diff. metals.
This sounds stupid......But my Granny had one of those Fake Fireplace inserts in her home and it had these types of Glass coal in it and it would *Sparkle* when the light from under them was turned on. They looked like glowing coals in the fireplace. That would be around the late 1960's era in my Grannies home.
I still have a piece from her home somewhere here. It is the same as what you have posted here -- not sure what you call it -- but I have a piece here.
It was something like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vtg-Glowing-Amber-Glass-Faux-Fireplace-Grate-Coal-Box-21-high-18-wide-12-deep-7-/251365521986
Here's some old iron slag http://images.yuku.com.s3.amazonaws.com/image/jpg/e3936c247592f56a555c486789ece9f2f53eebc2_r.jpg
Yours look like it's bottle brown glass. Clorox bottles in the trash fire would melt.
T A
Is it part of a meteorite. It has that real glassy look I have seen it before I did know what it is called but it not coming to me at the moment unless I'm correct in the first place.
Don't know Zowie. Only meteorite I ever held & examined was like a piece of iron ore but weighed about 1 1/2 times as much per size.
well looks like a piece of the stuff my granny had on the top of her fridge & yes it is a piece of volcanic glass also known as obsidian but I could be wrong take it to be tested the one my granny had was approx 8" long X 6" high & weighed about 5 pounds I actully got to chip a couple pieces off of it & had made & pendent necklace/brooch & matching braclett for granny & every time grany had one of her card playing buddies over & I was there she would brag to them about it
dvstigs-stff and zowie thanks for the comments. I have to agree it is slag glass. I used to collect rocks and minerals as a kid, it is not obsidian. It is not very heavy either. thanks everyone for the stories and help!
It was just a thought I'm glad you know what it is
I saw what you wrote in my post, thank you for looking at my things by the way:-). I can´t really say what this is, but maybe you already know? It could be some sort of slag but the first thing I see in your piece is that it´s very shiny like glass, it´s also shows crystals of some sort, at least it looks like it in photo nr 3 from the left. If I compare it to by slagstone who is a waste product from old ironmaking it has another surface, sometimes a little shine but not that much and sometimes almost mat. When I hold mine it feels like a stone and they need polishing to be as shiny as the one in the pendant i posted. They don´t show chrystals like I Think I see in yours. But it was very high quality iron core they used here and I don´t know how that effects the slag and it´s surface. Yours looks like glass to me but could be some sort of other slag. Hope you understand any of this, hard subject to write about in another language...
I ment to write "iron ore".