Guest guest Posted June 10, 2005 Report Share Posted June 10, 2005 Namaste All, In this mail I write to you a little about one family of stones called Quartz, I apologize for being long overdue in this mail, but Vegas gem show occupied my time. It is a common mineral from which many different types of rocks and gems come from, chemically a quartz is basically silicon oxide. On mohs' scale it comes up to about 7 , if I recall correctly. Now, quartzite is akin to a sandstone but only metamorphosed ( recall three types of rock formations from elementary science classes:- sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous). The metamorphosis is both in reference to mineral composite and texture is non-foliated in nature( like marble as oppose to slate). I believe that these are much harder than regular quartz because of greater concentration of quartz in it, resulting in more compressed hardening. Perhaps this is a factor as to why quartzite's break through producing smooth polish surface as oppose to rough and granular likes you get in common quartz's. Most commonly found gems in the semi-precious category of colorstones coming out of the quartz family are : citrine, lemon (or oro verde), champange, rose, smokey (brown, black, or lemon brown), white crystal and of course, the amethyst. Recently, a green amethyst is also being produced which is basically very pale green pastel color quartz. If these colors are occurring naturally ( since its easy to cook most of quartz to switch colors), it is basically the result of impurities present in the rock at the time of formation. Having said that, I would ask the learned to correct me; also, I can write more on this and related topics, if anyone wants to know in detail. namaste; Gaurav Jain Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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