Needing To Clean A Calcite Crystal...What Should I Use?

I have a Calcite that I obtained a few days back. its fresh from the earth so it is still quite dirty, I am not sure on whats on the outter layer of the Calcite, but it looks to be some form organic matter and remnants of its host. Soaking in water and scrubbing with a brush does little to nothing.

In the past I had been told to use Distilled White Vinager.
My results- most of the Calcite did loose all of the green plant life coating, yet the integrity of what was once a clear crystal was now qutie cloudy.....

Is the Vinager not strong enough or is it too strong? or am I just on the wrong path all together....?

As always any and all input is appreciated.

Thanks,
Matt

Vinegar will dissolve calcite, so I wouldn't put a calcite specimen in vinegar. I suppose you could do it for a short time to clean the surface - I'm not sure how long it would take to cloud the surface. You have probably etched the surface of your crystal.

I can say I have any suggestions on how to clean it if scrubbing doesn't work.

Andrew

I have not used anything to clean this specimen as of yet....aside from a little dish soap,water and slight scrubbing with a toothbrush.

its a nice specimen and Im wanting to get it as presentable as possible.
What should i do and use to make this possible?

I can post pictures of the crystal in question, if need be.

You might be able to loosen the organic matter by soaking the specimen in laundry bleach (dilute sodium hypochlorite solution) Take precautions to avoid contact with skin and eyes. After rinsing off the bleach, use a soft brush with soap and warm water to clean the surface.

You might try hydrogen peroxide if it is truly organic matter. I've been successful with this for lichens/algae and even loosening some dirt/clay. Don't think peroxide will hurt the calcite either.

Best regards,
Jonathan

Mathew, you may want to try a soaking in H2O2, good old hydrogenperoxide that can be purchased in most supermarkets or drugstores.
It will not etch or discolor your specimen of calcite. Just don'[t splash it on your skin or clothes in concentrated form.
Steve.

Best solution for my experiences is sodium hypoclorite.

Did you collect the specimen? Can you send us a picture of it? How large is it? Can you describe the geology of the deposit at which it was collected?

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Yes this is a crystal a dug up a few days back.

The location is Northern Colorado, just north of Fort Collins headed toward the Wyoming State Line.
The Calcite is found in diggings from an old Limestone Quarry, it has been inactive for sometime and when it was active all work seemed to be done by hand.....not any "Large" pits or workings, rather multiple smaller pits ranging in size from 1 meter x 1 meter up to maybe 8 meters x 8 meters at the largest workings.
The Calcite is in pockets within the Limestone, some of the pockets tend to be good sized 1+meter in length and a half meter in depth. Calcite from this location has distingushing characteristics.....Most have a "honey yellow color" that fades in and out with the clearer transparent zones and most all, at their termination have an inclusion of "red". Under SW most of the Calcite is a vibrant pink.....When under SW Light the Pink Coloring is "Phantom Like" and blotchy in different spots on each crystal...not completely Fluorescent throughout.....Still have not cleaned this crystal with anything....I have lots of other lesser crystals i will test with first to see what results i can get.

At first glance I thought your calcite was quartz, but I think it is a rather severely naturally etched calcite crystal. I think you might want to invest in one of the little fabric guns that almost all dealers use to clean their specimens these days. I think you could do a fair amount of mechanical cleaning with just the high pressure water that comes out of the working end of one of those. Beyond that it would depend on just exactly what else you wanted to do the specimen. You could use "Ironout" a commercially available iron removing chemical that is available at stores like Walmart to probably remove some of what appears to be "iron staining" and make the specimen whiter, if you wanted to do that. You might want to use a little concentrated hydrochloric acid on a little cotton swab to touch up any "bruised" areas on the specimen. This will acid polish away the bruising. However the specimen looks pretty rough and I don't think they will appeal to many collectors. If you wanted to go "whole hog" you could just throw the whole thing in a 10% aprox hydrochloric acid solution and let it boil away for a little while and see if that improves the quality to your taste. Doing this will give the entire specimen an "acid polish" that collectors don't like, but it might make them more desirable for your own taste or the garden. At any rate it sounds like you may have enough of them to experiment with and if you have never used hydrochloric acid to clean or "improve" calcite, it might be a worthwhile experience for you have.

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Post photos of whatever you end up doing!

Best regards,
Jonathan

If you do use acid, don't make the mistake I made. I soaked some specimines in my woodworking shop and anything made of steel ie table saw table and all steel screws rusted.

Dennis Armbruster

You don't even want to store your acid solutions, even if well caped and covered anywhere near iron objects. If you do, like Dennis says all iron objects develop rust. I stored some in a lawn shed and I thought I had the caps screwed on tight, but every iron object developed a severe coat of rust. It was amazing.

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.