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Techniques for CollectorsFairly new micromounter how to mount salt grains size micromounts?

21st Oct 2016 22:37 UTCCasey Montgomery

Hi I am an new micomounter. I have been reading quite a lot about how to micromount. My main question is I have a few salt grain minerals for example platinum in a capsule. I've seen people put the entire capsule in a thumbnail box. Hoping for some recommendations on how to mount extermely small minerals. I have some micromount boxes from Shannon's minerals black bottom . I've been using 0000 corks for my others with clear elmers glue on black construction paper with mineral tack on bottom of construction paper to help keep the construction paper more stable.

21st Oct 2016 22:50 UTCGary Weinstein

Casey,

A friend showed us how he put a group of Herkimer "diamonds" loose, in a glass slip which screwed together with another glass slip. The crystals move free and it is very thin. Might be a biological or optical part. Maybe the company which took over for Edmunds scientific has some. Also a snap together clear plastic dime case could work.

Best,

Gary

21st Oct 2016 22:53 UTCKelly Nash 🌟 Expert

From your description, you may already be doing this (?), but you can spread a thin mixture of white glue/water on a small square of contrasting construction paper, mounted on a cork, and drop the grains on there - if they themselves are not water soluble. That only allows one orientation and you don't want to be moving it around too much to re-orient it or you will get glue on the surface of the grain. This actually works fairly well for very small grains, assuming you don't want to try individually gluing them to a cat's whisker or something like that.

22nd Oct 2016 00:01 UTCPeter Nancarrow 🌟 Expert

If you don't have a cat, a bristle from a paint brush (held in tweezers, dipped in a tiny drop of cyano-acrylate adhesive then used to pick up the grain) is quite a good alternative.

Pete N.

22nd Oct 2016 00:10 UTCPavel Kartashov Manager

You may to prepare micro-vials similar these http://www.mindat.org/photo-107181.html and http://www.mindat.org/photo-107183.html.

It is very simply to prepare them from glass tubes by fusion of one end on your kitchen gas stove.

You also may to clog both sides of tube of necessary length by pieces of wool.

Glass tubes are more transparent then usual gelcaps. And grains are movable within such vials.

22nd Oct 2016 00:18 UTCCasey Montgomery

Lots of great ideas! Thank you all I'll let you know how it goes add some pictures soon.

22nd Oct 2016 01:26 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

For mounting, I've used cactus spines and acacia thorns dipped in black ink. Also one can buy lengths of capillary glass tubing, break off any lengths of it one wants, seal the ends shut with beeswax or, for a more professional look, fuse the ends of the tube shut by melting the end in a gas flame. Shut one end of the tube, then pop the tiny crystal inside, then close the other end of the tube. Keeps tiny crystals safe forever, and protected from the effects of oxygen and moisture too, which gluing on the end of a spine or whisker won't.

22nd Oct 2016 02:36 UTCD. Peck

Great ideas above. Another suggestion for a "whisker" mount - use a short length of black fishing leader, I have seen black paper from a paper punched, pierced in the center with a needle, so when it is set on a peg with glue on the upper end, a tiny drop comes through the hole. Then the specimen is set on the drop. It looks good, but I will say it isn't easy to do.

22nd Oct 2016 19:54 UTCCasey Montgomery

Lots of great ideas. I think I will need to practice a bit on each on some extra material. Might try some of each. So many good choices. Guess it's a balance between preservation, functional (optically). Most interested in in the enclosed techniques glass, dime etc... but first I think I'll experiment on some sample material with whisker and cork style see how it looks feel about it. Curious on glass style mounting? Guessing mount it on cork after fusing? Read some on capillary like it but not sure on size recommendations on general sizes to pick from?

23rd Oct 2016 16:17 UTCEd Clopton 🌟 Expert

The late Allan Mitchell (MinRec Biographical Archive article) made little cylindrical cells for mounting groups of loose crystals from two discs of Plexiglas (the bottom either black or white for contrast and the top clear) cemented to a clear ring of Plexiglas tubing of matching diameter cut to the desired height. He cut the discs on a drill press with a plug cutter, used for cutting wooden pegs for carpentry, which left the edges rather rough, but that was the best tool he could find, and I didn't have much better luck when I tried shopping around.

Rough edges or not, the "Mitchell cells" worked very well as they allowed the crystals to be jiggled around for varied orientations but kept them secure. A single crystal of a moisture-sensitive mineral also could be sealed into one of these cells for preservation. All of the Mitchell cells I had went with my micromount collection which I sold almost years ago--otherwise I would include a photo. Anybody else have one they could show us?

23rd Oct 2016 18:46 UTCDana Morong

Might practice on one or two that you don't care so much about. Then make sure you can find the tiny things in case you accidently bump them and they go flying. Don't have a shag rug under your mounting area - never find them again! But who knows where such tiny bits can fly off to? I had this happen once, and you don't want this to happen, not to neat interesting specimens. Be careful and have fun!

24th Oct 2016 18:17 UTCDoug Rambo Expert

If I recall correctly, micromount dealer Roy Christinasen used an ingenious method for mounting grain minerals and sending them to his customers. He used a disc of black Lucite material about 1cm in diameter and only about 2-3 mm thick glued to a piece of clear Lucite tubing that was only a few mm high with a clear Lucite or glass cover slip glued over it to keep it protected.

I re-mounted many of the diamonds we received that way but kept the water soluble crystals in the capsules he provided. If I think about it I can try to photograph one from different angles to show you how he did it - unless someone else out there has one readily available. It might take a few days to get to that stuff in my work room, though.

28th Oct 2016 02:01 UTCPavel Kartashov Manager

Such plexiglass holders were made in our institute in early 70th for storage of Lunar regolith samples. A lot of them were made, so such holders were spread widely within the institute. In this one (3 cm in length) a few small diamond xls storing.

28th Oct 2016 15:21 UTCCasey Montgomery

Lots of options good ideas Thank you all! I haven't heard/considered many of these makes a lot of sense. I have to looking into them :)

Dana good call on carpet! :) I've also been thinking of logistics of moving such small pieces, hmm maybe I need to wear a mask while doing this so my breath doesn't make them go flying.

My first thought would be put them on paper fold the paper and slide them into the container. Still wondering on a better method. I have a basic set of

tweezers I have been using for larger kinds, but likely wouldn't work since it's so small.

Kind of a side note / question on tweezers maybe this should be for another thread, what does everyone use for "cushioning" to prevent scratching/ crushing minerals when trying to mount them using tweezers?

I've used lots of techniques not sure if there are better ones I'm sure there are better ways.

Used tissue paper / toothpick extensions, etc... now leaning towards rubber dipped tweezers might dip them myself.

I know they have micromount tools but they seem pretty expensive maybe not looking at the right sites/ locations.

Very open to other ideas.

29th Oct 2016 13:27 UTCEd Clopton 🌟 Expert

For an ingenious tweezer adaptation for gently handling tiny fragile things, see William Henderson's "Microminerals" column in Mineralogical Record 17:273-274 (July-August 1986). Instead of padding the inside of the tweezer jaws, Bill cemented short lengths of suitable rubber band material to the outside of the tip of the tweezers so the rubber extended beyond the tip. The rubber extensions grasp the specimen and flex around it, holding it gently even if the metal tip is squeezed together hard enough to crush the specimen. I immediately made one myself, and it worked well. Here's a crude sketch based on the photo in the column (I don't know about reproducing the original here due to copyright considerations):

1st Nov 2016 17:45 UTCCasey Montgomery

Very good tip on the rubberband technique and source!

2nd Jan 2017 22:16 UTCMark Andrews

Looks like I'm a little late to the party (as usual).

For things that can withstand being mounted loose, I make mounts shown in the attached image.

I make a sort of plywood sandwich with black card stock on the top and bottom and a microscope slide cover glass for the top window. The mineral grains are free to move around and you can jiggle the container to get a different view of them.

I used a laser to cut out the parts but a person could achieve the same results with a forstner bit to drill the round hole in the plywood and an exacto knife to cut out the card stock.

The advantage of this set up is that the mount fits in a normal micromount box and can be stored and viewed with the rest of the normal-sized micromounts in my collection.

-Mark

2nd Jan 2017 23:31 UTCReiner Mielke Expert

Clear double sided tape works well and does not allow the small crystals to roll around and damage each other. For non-watersoluble minerals and easier removal (just add water) mucilage glue works well.

3rd Jan 2017 00:56 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

Micromounters should always put a bit of fish outside the back door, to attract the neighbors' cats. Good source of very thin tough whiskers for mounting microscopic grains.

3rd Jan 2017 01:17 UTCWayne Corwin

Alfredo

Do you put the fish in a mouse trap to get the whiskers :-S

3rd Jan 2017 12:09 UTCRobert Rothenberg

Hi Alfredo,

Many years ago I used to meet with a guy named Kerry Yellin. He mentioned that he needed cat whiskers to mount his tiny x'ls. I collected quite a few and gave them to him. He was disappointed that they were all white. He wanted only black whiskers. Apparently they are much rarer than the white. (I had a black cat, but the whiskers were all white.)

Bob

3rd Jan 2017 13:48 UTCReiner Mielke Expert

How much is a black wisker worth anyways? Maybe our cat can earn his keep ;-)

3rd Jan 2017 15:26 UTCJeff Weissman Expert

I asked my resident grumpy cat about this...

3rd Jan 2017 16:25 UTCSteven Kuitems Expert

Casey,

If you have a local cactus collector you could ask for different species with straight cactus spines ( not hooked like Barrel cactus )

they are stiffer then cats whiskers...no grumpy cats involved. As Alfredo mentioned they can be dipped in black ink the ends used for the tiniest crystals and what is left after trimming for slightly larger ones.

Steven

6th Jan 2017 05:04 UTCCasey Montgomery

Good tips ! Funny cat thoughts! Clean look on design Mark. Steven, cactus is good might ask local nursery for spares from a cactus on its way out. Haha my Husky mix has a few black whiskers that might need trimming lol. :-)

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