Have you ever wondered what combination of crystal forms were needed to create those unique pyrite crystals? What about other minerals in the isometric system? Below are some combinations of 2 and 3 isometric crystal forms that should help you interpret some complex crystals and assign the proper faces (I made each series using KRISTALL2000).Pyritohedron - Octahedron Crystal CombosPyritohedron - Cube Crystal CombosOctahedron - Cube Crystal Combos..

The photos have been removed from the locality pages, but they are still in the Mindat database, as part of the personal galleries.Click on them to get to the full description.146167146158146159146163146165146168146170153370226348258643258644258652261928296193

The same methods described below can also be used to clean other hard durable minerals like beryl, spinel, chrysoberyl etc.Probably the most commonly requested information about cleaning mineral specimens is for information about how to clean quartz crystals. Quartz crystals are pretty tough customers and you can clean them pretty aggressively, both by mechanical and chemical means. By that I mean you can go after most of them with a stiff brush ..

The following advice is aimed at beginning mineral collectors. This is the advice that I wish somebody had told me when I was starting out. Sadly, these lessons were discovered through experience. Every experienced collector will tell you the same advice, though perhaps in a different way.Keep those labels.Labels are important to your collection. They are the only evidence to distinguish an ordinary green tourmaline from Brazil from that rare tou..

Originally Published in Four Installments by the New York Mineralogical ClubAs promised this article is first in a series on how to clean mineral specimens. Many specimens collected in the field do not look like the ones that dealers are selling. Most collectors become discouraged or frustrated. These articles will give a few simple techniques clean the pieces you collect.Oxalic AcidAnything that has the word “acid“ sounds ominous. But oxalic a..