The best time to collect Bluebird Mine kyanite ore is from late October to late March. Winter temperatures can be warm enough, sometimes reaching 80 degrees or more. Getting to the Bluebird Mine is not difficult. It can be accomplished in even fairly low-slung, two-wheel-drive vehicles. Angle eastward onto American Girl Mine Road. Although this road was carefully maintained by the mining company until , with the closure of the mine such maintenance ceased.
Because now it probably will be subject to unrepaired washouts and other problems, you should proceed with caution despite the width and smoothness of some stretches. Road to Buebird Mine Quarry. Approximately six-tenths of a mile from Ogilby Road you will drive past some small structures off to the right. They house pumps for the wells that supplied water for the American Girl Mine, a major gold producer. Some 2. To the right, ahead, will be two hills that appear to be separate from the Cargo Muchacho Range.
In fact, it is possible to drive all the way around either one. The easternmost, and by far the higher, is Vitrefax Hill. The lower one, almost straight ahead, is Bluebird Hill. About 2. Then turn left onto the steep, rough road extending from the flat below Bluebird Hill to its top. If you have a four-wheel-drive vehicle, you can probably drive the road to the top of the hill.
Just take it easy. Another road, not so steep, reaches the top from the south end of the hill. The first goes back down to the flat below. Take the second. If you do not have a four-wheel-drive vehicle, just park alongside American Girl Mine Road or on the flat at the base of the hill.
It is only a short walk from there to the mine. Find out more in the article below:. Is Rock Tumbling Expensive? Complete Cost Breakdown. The state of South Carolina has its fair share of minerals and crystals, both rare and gorgeous. You can find gold, quartz, kyanite, possibly even diamonds, zircon, corundum, topaz, beryl, and more in this state.
Complete Cost BreakdownThe state of South Carolina has its fair share of minerals and crystals, both rare and gorgeous. In our table below, I have highlighted the most important specimens and where you can find them!
Gold is relatively easy to find in South Carolina, primarily due to the Carolina Slate Belt, where plenty of known gold-producing areas is located. Kyanite is a rare form of beryl that is easily found in South Carolina. This specimen is apparently abundant in Greenville County as well. TIP: Quartz is one of the most popular minerals among rockhounds.
Did you know that quartz has a huge amount of its varieties? Check out the most common quartz varieties in the article below:. Plenty of beautiful, rare, and precious gemstones can be found in South Carolina, such as amethyst, garnets, aquamarine, tourmaline, smoky amethyst, cats eye, sillimanite, and many others. Check out the table below to see where you can find the most popular and precious gemstones in South Carolina.
Amethyst is the official state gemstone of South Carolina, and it is found predominantly throughout the state. When it comes to garnets, South Carolina is filled with them in its north and central regions. You can find qualitative garnet specimens in places such as Greenville County, York County, Anderson County, or Abbeville County and their surrounding areas.
Aquamarine is another desirable gemstone that can be found in South Carolina. Though it is a rarer form of beryl, it can be found in plenty of places in this state, such as McCormick, Abbeville, or Anderson counties. Another great gem to hunt for in South Carolina is the beautiful tourmaline. TIP: The Internet is full of cheap gemstones.
You can find there a lot of really cheap specimens. But how is that possible? You Should Know This. There are plenty of interesting, rare, and beautiful rocks to be found in South Carolina. In the table below, you can find out the best locations in South Carolina where you can find them. Flint, or marine chert, is found throughout the state of South Carolina, especially in Allendale County, where the Red Bluff Flint Quarries are a historic archaeological site where these specimens have been collected.
Long ago, the natives would use these rocks as raw materials for tools. When it comes to blue granite, it is the official state rock of South Carolina, and it is found in abundance in the Piedmont or the Midlands regions. Water is added that creates a slurry from which the — mesh is removed deslimed.
The new slurry is conditioned with several ingredients and passed through a series of flotation cells that remove the pyrite and micaceous contaminants from the slurry. Tailings from the pyrite circuit are again deslimed and conditioned with other reagents and passed through a section of rougher flotation cells. The rougher concentrate goes to a two-stage recleaning circuit; tails of the rougher circuit go to waste. The ore goes on to further processing in floatation.
Then it is dried and magnetically separated until the final product which is a raw mesh kyanite product. Andalusite is found the form of black crystals of approximately 1. The ore is drilled with a wagon drill, blasted, and transported with a rubber-tired front-end loader with a 2.
It is fed into a surge hopper through a Oversized material is reduced by hand with a sledgehammer to pass the A conveyor belt carries the broken ore to an autogenous mill, which consists of a large drum revolving on many truck tires. The sized ore is fed into a hopper, from which it is passed over a four-roll high-intensity magnetic separator. The nonmagnetic fraction is conveyed to the heavy-media separator, and the magnetic particles are discarded. The heavy-media separator circuit consists of a hopper in which the andalusite ore is blended with ferrosilicon slurry and then pumped through a hydrocyclone.
The specific gravity of the slurry is controlled automatically by a water-metering device ahead of the blending hopper.
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