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How to Tumble a Tiger's Eye

Tiger eye rocks make beautifully polished stones with a gold color and brown striping. The tiger stones polish up well in tumblers and develop nice rounded edges. The tumbler allows you to stop the process at various points depending on how polished you want the stones to become. You can have any where from rough rounded stones with only faint lines showing up to highly polished and shiny stones that are smooth to the touch.

Things You'll Need

Tumbler
Polishing kit with coarse and medium grit
Pre-polish
Polish
Ivory soap
Water source

Instructions

- 1
  Set up a rotary tumbler.
- 2
  Add tiger eye stones to the tumbler and enough water to just cover them.
- 3
  Add a coarse grit in the amount of about 4 tablespoons for every two pounds of tiger eye stone. Turn the tumbler on and let it run for a week. When done check the basic shape of the stones. If you want them more rounded, repeat the process until you get the desired shape.
- 4
  Rinse the tiger's eye stones and return them to the tumbler. Repeat the process with a medium grade grit and water. Use the same measurements and run the tumbler for one week. When done, take out stones that are a quarter of an inch or smaller and all broken stones.
- 5
  Rinse the stones and put them back in the tumbler with a pre-polish and water. Use three tablespoons of pre-polish. Run the tumbler for 10 days. Remove broken or small tiger's eye.
- 6
  Rinse stones when done and then return them to the tumbler again. Add water and two tablespoons of polish and turn the tumbler on for two weeks. Remove broken or small stones.
- 7
  Rinse tiger eye and put back in the tumbler with water and a bar of ivory soap. Run the tumbler for a few hours. Wash stones when you are done.

Rocks & Minerals