MadMarshall
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Does anyone know ofany good resources in regards to rotted quartz? I am trying to figure out why the quartz is rotted and also why not the whole quartz vein is rotted.
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secondary enrichment and the sulfides reacting to water. Very little to do with pressure or heat if at all within the upper layers of the modern geology.
Lack of pressure is more like it.
As the water percs down it carries sulfuric acid with it. Leaving rotten quarts behind. Many times the Iron that is left oxidizes into the "rust" you see.
The cracks available for water to follow get bigger and lead to others. Typically the quartz is already fractured and where it is fractured you get the "rot"
The bullish quartz tends to be less fractured. The impurities I.E. sulfides create relatively weak quarts (calcite too) so it rots there as that is where the reaction is taking place. So, thats where you see it.In some float and veins and not in others. Thats the reason you walk over lots of worthless quartz in our neck of the woods...and tend to notice the rotten stuff.
Pressure and heat have had little effect on that quartz for thousands of years....the relief/lack of pressure at the surface is why it happens.
Oxidizing isn't happening when the original space was being filled by the silica fluid under pressure was filling the voids that turn into quartz veins ant the contact zones they create. The rot happened long after.
Shear zones and seam diggins' highgrade pocket diggins near the surface were all created this way. There is a big difference deeper down. In the mother lode the zone varies south of here they went a lot deeper and were working different quarts vein types but, the similar surface deposits remain and occur for the same reason.
Same sort of thing at 16 to 1 and Empire deeper cleaner more intact veins less exposure to oxygen and acidic percolation.
I searched both links for the word quartz. Neither page has the word quartz.
What is SECONDARY ENRICHMENT? definition of SECONDARY ENRICHMENT (Science Dictionary)
https://www.britannica.com/science/supergene-sulfide-enrichment