Mineral Oil

[antmike915]

How many of you have soaked any of your artifacts in mineral oil? Some of the ones I have dry up quickly, turns some white chert to grey or black, and I've noticed that the thinner points hold it better. There are a few coral points I soaked over 5 years ago and it looked like I did it yesterday and 1 happens to be my avatar and another my profile picture, kind of weird how that works.

 

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[newnan man]

I use it on some Florida points. They will get chalky and dull looking otherwise.

 

[antmike915]

This Hardee (avatar picture)was one of the few I experimented with, the main reason was during my digging days I was trying to bust a root with my shovel and this was laying right underneath, the shovel dinged it twice close to tip and the actual tip. Needless to say I took my time digging and cutting the roots after that.

 

[tnmudman]

Wow thats sick. What a jewel though still. I think I will try the mineral oil treatment, I have some points that have lost their original color.

 

[antmike915]

Out of all the members of this forum there has to be some that has used mineral oil on points besides myself and newnan man, let's see some pictures.

 

[sandchip]

That's about as nice a Hardee as I've seen.

Never experimented with mineral oil. Thought about it, but never took the plunge. I can relate to points hiding under those roots though. I lucked up on not damaging this one, probably because it wasn't that great a point in the first place. That edge had me going for a minute. Seems it's always the killers that get dinged.

 

[smallfoot]

You can melt beeswax(toilet bowl seals are 100%) and mix mineral oil at 50/50 and get a real good material for coating artifacts of all kinds. It works on lots of things besides points as well..just about any natural substance.

 

[OntarioArch]

You can melt beeswax(toilet bowl seals are 100%) and mix mineral oil at 50/50 and get a real good material for coating artifacts of all kinds. It works on lots of things besides points as well..just about any natural substance.

Love to see a Before / After!

 

[smallfoot]

Love to see a Before / After!

OK, I grabbed a couple of brokes and a scraper that have some water wear. These are Florida river finds. Some of our tannic acid stained waters are pretty hard on rocks. Some rivers you have to train your eyes for shape because color hunting doesn't work when everything turns orange. Hoping some of this light chert shows up good enough. Sorry for my photography. My camera is ok, it's my eyes that don't work so well anymore.
Before:


Beeswax mixed with mineral oil looks a little like cosmoline.:


After:

 

[OntarioArch]

Interesting! I see more detail.

 

[smallfoot]

It goes a long way! Just a touch on the finger tip was enough to coat all 3 pieces, followed by a wipe down with cloth. It works pretty well on lots of natural surfaces..things like bone, antler, horn,wood, even leather fair well with it as a preservative. The oil soaks in well carrying the wax all over, then the oil mostly evaporates leaving a thin coat of wax.

 

[antmike915]

Definitely tell a difference, they don't look so dry and the thing i like is that they don't have a crazy discolored look.

 

[antmike915]

Thanks for the pics smallfoot.