Rock hounds help....please

Does anyone know how to find out what the melting point (degrees) of a quartz rock would be?

For example: What would be the rarity of finding a piece of quartz, from sandstone. that has an unburned piece of wood in the center of it.

Thus leading to, What would the melting point be to melt quartz which can consume a piece of wood that has no apparent burn marks???

What could have caused this proccess to happen here on Earth. I Live in Northern New Jersey and cannot find any info of the planet becoming that hot in my geoligical setting.

If anyone knows more I would appreciate the help, because I have that rock!

thanks,

Justmytype

(edit to remove caps from title)

[edit on 25-4-2005 by pantha]

Google comes in handy for questions like this. I found:

Sand (silicon dioxide, or Quartz): 1723 C

So that would be 3133.4 F.

You sure its actually a piece of wood or does it just look like a piece of wood? Got any photos? Sounds interesting.

K a quick question

Is it a single crystal of quartz or is it several?

I believe the melting point is around 600 degrees, not sure been a while since I covered it. But it should still burn the wood.

This site might be of some help

Perhaps what you are seeing is a piece of petrified wood included into the quartz as it was created. Petrified wood as I understand it is quartz.

Is this a quartz crystal?
Or is it some other form of quartz?
There are so many varieties of quartz based stones, it's an importatnt thing to know. Some formations take place at lower temperatures.

Crystal growth, can take place at temperatures way below the melting point of the quartz itself.

A picture would be really cool, and helpful..

Also, here is some geological info on the state of New Jersey.
Note the BIG differences between Southern and Northern Jersey!

GeoJersey

Joking apart, but couldn't his be a case like that of a "baked Alaska"?? In otherwords, the quartz acts as an insulator (lie the meringue of the dessert) and stoppped the wood becoming too hot to burn?? After all, the meringue stops the ice cream from melting..... Hmmm, ice cream.....

Could you post a picture of what you've got, I should then be able to help you out.

It may be possible that a hyrdothermal vein has gone through the rock in which you have found, depositing quartz around the wood. Without a pic it is really hard to say.

I will post a pic as soon as I learn to upload it onto a post. Anyone know any shortcuts??

Originally posted by Justmytype
I will post a pic as soon as I learn to upload it onto a post. Anyone know any shortcuts??

All you need to do is host the image with a free service called ImageShack and post the link they assign to the image.

Sandstone is a type of concretion, so it doesn't actually require quartz to melt. And yes, fossils in sandstone (including plant materials) are unusual but not unknown. Amonites are frequently found embedded in sandstone:

www.travelingtiger.com...

www.oregonfossilguy.com...

Perhaps the melting was a result of a lightening strike or a meteor impact.

There are glass 'sheets' or 'fragments' found in the Libyan desert. They are believed, by some, to have resulted from impacts.....quartz and sand are both silica....right? Not sure how the wood would have not burned up....maybe it was large enough, or wet enough to not fully burn up??

A search for 'libyan desert glass' will turn up some photo's you can compare to your sample.

[edit on 28-4-2005 by frayed1]

[edit on 28-4-2005 by frayed1]

Oh... you should also check the hardness of the rock to see if it IS quartz. There are things that look like quartz that are precipitates and can form fairly quickly. Flowstone (stalactites and stalagmites) and other cave rocks actually can cover an object within a generation or three. In Cave Without A Name, their railings are covered in flowstone (and the railings have only been in place since 1930, and there's a dead bat that's partly embedded in a stalagmite. It clearly hasn't been there for more than 80 years.

That reminds me!
I have (or had) a photo of something similar.
Some sort of larva, like a grubworm, embedded in
a clear mineral. The mineral was like a small rock, on the outside.
But cracked open, there was this fossil. It was really well preserved.

I'll try my best to find that photo, and post it.

spacedoubt, You mean something like this?

www.stonesbones.com...

SKibum,

No it's definitely not amber..
Too heavy and hard, no static charge like amber.
Did you know the Greek word for amber, is Electron?

Anyway. That stone, It's almost like a fossliized walnut was
cracked open to reveal an interior filled with a clear mineral.
Weird, I'm trying to find the picture..

It's almost like a fossliized walnut was cracked open to reveal an interior filled with a clear mineral.

Like a geode?

Yep,

A geode is the closest analogy. But it was no longer hollow..


[edit on 1-5-2005 by spacedoubt]

They have solid geodes, actually (where the crystals fill up the hollow space.)

Well, you don't really need heat at all. It may not even be quartz. It may an encasement of limestone where the wood has been covered with it in a cave like system where water softens and erodes the limestone and redeposits its as in the stalagmight stalagtite suggestion.

As in the case of many geodes found in this region, any foreign material can become entraped over time and form within the mineral deposit. I have noticed trapped soil and stones inside geodes a few times. I guess wood could be preserved due to the lack of oxygen present to precipitate rot.