Thought I’d have a crack at growing my own crystals, below are my first time results. They have been put in one of my terrariums.
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What salt are they?
Did you grow by evaporation or cooling m
Ciao
Simon
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Looks like you are generating physically solid fractals !!
Delving into the domain of complex numbers, the mandelbrot set, imaginary numbers and j the square root of minus one.
Fascinating stuff.
What material are you crystallising?
. . . and how long is it taking for your crystals to grow?
Has any of this got a connection with Dark Materials??
keep on keepin’ on
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Aluminium potassium and evaporating in small containers. One batch tried to escape, making a run for it across the table. I am going to attempt some more.
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Aluminium potassium, they are very delicate. The fractal tips can break easily.
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Wow! They are impressive. Takes me back to my early teens when I made a ‘water garden’.
The solution was made up of Sodium Silcate, or as it was more commonly known, water glass. Water glass was used ‘in the old days’ for preserving eggs as it blocked the pores, stopping air ingress.
Soooo, you make up a solution with water, pop it in a glass and drop chemicals in it. The different chemicals ‘grow’ like trees as they drop through the solution. Different colour chemicals, different coloured trees.
I did try growing my own crystals, but didn’t have the patience for it, so only got tiny ones, not like your beasts!
Briill!!!
Cheers
Steve
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Diolch Steve, I haven’t heard of water gardens made with Sodium Silcate, but just had a look and I’m sold on the idea. These ones got popped into my terrarium to keep the plant company, but what I would, ideally, hope to grow is an elongated five inch crystal I can use as part of making an Adamcos. I have the wood for it but not the crystal. This may all be left to chance, of course, but I am all for happy accidents if they happen.
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Yes, it sure was fun. As a young teenager (ahem) years go it was loads of fun. You dropped the chemical in and it expanded to many times its original size, leaving a trail behind it, then it hit the bottom and carried on sprouting branches. All from my chemistry set I got for my birthday. No idea where you’d get water glass from these days.
Cheers
Steve
Blimey! Water Glass 40% Sodium Silicate R-145 | liquid glass | 50ml to 1L - Free P&P | eBay
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Thanks for all that you boffins. My mother said she stored eggs in water glass during WW2 and it always puzzled me.
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Oooophs ! Think now it was isinglass you put eggs into. Some byproduct of sea fish industry that sealed the pores in eggshells
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Yeah I think that’s a bit more likely 
Never heard of isinglass. I think both were used to preserve eggy weggies 
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What is an Adamcos?
My ‘heart’ was for having a project, even though I have no idea what it is. Wood and crytal…whatever it is will be cool.
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It is catweasels ceremonial druids knife.
Cat weasel was a 1970s kids TV character
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As Simon has so astutely pointed out, it is indeed Catweazle’s druids knife which hangs from his neck. Written by Richard Carpenter, who incidentally also wrote The Ghosts of Motley Hall which aired in the 1970s, about a person confined to a manor house who is accompanied by ghosts from different eras. Sound familiar? Catweazle is possibly one of my all-time favourite television programmes, and I still continue to rewatch it to this day. The first series was shot on 16mm film, which was rare for a television programme, so the cinematography is rich and dynamic.
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I don’t think I will be messing with you. That looks very sharp!
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Catweazle’s Adamcos is not nearly so lethal.
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Woah, they look beautiful!
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