Shane Degen, Secondary Education

1
McCrone Micronising Mill Methods
Shane Degen, Secondary Education Peter Jacobs
(mentor), Geography and Geology.
Micronising is the process of grinding larger
particles (such as sand grains) into smaller
particles. This is important because large
particles are too thick to allow X-rays to
penetrate to the particles core, thus not
exciting them. Without this tool it would not
have been possible to analyze all of our data.
5ml sample 7 ml water in grinding jar
McCrone Micronising Mill and accessories
Grind Sand 2.5 min Silt and Very Fine
Sand 2.5 min
Pour Sand One pour Silt and Very Fine
Sand Until water is clean
Dry Sand Treat with 10 ml Ethanol, air
dry gt24 hours Silt and Very Fine Sand Oven heat
105C over night
A stiff brush is used to recover the sample.
After which it may be necessary to use a mortar
and pestle to break up dried together pieces.
The McCrone Micronising Mill has allowed us to
more accurately and precisely analyze our samples
by X-ray Diffraction. Having a proper set of
methods gives a level of consistency and will
allow us to minimize errors.
We wish to thank the Provosts Summer Research
Scholars program for supporting for this
research, and Dr. Joe Mason for use of Coulter
Mastersizer. It should also be noted this
equipment was purchased thanks to the Upham Hall
equipment fund. Special thanks to the
Proper particle size (lt45 µm) shown to have been
achieved after just brief grinding in the McCrone
Micronising Mill. This graph was made through
use of a Coulter laser particle size analyzing
Mastersizer.
X-Ray diffractogram sample was micronised by
McCrone Micronising Mill