Repairing Asaphus kowalewskii

[kurdelmb]

While doing a little fossil presentation to a local "Intro to Geology" class I did it..... Broke both eye stalks off this Asaphus kowalewskii. Any helpful tips from you folks regarding ways to align and hold the pieces while adhesive sets?  And......lesson learned about transporting fragile specimens. :-(

[RJB]

If the breaks are nice and clean, it should be an easy repair?  if there are little tiny pieces missing you may have to fill those areas in with some 2 part putty and color.  Good luck.     Oh, don't feel too bad.  I once passed around a dino tooth in the class room I was doing a fossil presentation for and the tooth came back in 3 pieces. 

 

RB

[kurdelmb]

Thanks RB. One stalk is a good clean break. The other missing a tiny piece. I looked literally for hours on the floor but no luck. Surprising how many things looked like "the piece" ....  :-P

 

[oilshale]

17 minutes ago, kurdelmb said:

Thanks RB. One stalk is a good clean break. The other missing a tiny piece. I looked literally for hours on the floor but no luck. Surprising how many things looked like "the piece" ....  :-P

 

 Does not work always, but searching with a UV lamp can help. At least this works well with Solnhofen stuff - most bones and scales light up under UV.

I use some putty / modeling clay as support to align and hold the pieces while adhesive sets.

Thomas

[Dsailor]

If the broken ends look porous at all, I would pre-seal them with a bit of the adhesive you are using and wait for that to dry before you do the full repair. It is much like sealing the end grain of wood. But, then again, only if the ends look porous.

 

Dom

[Wrangellian]

13 hours ago, kurdelmb said:

... I looked literally for hours on the floor but no luck. Surprising how many things looked like "the piece" ....  :-P

 

BEEN THERE, DONE THAT! too many times to count.

Good luck with the repair. I'm very nervous about transporting fossils. We've all heard enough horror stories about careless shipping, dropping, etc. (I don't like to pass fossils around, either - every time I figure one of them will hold up well enough and I tell the people to be careful, pieces start falling off as soon as they get hold of it)

[Ptychodus04]

20 hours ago, kurdelmb said:

Thanks RB. One stalk is a good clean break. The other missing a tiny piece. I looked literally for hours on the floor but no luck. Surprising how many things looked like "the piece" ....  :-P

 

I test the alignment to make sure I understand what I'm doing first. Then a small drop of super glue and a short hold in place should take care of it.

 

 

6 hours ago, Wrangellian said:

BEEN THERE, DONE THAT! too many times to count.

Good luck with the repair. I'm very nervous about transporting fossils. We've all heard enough horror stories about careless shipping, dropping, etc. (I don't like to pass fossils around, either - every time I figure one of them will hold up well enough and I tell the people to be careful, pieces start falling off as soon as they get hold of it)

 

I only pass around fossils that either can survive a fall or ones that I won't be heartbroken if they come back broken. So far, I've dropped more of my fossils than the kids I'm teaching have.

[gigantoraptor]

On 14-3-2017 at 4:11 PM, RJB said:

If the breaks are nice and clean, it should be an easy repair?  if there are little tiny pieces missing you may have to fill those areas in with some 2 part putty and color.  Good luck.     Oh, don't feel too bad.  I once passed around a dino tooth in the class room I was doing a fossil presentation for and the tooth came back in 3 pieces. 

 

RB

I hope that tooth wasn't too rare? I once did a presentation in class. I passed a trilobite trought the class and a girl was shaking with it. I was happy it didn't break.

[RJB]

gigantoraptor:   The tooth was one of those common Morrocan spino teeth so I wasn't too disappointed, but was more careful after that.

 

RB