38 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF ALABAMA 



Ground quartz finds its application in the manufacture 

 of sand-paper, sand belts, and in sand-blast apparatus for 

 frosting glass. It is also one of the constituents with 

 feldspar and kaolin of pottery and glaze mixtures. 

 In copper smelting, it is used as a flux. Finely ground 

 it finds its application to some extent for filters, and in 

 acid proof cements ; as a wood filler, and in scouring and 

 cleaning preparations, and paints. 



The commercial value of the crude product ranges from 

 80 cents to $3.50 per ton, and from $6.50 to $20.00 per ton 

 for ground quartz of various degrees of fineness. 



The kaolins, resulting from the decomposition of the 

 potash spars in the mica bearing pegmatites, constitute a 

 very considerable part of the dead material necessarily 

 removed in the recovery of mica. Competent expert 

 tests made at Trenton, New Jersey potteries on certain 

 Alabama kaolins occurring in the mica pegmatites, have 

 proved them to be of superior quality for use in porcelain 

 manufacture. A detailed statement of these tests, and 

 of the values indicated, will be found under the head of 

 kaolin. 



The above facts relative to the uses and approximate 

 commercial values of the pegmatite minerals other than 

 mica, are given as of possible and material bearing on 

 the question of by-product recovery in mica mine oper- 

 ation ; being an available means of possibly reducing mine 

 cost by their utilization. 



Statistics of recently augmented mica output, have 

 clearly indicated that by-product recovery has been to a 

 considerable extent an important and increasing factor 

 in such augmented production. Hydro-electric power is 

 now in the Alabama mica field at certain points avail- 

 able and will in the near future become increasingly so 

 for economically grinding scrap as also the above named 

 mica by-products requiring pulverization into acceptable 

 and salable commercial forms and grades. 



As a positive mineral value, directly and indirectly 

 associated with the mica pegmatites of Alabama, gold may 

 prove of material and definite importance. 



The original exploitation of mica in this State and its 

 first attempted commercial development, was located at 



