Slippery Rock Gazette

We are almost past the first quarter of the year and I’m still throwing pencils at the ceiling. I keep reminding myself that I would be better off with a dart board, but whose picture do I put on it?

I had just thrown my last pencil when I heard a knock at the door.  I yelled, “Come on in.” 

The door slowly opened and in stepped a lady  that would stop any guy in his shoes. In my case, my socks since I had already kicked off my shoes.  

She sat down, reached in her purse for a hanky to wipe the tears from her eyes. She began to tell me that she just had a new kitchen done, floors and vanity installed with a white marble and it was all turning to sugar. I wanted to crack a joke and ask her if she took sugar in her coffee but she was sobbing continuously. 

The sample she showed me released white powder when scraped with a knife. I knew the explanation for this was going to be very interesting.

She reached back in her purse and pulled out an 8 x 8 inch piece of white marble. She placed it gently on my desk and just pointed to it as she wiped some more tears from her eyes. I looked at the stone and it appeared to be normal. I took my knife out and tried scraping the surface and wherever I scraped, it turned to powder. 

My first thought was that something had been done to the stone. I began to ask her all kinds of questions and could hardly understand her through all the sobbing.

I finally realized that the only way I was going to solve this case was to go to “Cry Baby’s” home and perform a full inspection on the stone. I asked her if I could come by and look. She wiped the tears from her eyes and nodded yes. 

She wrote down her address and told me that she would be home in about an hour. She got up, turned around and said thank you in a Bette Davis voice and off she swayed. I couldn’t help but wonder if she was married or…. oh, never mind. I hadn’t had breakfast yet, so I walked across the street for a cup of joe and some ham and eggs at my favorite greasy spoon.

I finished breakfast and started walking back to my office and noticed it was turning out to be a beautiful day. So, I thought it might be a good day for a ride on the Harley. Sorry, my frosty northern friends, but this is a perk of living in Florida. We can ride motorcycles all year long. I went back to my office, grabbed my inspection bag and helmet, and off I went.

I told Ms. Cry Baby that I would be by that morning, but not when exactly. So I   took the scenic route along the ocean side and finally arrived at her house. 

It was a large mansion right on the beach. It looked brand new. I pulled up to the gate and pressed the intercom button and announced that the Stone Detective had arrived. The gate opened and I roared up the long drive to the front door. There she was, sitting on the front porch, still crying. It always amazes me what these rich folks cry over. My ex-wife used to ask me if there were life and death emergencies in the stone industry. Of course, there are a few rare deaths due to mishandling stone, but not due to poor installations. She spent a lot of money on this stone and if it’s not right, then I guess it’s certainly something to cry over or to sue over.

She ushered me into the house through the front door and, lo and behold, the first thing that hit me was all the white marble. The floors, walls, everything, were all white marble. I recognized the material right away. It was a domestic marble, but I cannot let you all know what it was exactly, otherwise I might get sued!

This material is usually very dense and should not have this powdering problem. So, I needed to find out why. She led me onward to the kitchen and pointed to the countertop. I ran my hand across it and felt a gritty, powdery residue. I began to ask her what she used to clean the countertop and she told me it was a cleaner the fabricator gave her. 

Aha, I thought.

She reached under the countertop and grabbed the bottle. It was your standard neutral cleaner which should have had no adverse effect on the stone. My next thought was that maybe the fabricator used something on the stone, so I asked if I could speak with the fabricator. I pulled out my cell and called the fabricator, who I happened to know. 

Long story short, after a half hour phone call, I couldn’t find anything that he did that could cause this problem. Now, for all my students from my inspection class who are reading this, what do we do next? That’s right. Lab testing. I asked if I could take the sample she had and send it off to the lab. She grabbed her purse, reached inside and handed it to me.

I told her it would take several weeks to get the lab results and I would be in touch. I said good-bye and went off on another scenic ride back to the office.

Three weeks later I get a call from the lab with the results. The marble sample I submitted had a very weak structure.  In other words, the natural binders in the stone did not hold the minerals tight and therefore would powder or just fall apart. I called the quarry and, lo and behold, they have had this problem with several other projects. They told me that they hit a section of the quarry where the stone had this problem, and they agreed to replace the stone. The good news is that the stone coming out of the quarry now is dense and doesn’t have that problem. Now to call my client and tell her the good and bad news. Maybe I should tell her to just put a little of the sugared marble in her coffee…NOT! Anyway, another case solved.

The Stone Detective is a fictional character created by Dr. Frederick M. Hueston, PhD, written to be entertaining and educational. Dr. Fred has written over 33 books on stone and tile installations, fabrication and restoration and also serves as an expert for many legal cases across the world. You can send your email comments to him at fhueston@gmail.com.