thinking of making a rock mount? -OR- Lava Rock is really hard

[DirtyCoconuts]

So i was inspired by Subrosa's recent post in the LED ping thread and i wanted to use a nice round black lava rock ive had for a while....i knew i wanted it to be generally split in half and the holes would be drilled by me for a sort of natural but minimalist approach.


here is the sort of finished product, it does not wick as well as i want it to so i think i will drill some holes up into the bottom and widen the mounting holes (if i can...1/2" masonry bit is probably the biggest i have) and if not, drill all the way to the bottom for real access to the water

Grill stuff by J Solo, on Flickr


but here is the real reason for the post.....the lava rock...hold the phone.

i tried to use a chisel (rock breaker tip) and a sledge hammer and it was not enough force (me swinging the sledge one handed is limited) tried the breaker bar (6" iron spike for breaking limestone...just skipped off the rock...…...hmmmm


so i figured, maybe hit something with the rock....

first candidate...a brick


Some good green stuff by J Solo, on Flickr


NOPE...also notice how deep the brick is now in the sand

how about a 2' wide and 2" thick piece of landscape shale???


Some good green stuff by J Solo, on Flickr



NOPE

Some good green stuff by J Solo, on Flickr



finally i realized that a small breaking point was going to be more effective and placed a piece of the brick onto another brick and that split it


i was then told by my neighbor....don't you have an angle grinder? (he knows i deo as he has borrowed it) that'll cut through the rock like butter....