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Rock tumbling is a great family activity – and that’s the way the hobby should be done.

Children under age 14 require adult help and supervision. They will need help following the instructions, help opening tumbler barrels with small hands, and 100% supervision because a rock tumbler has a motor that is powered by electricity. An adult might also be needed to clean up an accidental spill.

Each step in the rock tumbling process takes about seven days. So many parents, grandparents or other supervising adults often set aside a special time of the week – like Saturday morning – to tend to their rock tumbler. After you, the adult, know what you are doing, changing a rock tumbler from one step to another will take less than an hour (more if your kids want to ogle their rocks – and most of them will want to ogle their rocks every week – it’s part of the fun of rock tumbling). Plan for a couple hours the first time and be ready to enjoy learning about rocks together.

The schedule of rock tumbling is very flexible. If you can’t tend to your tumbler on Saturday morning, Friday night will work fine and Sunday evening will work fine too. Allowing your tumbler to run for six to eight days (or a little longer) will not hurt a thing. It is better to allow the rocks to tumble a little longer than it is to cut the process short. Cutting the process short will prevent the rocks from being adequately shaped and smoothed for the next step in the process.

One thing that you should not do is stop the rock tumbler and allow the barrel and its contents to go uncleaned between steps. If you stop the tumbler and don’t clean the rocks promptly, the mud in the barrel will start to harden. So, if you can’t change the tumbler Saturday morning and plan to change it on Sunday evening, just allow it to continue running.