Is Limestone Or Marble Harder

From greek statues to roman baths it has been used for centuries in just about every possible interior and exterior application.

Is limestone or marble harder.

Limestone generally ranks at around a 3 on the scale while marble falls between 3 and 4. Limestone is softer than marble but harder than chalk. Groups a b c and d. Even though it is harder than limestone it is not as hard as granite.

This may be important for areas like kitchen countertops where there is high traffic. It goes granite marble limestone and it comes down to simple minerals. Fired clay tends to be quite hard and depending on the formula might be harder than limestone. Both limestone and marble tend to react with acidic substances by forming a gray or black crust of gypsum crystals.

Rocks don t technically have any concrete mohs hardness as they are mixtures of minerals. For instance quartzite is a harder material than marble making it less prone to wear regarding staining and scratching. Marble is often used as a building material and in sculptures. Granites have large amounts of quartz sio2 and other hard silicate materials quartz 7 mohs.

Most people are familiar with marble. Marble basically classifies into four groups which include. Marble is a very hard stone. While marble is slightly harder and denser than limestone both rate very low on the mohs scale a rating used to measure the hardness of stones.

3 limestone is a sedimentary rock while marble is a metamorphic rock. 5 limestone is more porous than marble while marble is harder than limestone. It features many colors due to the mineral impurities in limestone but those used in sculptures are typically white. Marble is relatively hard but not as hard as granite.

Marble and limestone lie at the opposite end of the hardness scale from granite. Minerals do have defined hardnesses though. Limestone is a soft easily workable rock that is comprised of at least 50 calcite aragonite and or dolomite. 4 heat and pressure causes the formation of marble while they are not necessary for the formation of limestone.

Marble is slightly denser and harder than limestone but both stones are relatively soft which makes them easy to work with. We can see from this government report that both limestone and marble are affected by the problem of acid rain.