Rimstone

A sintered pool ( sintered shell, sintered bowl) may be a depression in a rock formation that retains water in the dry season, or a limestone formations in caves or grottoes.

The sintering pool resulting from deposits of calcite. Underground acidic water leaches the calcite from the limestone ( calcium carbonate accurate ).

The water can evaporate when its flow is interrupted, as in the collection in puddles in existing wells. The calcite concentration, which segregates to the edges of puddles above the water level rises. The water supply must be sufficiently weak or interrupted in order not to reduce the calcite concentration by runoff and thereby curb the secretion process.

This results in time trough-like depressions, holes or puddles, which can be arranged side by side or one above the other and thus pass on unnecessary amounts of water to the next sintering pool.

On the floor of underground sinter basins are mostly fragments of stalactites and pea -like beads ( Pisoide, cave pearls ) and small cylinders that emerged from small fragments. The inside of the sinter basin is porous and highly crystalline in general. Your outer sides have a smooth surface. At the edge of the pool sometimes grow grape-like concretions and chandelier shaped stalagmites.

Examples of sintered pool

• France, Auvergne: Puy -de- Dôme, Charbonnières- les- Vieilles, Gour de Tazenat
• France: Rhône- Alpes Ardeche, Saint -Marcel d'Ardèche - Gours de la grotte Saint -Marcel
• Italy, Tuscany Saturnia - Cascate del Mulino
• Slovakia: Slovak Karst, in the Domicahöhle ( Jaskyňa Domica ) in the course of the river Styx
• Slovenia: Škocjanske Jame Reka at St. Kanzian (now Škocjan in Divača )
• Turkey: Pamukkale
• USA: Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone National Park

Sinter pools in the caves Skocijan

Sinter basin of Mammoth Hot springs

Sinter basin at the source of Huveaune