Blogging from a Gem restoration and Lapidary workshop

With gems of serious value, when saving a few points is real money, the increased time involved in locating each original facet and repolishing it, is worth paying for.

Other than that repolishing is somewhat of a misnomer because a damaged or abraded stone is invariably recut and then polished. Even if a stone has only received light scratching and abrasion, that might be removed with a polishing lap, it is usually quicker and cheaper to recut.

Tanzanite, which is a relatively soft gemstone is one of my most frequent visitors. This material is not really suited for hard wear but inevitably gets put into rings where it quickly deteriorates into a stone looking like this one;sadly my work is only temporary as this stone will go back into the ring;

Much restoration work is relatively mundane and this Emerald qualifies nicely;
and after a crown recut;

This Citrine was certainly more fun, but hardly anything to do with me;It has a contour faceted pavilion that provides all of the excitement. I just got to reveal it once more with a crown recut;

As much fun as it is restoring a Citrine like the one above, there is considerably more satisfaction when a stones pavilion is recut to improve performance. Here are a couple of very clean red Spinels that were unfortunately not as dust free as the photog thought;and an oval;

Finally I have a more sad repolishing story. This is a classic borax glass filled Ruby, a customer’s stone, that was inadvertently put into the jewellers acid pickle. The resultant etching and whitening necessitated the entire stone having to be recut sufficiently to remove all the offensive damage. Luckily the stone still fit into its original setting;

Tony.

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Well, I do like writing that name almost as much as I enjoy mispronouncing it….

It is ‘better’ known as the iron rich Black Spinel which is currently gaining popularity being cut into tiny faceted stones as a black diamond simulant.

It is also lesser known as a simulant for Jewellers Black Onyx. Amusing that Jewellers Black Onyx is not an actual stone but a generic term used for almost any shiny black material. The most common being a dyed chalcedony but also includes agate, lignite, plastics and glass.

Black Spinel does provide a much harder and tougher inlay material and I recommend the extra expense when successive failures of dyed Chalcedony occur.

The first picture however is not Pleonaste, it is dyed Chalcedony that I recently inlaid into a white gold ring for a customer. It is a useful contrast;
http://www.dailymotion.com/videoxaixng

This Pleonaste inlaid ring has suffered a few failures with Chalcedony and hopefully I won’t get to see it again for a long time;
http://www.dailymotion.com/videoxaixqa

This Pleonaste inlaid Harley Davidson ring also suffered a failure with Chalcedony;
http://www.dailymotion.com/videoxaixrz

Although it’s very unlikely that Black Nephrite jade would be sold as black Onyx as it does have a different look and of course there is the additional cost. Three pieces cut and inlaid into this 19 kt white gold ring;
http://www.dailymotion.com/videoxak3dg

Just to show that I haven’t just been inlaying black stuff, here is some blue in a silver ring;
http://www.dailymotion.com/videoxaixon

Tony.

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I have no problem with having people watch or talk to me when I am cutting and have given a couple of talks to clubs and such. I have even cut in a shop window, so when a gemmologist friend asked me to give a cutting demonstration to his gemmology students, I agreed on the proviso that I could borrow a portable faceting machine as mine is built into my desk and my office is far too small to accomodate a 20 person class.

Although I was given months of notice and fully intended to cut a stone or two on the borrowed machine to get familiar with it, Murphy had other ideas. So as the day got closer fear and trepidation turned to blind panic as I found myself in a rapidly filling classroom sitting in front of a borrowed Facetron faceting machine that I had never operated before with the realisation that my dop wax and transfer block had been left behind in my office.

Luckily I had enlisted the help of a friend to shoot a video of the event and she valiantly offered to go back to the office and retrieved the missing supplies. I cut and polish my tables by hand as the first step in cutting a stone which gave me some time before I needed any dop wax. I was also very relieved to discover the ’stage fright’ pretty much disappeared about the same time as the stone touched the lap and I got to answer the first questions. I was happy that the Facetron proved so comfortable within a few minutes with the adjustments being nicely intuitive. I used
an Aquamarine and cut a Standard Round Brilliant

I didn’t have any prepared talk as I intended to just explain what I was doing as the various steps progressed and why I was doing them in that order. I was a little fearful of questions as these were gemmology students and they might have hard ones. I was pleasantly relieved to get intelligent curiousity throughout the entire demonstration, with hardly a lull.

I was reminded of break time by a couple of students, as the coffee shop was due to close, but they didn’t want to miss any part of the demonstration. I assured them I wouldn’t answer any questions until everyone got back and all they would miss was this bit going round and round and this thing going up and down.

The class was appreciative and everyone stayed to the end I did give the Aqua to the class instructor the next day, incidentally whose only contribution to the evening was to give me the classroom keys, tell me the students don’t bite and leave, raising my anxiety level quite nicely.

The only downside for me in an otherwise very enjoyable experience was the video didn’t work. My friend found my Sony less intuitive than I found the Facetron.

So I don’t know the finished dimensions or weight. The student with the closest guess to these at their next lesson gets to keep the stone. That went over well.

Tony.

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This is a B.C. Nephrite jade ring that I cut from a block of ‘Cassia chromite’ to fit the 14k white gold mount supplied by my customer.

Usually if I am called upon to work on Christmas Eve it’s because some very sad jeweller is in deep trouble from a last minute woops. The only reason I’m there is just in case such an emergency occurs and I have saved a couple of very grateful butts over the years.

In this case it wasn’t a last minute present but it was a time sensitive job. My plans for a relaxing day playing were dashed. Although not a particularly difficult job it was quite time consuming as the fit needed to be exact and of course the gold work wasn’t. Luckily Cassia Jade is B.C.’s finest jade to work with, it takes an agate like polish and rarely splinters like the other nephrites so I did manage to deliver the piece that afternoon.

Tony.

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Having bits left over is a quite different concern for a lapidary than it is for a motor car mechanic.

In this first case I didn’t do anything particularly clever but since I have some pictures of it I have to share. The first picture shows the checker-board cushion rectangle Amethyst that I cut to replace the original stone that had been severely busticated at one end;

And this is the square cushion I got from the remainder;

In this next case I had a couple of very bright opals that had both been chipped, the chipper/setter/jeweller had glued the chips back onto the stone and set them anyway. The disgusted chipper/setter/jeweller/owner eventually sold them to my customer. After removing the chips with an acetone soaked swab I recut the opals into a pair of ‘free form’ cabs that were very saleable and would readily and generously repay his investment.

I was left with a couple of conchoidal (like a piece of eggshell) opal chips that although pretty were quite small and very fragile. Useless for all practical purposes. In a fit of self amusement and loss of practical purpose I shaped a piece of lapis lazuli with a couple of recesses and then filled the backs of the opal with epoxy and fitted them into the lapis.

My customer was thrilled when he came to recover his opals as all his doubts and fears faded as he realised that his investment was not the risk he thought it to be. Being as how he was in such a good mood I showed him what I had done with his chipped off bits. Instead of giving me his useless chips he plied me with cash until I sold him my lapis;

Finally I have to share this 18kt pinball machine charm with a turquoise ‘pinball’. I cut and inlaid a new top to replace a yuck, piece plastic that had been glued across the top and had long since been abraded to opaque. Nothing clever from me but how often does one get a high score doing repairs;

Tony.

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For a repair guy this is the phrase we dread having to use with our customers. It invariably means bad news along the lines of ‘Great-grandpa was a cheapskate’ or hopefully something more diplomatic. As rare and unlikely as it may seem it is possible to go the other way.

Here is a very shabby ‘Sapphire’ that was sent to me for recutting and polishing, the scuffed looking table had been improved before these pictures were taken but not fully polished;

My customer was unable to get an R.I. reading from the stone and suggested the poor table finish was responsible. Immediately I tried polishing the table I was aware this was not a sapphire and did a relative density test which suggested the only possible stone this might be was a Scheelite, no wonder he couldn’t get a reading and no wonder the polish was rubbish.

Following the suggestions of Capt. John Sinkankas in his book ‘Gem Cutting’ I cut and polished this stone feeling much empathy for the poor frustrated cutter that had been desperately doing the best he could with his sapphire polishing equipment and ended up with such a shabby mess and probably a shabby paycheck for that day too.

Needless to say my customer was quite delighted. Like me this was his first encounter with a Scheelite and he no longer regretted the somewhat negligable amount he had paid for it.

Tony.

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For my first post I have to express my gratitude to Hanuman for giving us all the opportunity to both show and see what’s going on in the workshops, offices and stores of fellow Orchidians.

I shall strive to be adequate.

Tony.

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