[Jewelry making - Article 00213] - Re: [Orchid] Stone Setting - getting rid of graver's marks

[coralnut]

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>     set a bunch of rubies into a ring and skated aroudn the inside
>     edges with a hardened steel burnisher. My customer pointed out that
>     I had chunked off a lot of facet junctions 

    It seems to me that stone setters may need more education on the
    relative hardnesses between  metal tools and stones and better
    knowledge of how stones react to setting functions. My students are
    constantly amazed when I grab a file and begin dressing up prongs
    holding agate, jasper, quartz etc. When I explain that the hardened
    steel file is at most a 6 (maybe 6.5 at the very top) while the
    stone is a 7 they begin to understand hardness.  Then I tell them
    they should never try to dress prongs or bezels with SiC paper or
    polishing wheels containing SiC because they are usually 9 to 9.5,
    reality begins to set in. 

    Now, if one should take a steel burnisher (hardness about 6) to a
    ruby (corundum at a 9) it would require some awful effort to chunk
    off a piece of anything.  It is true that facet meets are more
    vulnerable but it would still take a heck of a lot of pressure to do
    much damage (except maybe around the girdle where the stone is
    thin).  Now, if setters were educated to these differences, they
    could adjust their process to accommodate them. Would a setter use
    the same rough treatment if setting an apatite?  How about
    scapolite?  I bet they could destroy a faceted opal in seconds. 

    All you setters out there.....do you really know the relative
    differences between the hardness of stones and your tools and other
    equipment? 

    Cheers from Don at The Charles Belle Studio in SOFL where simple
    elegance IS fine jewelry! dcdietz AT comcast.net

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