[Jewelry making - Article 00314] - Re: [Orchid] Good quality stones at a good price?

[Wayne Emery]

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Don,

    Yes, I agree with everything you said about the cabbing process. And
    stones as large as you are doing DO take more time...and it's
    exponential!! 

    Steve Attaway's seminal work on subsurface damage was done with
    quartz, I think, and NOT the cryptocrystalline variety. I have NEVER
    experienced the slightest bit of subsurface damage on the
    chalcedonies, probably for the same reason I don't get it on jade
    (interlocking crystalline aggregates). Nor have I ever experienced it
    on corundum, spinel, garnet, or much of anything else besides quartz.
    I do get some on Tanzanite and a little (darn little) on beryl, but
    this is just my observation and I could be wrong. 

    In an attempt to add to this excellent exchange, and in the hope that
    others may learn something new, I have found that the hydrothermally
    grown quartzes available in amethyst, ametrine, blue, green and
    citrine colors are FAR more brittle than their natural counterparts.
    I recently dropped a kilo-sized crystal of the hydro material on a
    concrete floor and it shattered into hundreds of pieces....with
    absolutely NO HINT of a conchoidal fracture surface anywhere!! None.
    For comparison, I took a large, previously damaged piece of natural
    clear quartz, dropped it from th same height, with only a small chip
    coming off the crystal. And every natural quartz chip displays
    conchoidal fracture, well-developed. The stuff is odd, and the
    physical properties are NOT the same as natural, in my experience.
    Pretty, though! And the subsurface damae induced on hydro quartz with
    a too-coarse lap is monstrous, much worse than natural quartz. 

Thanks!
Wayne
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