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| HOME : FORUM : COMMUNITY : Archives : Gemstones Photo Gallery : Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under" |
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Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#1 @
07-22-05
, 01:25 AM
I have always enjoyed the challenge of faceting sapphires from Australia, since many of those have been fairly dark and difficult to get a fine color to show consistently. I have recently been engaged in conversations with an Aussie miner who has some sapphires of lighter saturation and a very fine color. This material is NOT "electric" blue or even "cornflower" blue. It is deeper in color which shows off the flashes from the pavilion with a very dramatic contrast, much like lightening against a summer evening sky. This material is unheated, very clear, as in little silk or other inclusions, and is very reasonable in price. The only drawback that I have run into so far is that it starts getting too dark to cut this fine blue when the stones approach 3 carats or so. I'm still experimenting, so stay tuned ! |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#2 @
07-22-05
, 01:27 AM
Darn, I forgot the picture ! Here it is ! I also forgot the specs on this stone. It is a Barion trillion measuring 6mm from point to point and it weighs .92 carat. I tried to get it over a carat, but I had to work around some fracturing as I was cutting the crown and had to cut it shorter than I would ordinarily. |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#3 @
07-22-05
, 01:28 AM
Ohhhhhhhhh, sounds nice Michael!! Please, please come back and post some pictures when you have something cut!! 
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#4 @
07-22-05
, 01:29 AM
LOL You were posting the picture as I was posting my reply. G O R G E O U S BLUE on that baby!! What size is that? |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#5 @
07-22-05
, 02:18 AM
That's beautiful! What a nice refreshing blue hue for sapphire. Very neat! |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#6 @
07-22-05
, 03:39 AM
That's beautiful! You always seem to get such incredible polish on your stones. Lisa |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#7 @
07-22-05
, 04:27 AM
Just beautiful, Michael!! Maybe you should do a sapphire bracelet next.... White gold, trillions, various colours? ;-) ------------------ Trikby (Not entirely serious but not entirely joking) |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#8 @
07-22-05
, 05:47 AM
Gorgeous cut, I love it!! Trilby... I likes the way ya think 
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#9 @
07-23-05
, 02:54 PM
That is a beautiful sapphire. |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#10 @
07-23-05
, 08:35 PM
Webgal, That sapphire is about 65% as deep as it is wide, (meaning the narrowest part of the girdle). Since it's close to 6mm wide, it's about 4mm deep. Actually all well cut gems, including diamond, have minimum angles on their pavilions which are close to the same, or about 40 degrees. You can squeak by with shallower pavilions, but in diamond they don't look good and in colored stones they really start to lose it. This particular stone has a very short crown of only 9% or a little over .5mm tall. This would make for a diamond that was fairly bright, but with no fire at all. In a deeply colored sapphire, these low crown angles will make the stone much brighter and more attractive. I'm going to cut another piece that I have of similar size and see if I can get a matching pair out of them. I may have to hit you guy's up for a BIG diamond to put in between them ! |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#11 @
07-23-05
, 09:03 PM
Oh! Oh! I'm having Vapors!!! Michael I love the color of this... but somehow I thought it would be darker then your description....What size did you say is the maximum you can cut out of this rough??  irish 
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#12 @
07-23-05
, 09:54 PM
Vapors ??? From the look of your avatar that would be either Vick's Vapo-Rub or Ben-Gay ! Irish, I wish that you'd get rid of that avatar and put the REAL YOU up there instead !  About these sapphires... the stones under 7mm or so will be fairly bright if cut well. I'm still messing around with some larger stones to see what they'll look like and I'm hoping to get an 8mm cushion out of one of them. I have a feeling that 3 carats is pretty much the upper limit for these, BUT this is for unheated stones and the fellow who's mining these has a process for heat treating that he says will lighten them. If this lightens them enough, then it may be possible to get something larger than 3 carats from some of these stones. Although I'd love to cut some larger stones, I think that those under 1.5 carats will be a really great bargain for those who want to use them as side stones, multiple stones and in earrings. This picture was taken with a ring light and so the light was entering the stone from all directions and makes it look about as bright as it would on a bright overcast day or under bright florescents in an office. In darker lighting the stone will, of course, be darker. The neat thing is that it never goes black as some sapphires do in low light. The bright flashes from this in low light are really neat, kind of like little electric sparks. |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#13 @
07-24-05
, 01:43 AM
absolutely beautiful Michael! You've done it again! |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#14 @
07-24-05
, 08:04 PM
So..... Michael. What would a pair of rounds run from this material, say about a carat each? |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#15 @
07-25-05
, 07:38 PM
Michael how did I miss your post?!?! I think a pair of those trills would make unbelievable sidestones! I can sense everyone fantasizing about another M.E. / DBL collaboration 
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#16 @
07-26-05
, 09:42 PM
CaptFun, The price for a matched pair of 1 carat rounds with this nice royal blue color would be about $1400 or about $700 per carat. This is for stones that I cut and in the best colors available from unheated rough stones. I can provide certs from the AGTA, but that will make the price go up. Smaller stones, heated stones and commercially cut stones are less than this and have similar color quality. The objective in heating these, by the way, is not to dissolve silk or improve clarity of a stone that started off as an unmarketable piece of gravel, but to lighten the stone. I'm not sure how this works, but apparently it does. I'll have to inquire further about this process. A word about pricing. Prices are variable and can be negotiated lower by allowing me to create an entire piece for a client. The more that is spent on the piece of jewelry the more I can be squeezed on the price of these sapphires, ( or any stone for that matter). Go ahead and give me a squeeze ! 
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
Post#17 @
07-26-05
, 11:43 PM
Quote:
In theory, it's fairly simple. The color in blue sapphire is caused by an intervalence charge transfer between titanium and iron. When stimulated by light, an electron is shared by a titanium and an iron molecule. Depending on which method of heat treatment is used, this reactuon can be manipulated to acheive a number of results. In this case, it could be either of two methods. 1) The material is heated in an oxygen rich atmosphere causing either the titanium and/or the iron to combine with oxygen, thus lowering the number titanium-iron pairs. This would, logically, eliminate some of the blue. 2) More commonly, in dark sapphires, like much of the Aussie and Thai stones, the cause of the dark tone is often large amounts of either rutile (a mineral composed of titanium and oxygen) or hematite (iron and oxygen). When these stones are heated in a low oxygen atmosphere, the rutile and/or the hematite actually disolve into the sapphire, giving up oxygen. This actually frees up more titanium and iron, giving more blue. But the removal of the rutile and/or the hematite allows more light to pass through the stone, actually producing a lighter stone. A least this is my overly-simplified explanation . . . as I understand it. Drop me a private message with instructions on how to contact you . . . I'd love to get the afrorementioned pair of rounds from you. stephen mickam G.G., G.J. (GIA) |
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Re: Super Blue sapphire from "Down Under"
I am thinking that that a pair of trills would look wonderful as dangle jackets for a pair of diamond earrings, or pearl earrings |
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