As a general rule, what is the smallest size rough gem that can be faceted? I’m sure a lot of us have a heap of bottom sieve sapphires we wish we could get done.
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That’s a great question Jake!
Small would have to be fiddly, but if the stone is good enough, I suspect worth doing.
Ratters, I am also interested in those cases you bought to contain your cut gems: look very smart!
I think what most people do is send those to Thailand for cutting, the name ‘Lamberts’ gets bandied around a bit as reputable Thai cutting place but i haven’t tried.
As for cutting the bottom screeners myself, I definitely could and I do have a few small gems that I will probably end up doing because they would be worth the effort but generally speaking I’m not excited by the idea! It’s very fiddly work when you do small stones and it becomes easier to make mistakes as they get smaller. I don’t even bring my bottom screen with me any more to the creeks because I only want top screen cutters so it frees up more time for digging when your not picking out dozens of tiny little gems that you wont cut.
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@Drystone That’s just an eBay job, a few different ones to choose from. Hopefully one day I will fill one up with Tassie blues but that might take a while!
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Thanks @ratters it nice knowing that it’s possible. I may have to employ the one sieve strategy myself, I’ve never found a top sieve gem but I feel I’ve got enough bottom sieve prizes to go for the glory now. I’m enjoying this feed an the amazing pictures, keep them coming!
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I thought that my luck had changed when I got 4 top sieve sapphires out of one hole in the Cascade yesterday, but they all turned out to be complete duds! Ahh well, there’s always next time.
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What a shame, beter luck next time. .