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Anne Whateley posted:Why is she never going to wear it? Does she even want a ring then? I think what he's saying is he wants to make the engagement ring into something she wants to wear on its own merits.
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Mar 27, 2016 00:14
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I can't afford it, but would you PM me a price anyway just so I can assign a number to that feeling?
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May 1, 2016 07:44
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That dude's a dick, but if the return's been processed and he has the ring back and you have the cash back any attempt at forcibly un-returning the item is pretty drat unlikely.
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May 10, 2016 22:21
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If anyone wants to get some cheap color-change rough, I recently got my hands on some synthetic neodynium YAG. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNSTPEeiQwU Purple under incandescent light and sunlight, still purple but a little bluer in LED light, and totally colorless under fluorescent lighting. The change looks great in person, and this material is really easy to facet.
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May 18, 2016 01:42
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Xun posted:OOoo, where did you get the YAG from? I've been trying to find a good place to get synthetic rough It's leftover material from a chinese laser-rod company. Here's a better photo of the pieces I have.  You can see the fluted edges, which is where they cut laser rods out of the big boule. The boule end seems to have broke off when they were pulling it out of the melt, and it's pretty cool too.
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May 18, 2016 02:06
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Looks like Erongo and Vietnamese (maybe some nice Pakistani0. At 2 dollars a carat you could certainly do a lot worse. I saw some cheaper a Tucson, but of course everything is cheaper there.
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May 21, 2016 19:03
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Yeah, setting tanzanite is fine, it's only a hair softer than quartz. Just don't give it ultrasonic cleaning.
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Jun 17, 2016 18:07
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WOOFDOCTOR posted:Is there something visually similar with better durability? I really like the sort of shifty blue-purple color I have seen in tanzanite. A color change sapphire or a spinel will shift between blue and purple, so in some lights you get that mixed color. They aren't cheap, but that'll get the look and be significantly more durable. If you're one of those dubai billionaires, color-change blue garnet 
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Jun 20, 2016 01:45
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Xun posted:And there's nothing wrong with synthetic gems if you want a lower price. Sometimes I feel sad about all the poo poo synthetic gems get for basically no reason 60-90% of the cut amethyst you see in jewelry stores is an undisclosed synthetic, after all. Literally impossible to tell the exact amount -- the GIA won't even give an opinion for amethyst anymore. As far as price goes, synthetics (with the exception of Victoria Stone, since that's LOST TECHNOLOGY) have the problem that supply is essentially unlimited, while things like Parabia Tourmaline or Louisiana Sand Opal or even Charoite are more limited in source. Try getting your hands on that really good ocean jasper at anything like the price it was ten years ago. Not that I'm knocking synthetics, there's a lot of really neat synthetic stuff, but the big issues with them in terms of value is mass-production and loss of perceived uniqueness in what's ultimately an art market.
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Jun 20, 2016 06:41
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With so little information to go on, and since it's not gonna be a real spectrometer, maybe a touchstone? Or a scam?
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Jun 20, 2016 19:23
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Of course, if you really are going to be a apocalypse prepper, you should build skills necessary for scavenging the post-apocalyptic ruins of civilization while also picking up gold and silver for below spot price. Scour your local flea markets.
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Jun 20, 2016 23:25
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Wow, I had no idea that existedquote:What is currently available as a used analyzer? yeah sounds expensive as gently caress. Gotta be a few k if that's the discount for a used one. EDIT: checked ebay, seem to be running a bare minimum of 10k to 12k if you want one that actually works, or you can get a nonfunctional paperweight for 3k. You could get a pretty big chunk of gold for that price. Tunicate fucked around with this message at 07:37 on Jun 21, 2016 |
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Jun 21, 2016 07:33
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You should look at the ethiopian opals being sold by Daniel Kinfe - he's my regular supplier and great. Top floor of coliseum.
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Sep 17, 2016 21:31
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Opals are prima donnas and can be individually tricky to photograph. Direct sunlight against a black or white sheet of paper is usually pretty good, though to get your camera to adjust brightness correctly you mighg need to surround your white paper with something darker (or vice versa).
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Sep 23, 2016 17:02
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How's the color?
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Oct 5, 2016 23:01
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How about malachite? Not super durable as far as gemstones go, but as an inlay it might fit the bill.
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Oct 13, 2016 07:25
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If you don't care about Be-treatment, of course, then they're pretty cheap.
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Oct 27, 2016 06:55
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Also sometimes the stone have little blue polka dots
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Oct 27, 2016 23:33
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I don't have much in the way of high-quality Be sapphires, but here are a couple really zoomed-in photos of a few of my bottom-of-the barrel quality ones I got as part of a parcel.   You can see the polka dots (also: various other flaws). They don't show up in all Be-treated sapphires (I think they come from little rutile inclusions getting heated for a long time?) but if you see them you know what happened  .I bought this guy just because it was weird:  (And I set a more peachy one that isn't very polka dotty as an accent stone here) Tunicate fucked around with this message at 08:36 on Oct 28, 2016 |
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Oct 28, 2016 08:11
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Yeah, I should clarify here that my low-grade ones shouldn't be taken as indicative of anything about high-end be-treated sapphires, except to give some examples of the possible color range
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Oct 28, 2016 20:58
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I'm the person running the christmas goon giftsellers thread this year. Mostly etsy goons, but that's not a rule or anything. Anyone interested in being part of it?
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Nov 26, 2016 22:56
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goodness posted:Link it please We're currently arranging things in the etsy thread. Last year's thread is here; I'm going to be following the same formula. Gonna put up the thread and buy a banner once we have 4 shops in it, just so it doesn't seem like I'm buying 'christmas goon' ads which only link to my shop.
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Nov 27, 2016 02:42
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Thread is up. Figured it would be best to have it running for cyber monday. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3799626
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Nov 28, 2016 10:39
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JohnnyRnR posted:I'll be back tomorrow to post a few photos of Rwandan amethysts that are just entering the market this year. They are amazing. Expecting to see any at Tucson?
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Dec 30, 2016 06:45
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JohnnyRnR posted:
The peripheral effects will be pretty nice as well - I'm already having less issues with customs and I don't even deal with Burmese stones.
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Dec 30, 2016 09:04
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Dienes posted:That's it! Holy cow, that price tag is a bit more than I expected. It was less on ebay last year http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-STERLING-SILVER-DRAGON-SERPENT-RING-HOLDING-MYSTICAL-AMETHYST-BALL-UMA/251928943262 (but that one sold) EDIT: another sold one on rubylane: https://www.rubylane.com/item/635099-R-1469/Natural-Amethyst-Dragon-Ring-Sterling-Silver Edit: and another on liveauctioneers for $15 https://new.liveauctioneers.com/item/32097238 Mass-produced so probably there are a lot more running around if you can sift through the right search terms. Prolly can expect a new one to show up every year or so as well. That Etsy seller is a low-information person just starting out, so there's a good chance you can negotiate the price down to something far more reasonable. Tunicate fucked around with this message at 02:55 on Dec 31, 2016 |
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Dec 31, 2016 02:18
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Arkanomen posted:I'm reading through the thread, so forgive me if i'm retreading ground, but are there any good resources for rough gemstone pricing, appraisal and selling. I personally can't give much in the way of hard-and-fast rules, but instead of just wildly guessing you can search ebay's 'sold' listings (which I think go back 3 months?), compare against other material with similar size/color/clarity, and get a feel for the current going rate.
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Jan 12, 2017 00:42
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Hoover Dam posted:Are the "chocolate" ones just a scam to sell less desirably colored ones? Desirability is a creation of marketing, so no more than diamonds themselves being a scam.
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Jan 16, 2017 23:12
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Anyone interested in a tucson meetup?
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Jan 23, 2017 18:21
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Both days look good for me!
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Jan 26, 2017 05:12
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Xun posted:My gem prof says normies can't even get into the good shows with all the cool gem rough and stuff. Heh, by 'good shows' he's talking about the shows that suck to buy low-end stuff and cool rough. Because they feature primarily high-end already-cut material, and things from the retail side of the business. But if you do want to get into the high-end shows to look around, filling out the paperwork can be a huge pain in the rear end... unless you get into AGTA first, because it seems that having an AGTA badge in your name is sufficient evidence that you're not a normie, and AGTA is pretty easy to get into. Overall, I've generally had a lot more luck with Kino, Pueblo, Day's Inn, Granada, 22nd street, the Miner's Coop, and JGX. You'll often have to high grade out the best pieces of rough from a big pile, but the prices are way lower and there's a lot of variety. What are you looking for in particular? Tunicate fucked around with this message at 08:30 on Feb 6, 2017 |
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Feb 6, 2017 07:51
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Niiiiiiiiice.
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Jun 23, 2017 21:54
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fps_bill posted:Is there a chart or spreadsheet that will tell you about what a chain should weigh based off of karat, length, and width? It varies so much based on style that you can't really say just from those three numbers.
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Sep 25, 2017 03:38
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fps_bill posted:I figured as much. I'm looking at rope chains and weights are all over the place. I really don't want to get a hollow chain and when searching the used market sometimes that isn't always known/listed. He probably buys them by weight
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Sep 25, 2017 18:02
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Xun posted:My jeweler skills are "I am actually a CS student" so its not looking good lol. I've been talking to some custom goldsmiths around here and quotes have been like 300$ for a setting because my stone was 6.1mm wide instead of 6.0. I bet the stone isn't even worth 300$ If you're interested, I've got a silversmith friend who casts sterling settings. They aren't gonna be custom for the stone, but he should have ones that take 6ish mm gems - silver's a lot more flexible than gold. Dunno how valuable that is to you since he's in the US but I can give you contact info.
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Oct 26, 2017 21:43
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Goodpancakes posted:Im looking to land a nice lab ruby, 1/3 of a carat, round cut. What are the preferred purveyors of lab gem stones? That's what, 4 mm? I dunno, but you can probably get one on ebay for fifty cents. I mean, it's a synthetic corundum, they're pretty interchangeable aside from color. Is there anything in particular that you care about? EDIT: If you just want a random link, you can get 10 4 mm rubies for 3 dollars + shipping from these guys Tunicate fucked around with this message at 10:21 on Dec 21, 2017 |
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Dec 21, 2017 10:16
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