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Author Topic: carved opal from lighning ridge  (Read 9270 times)

Giel

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carved opal from lighning ridge
« on: November 02, 2019, 11:55:53 PM »
I bought this piece a long time ago as "gamble rough"  and I finally finished carving and polishing it.
It's very hard get a good photo of the colors, but it turned out pretty good.
Someone already asked me about the price, but I really have no clue what a piece like this should sell for!

Its a whopping 194,5 carat piece from lightning ridge. It's 60mm by 40 mm.
I carved it to show as much of the different colors as possible.
On the top there is a large patch of very bright green-gold that is just one big flash, also a small patch of very bright light blue-green, and a patch of very bright multicolor. The rest of the stone is mostly green and blue color with some potch running in between.
First two pictures are the front of the stone, last one is the back. Hope you like it!







colza

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #1 on: November 03, 2019, 06:37:49 AM »
It's beautiful Giel. Nothing quite like opal, its powerful colouring.
Cheers,
colza
I dig it.

sapphireminer

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #2 on: November 03, 2019, 01:43:06 PM »
Hi Giel you have done a great deal of work on the stone it looks good well done. Dave

Lap2020

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #3 on: November 11, 2019, 11:33:52 PM »
Hi Giel

Beautiful job with the carving and polishing.

I like the back of the stone more than the front of the stone.

Andrew

Giel

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #4 on: November 15, 2019, 07:32:59 PM »
Thanx for the compliments!

harryopal

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #5 on: November 22, 2019, 04:24:57 PM »
 A lovely piece. I carved a tiny piece about 3/4" high that has a robed scholar sitting on a stool and reading a book with a monkey peering over the shoulder. It turned out much better than I had expected and I am just sorry I didn't use better quality opal with some decent colour.
Could you describe the polishing methods used in the grooves and how you set about it, please?
By the way, does orientation of the stone effect the display or is it pretty good from any direction?
My inclination would be to set it as a pendant using gold.



harryopal

Giel

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #6 on: November 22, 2019, 07:21:30 PM »
For polishing the grooves I used a handpiece with small felt head/mandrel. (dont know how you call them in english)
I used a round felt piece and a cylindrical felt piece. the cylindrical felt piece has a sharp edge that you can use for tiny grooves.
Polished with faceting cerium. (french cerium?)

harryopal

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #7 on: November 23, 2019, 04:16:36 PM »
Thanks for the response. Any particular reason you did not use diamond spray?


And the other question was :


By the way, does orientation of the stone effect the display or is it pretty good from any direction?
harryopal

Giel

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Re: carved opal from lighning ridge
« Reply #8 on: November 23, 2019, 08:26:34 PM »
I have never used diamond spray on opal, I think it is to aggressive.
Cerium oxide works very well on opal.
For opal I think felt with cerium is the way to go, you could even try felt with 1200 carborundum powder for prepolish, but I have never tried it myself.
For prepolishing I used some old 1200 flexible disc that I cut up into small rounds and glued them on a small shank for a micromotor handpiece.

Quote
By the way, does orientation of the stone effect the display or is it pretty good from any direction?

In this stone the colors are pretty good from any direction, but that depends entirely on the piece of opal, every piece is different!
I could have cut it into pieces for individual stones, but I thought that was a waste. So I cut this one as a "collecters item" as it displays a lot of different colors and patterns.
« Last Edit: November 23, 2019, 08:30:34 PM by Giel »

 

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