Cat's Eye Facet Design

[MakkyBrown]

What I'd do is cut, then apply the dextone. Next gently cut away the dextone on the pupil to make it an even layer(don't have to), then gently cut any dextone off the bordering facets. I will send you the file in a bit. Please keep for your personal use as it is a concept I've played with from awhile and may publish it.
CheersMB

[Manficat]

Thank you, looking forward to cutting it. Ill give it a go once my lapidary club opens up again. Ill keep the design to myself of course.

[MakkyBrown]

Just a note, I haven't forgotten. I tidied it up and sequence this arvo. I will send it when I turn on my main computer tomorrow.
MB

[Manficat]

It's been a while, but I haven't forgotten to try this design out.
I had a go a while ago but then someone at my club must have accidentally broken it off the dop stick. I was forced to restart and am working on it now. I also got a bit distracted by jewellery making. I put a photo in the gallery of the first things I've made, all out of old electrical cable or pipes.

[Manficat]

Finished!
I put a photo in the gallery. Seems somewhere along the line I got some scratches on the pupil. I think it turned out quite well, and will look good in peridot. The stone actually looks very refractive too (although you can't tell in the photo)

[Bucket]

I agree Manficat, it does look good. I can imagine it in citrine or lemon quartz. You didn't mention what material you used. Did you pick up the scratches in the polishing or were they missed during pre-polish?

[Manficat]

Thank you!
The scratches came from the polish. Strangely none of the other pavilion facets had this issue. I used a natural lap and cerium oxide, with a $10, 3000 lap to prepolish. For some reason I seem to have a lot more luck with the natural lap compared to my precharged one. The material is quartz.

[Bucket]

Yeah, apparently quartz can be problematic sometimes, for some. Cats whiskers can be caused through contamination or even build up of material, I think it's called swarf. I'm not familiar with the natural laps, however I've had consistently good results with white cerium oxide on a pewter laps.

[RoughCreations]

Thank you!
The scratches came from the polish. Strangely none of the other pavilion facets had this issue. I used a natural lap and cerium oxide, with a $10, 3000 lap to prepolish. For some reason I seem to have a lot more luck with the natural lap compared to my precharged one. The material is quartz.

Nice work - and I like the design. What do you mean by a natural lap?

RC

[MakkyBrown]

Well done.  Did you try the dextone. Might be ok in clear material without it.
CheersMB

[Manficat]

The natural lap I used just looked like one of those precharged cerium laps from lightning laps, just without the cerium. You just paste the white powder mixed with water on. For some reason I have had more luck with those than the precharged ones.
I'm having a go in a faceting competition soon, so I hope this luck continues.
I didn't end up using the dextone as the cats eye actually showed up quite well. 

[MakkyBrown]

It looks better than when I cut it in CZ.

[Faceting Frank]

If you can cut cats eye Manficat you won’t have any problem getting a good score in competitions.
There is an article on page 11 of the July 2022 facet talk in the Australian Facetors Guild about polishing quartz. If you’re not a member and can’t access that info I will post what it’s about here if you want. All you need is a lucite lap to polish with cerium, going directly to that lap from a 1200 diamond lap.

[Manficat]

I presume lucite laps are those clear ones. Those are the ones we were taught to use at my gem club. I just finished the crown on this other quartz a few days ago, and didnt get a single scratch with my little natural lap. Thanks for the advice though, I'll give the transparent laps another go then. 
It would be good to see that info, unfortunately I am not a member though.
Does anyone have some tips for competition faceting? (or cabbing) I heard that cutting with high speed leads to straighter facets.
Thanks for all the feedback!

[Faceting Frank]

Lucite is those clear hard plastic laps also known as Perspex, but lapidary suppliers use the name Lucite.
The feature on polishing quartz was by Vic Winterford and it produces a perfectly flat channel free polish.
Sand the lap with 180 grit wet or dry sandpaper under running water. You will need 2 containers, one for a 10% cerium-water mix and the other for just water. Also, an artist paint brush, I use a flat soft brush 12mm wide and run the lap at about 300rpm.
There is no drip, so it’s convenient to keep the brush in the water and apply water to keep the lap wet adding more cerium as required. I keep the brush on the lap as I’m polishing, so I know there are no dry areas developing and turn the machine off when not using the lap.

As for competition stones, I get my meet points accurate at the 1200 grit stage, unfortunately there will be a few individual facets with their own cheater and height settings. I have a height gauge on the mast of my machine, so I can record the position of individual facets making it easy to have them correctly positioned for the pre-polish or polish laps.