Bucket of Australian Opal
Special Thanks to Graham of GemOpal from Opalauctions.com .
Come and see what beauty gets discovered as we expose the layers of Opal and venture into many new product areas. The pictures below show a progressive cutting and polishing by hand and only a letter opener, a bowl of water, A dremel black diamond cleaning stone, a nylon bristle wheel, one diamond bit and a felt wheel with a touch of cerium oxide. With the size of these chunks, I don't need a dopstick. These are alot of fun to work.
The first set of pictures:
I like working the opal in this fashion because of the possibilities, Inlay material, New Jewelry ideas, New displays of art and the faces you see just in the crusts is captivating. So for $66.00, Graham sent me 4 kilos of this material and I sent him a few extra dollars to pay for some cold ones and did this web page for him.
A little bit at a time is being removed as I move from one project to the next...
More of the Mysterious content is revealed...
The layers you are looking at are now about 1mm thick and it is nice to have the edge view of the opal, because it shows the depth of the fireline.