4 years, 7 months ago-
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25 years ago I became an avid faceter. Unfortunately after 5 years life happens and faceting went the wayside until recently. Now, suddenly its the future! I am dying to see what all has changed. I’ve started playing around with a few things, but there’s so much new shiny stuff out there I’d love to hear what modern stuff you are all having success with.
The way I always cut stones was steel plates with diamond to 1200, a Raytech nubond at 1200 (THe Gearloose D’lite’s seem to be the modern equivelant) then polish on either ceramic with 100k spray (and graphite powder sometimes) or an ultralap with the ceramic as the backing plate. The only thing I really was unhappy with was the few facets on every topaz that would scratch and be a pain. So I ordered a Gearloose Diamatrix and some 10oK diamond crayon. The next topaz? Beautiful. Of course . the diamatrix.. is .. really .slow. Unless I was completely using it wrong.
Oh, and a credit to the workmanship of our equipment and supplies…. Even my 20 year old Spectra Ultralaps were still good, and all my equipment still works well.
Welcome back to the new world of faceting 🙂
Just a note that the D’lite laps are from Marsh Howard, not Gearloose. Both suppliers make fine products, though everyone has their own preferences. I would guess that the reason you find the Diamatrix slow is insufficient prepolish. I prepolish on BATT with 3K. Some people prefer Gearloose Zinc with 8K.Oh, no S**t, that’s what the LL stands for on the D-lite’s. See? That’s how new I am to all these technological advancements and new manufacturers.
Ok, I took your advice and bought one of the 3000 grit d-lites. That does speed the polishing up quite a bit on the diamatrix. I might have to try the 8000 grit d-lite as well. Good call 🙂
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