Now we're talking. Been looking forward to these sets of videos for awhile now. Best to use that Stylo I sent ya and a super gentle carve. I'm talking a very primitive carve so it takes less stress from the constant passes. So far I've had success on that one piece I've shown ya. Though that was the more orange / light brown material. The darker brown Menzo stuff is an absolute nightmare. So I'm just gonna treat it like the most fragile Ethiopian Opal I've been carving.
You'll have to brace yourself because there wont be much gentle stylo work during the torture testing coming up. The aim is to damage quite a few little chunks of the stuff.
If I can find the budget for a dust extraction and filtering system this financial year for the business I'll do some dry cutting on all material including ethiopian. I still need to buy the last silversmithing stuff and a few other rotary tools and flex shafts. Maybe I really should have done a go fund me for the silversmithing stuff like people have suggested... I'll keep thinking about it.
Hi Roy..I know u not a fan of diamond paste,but for Ethiopian,Diamond paste is best for stabilise and look..your super cerium is the last stage to finish to a perfect Ethio Opal
The colour in Ethiopian opal is gorgeous. Why is it valued so much lower than Australian opal? Is it the instability of the material, or the fact that it is not as hard to find- or both?
Both reasons, plus a few more. Ethiopian opal can absorb your sweat and discolour to a yucky yellow, permanently. It can crack easily if set in jewellery incorrectly because of expansion if its hydrophane, And the average wage in Africa is low, and kept that way by the west, that's political I know it ain't fair!!!!
Yeah you are on the money and so is Scott in the reply. If it was really stable price would soar, though the miners would see little of that money and it would become a blood diamond style situation most likely.
Ah the big stone is very crumbly so will most likely end up as many sacrificial pieces for the testing. There will be some good pieces to cab up the right way as well though.
Mostly true but I do know people that have been successful with it so I'll be trying to get one good one eventually and show people how to boost their odds of success.
Cool. Cant wait to see the next experiment. I bought two of these after i saw your original video. Ones just been sitting in the state it came in. The other one i broke up into little pieces and tried to polish with mixed results. Want to see what worked or didn't for you.
I'm an opalholic , I can't help myself, I can't stop buying, trying to find that piece with awesome colour and patterns, I've tried weening myself off with labradorite , doesn't work. I hoard all the opals I cut, even when I've set them in silver, I still can't bear to see them leave There is no hope apart from lightning ridge, / lambina /coober p/ white cliffs,, etc etc Help!!!!! 😂😂😂😂😂 Just found your channel, really good videos Thanks
Haha join the club (well seems like you are already a member, maybe even a senior one). I think opal is a terminal illness unfortunately so no getting off the train now. Very few grow out of it once hooked. Labradorite is pretty cool, like I find fire agate cool but it just doesn't grip me the same.
Very best of luck to you. I’ve got a nice sized jar of Shewa opals from 15-67 carats each. I tried polishing 3 of them, but they all crumbled like yours. I belong to a couple Ethiopian opal sites and I’ve been told one out of every couple hundred will hold together and polish to gorgeous cabs. Of course I don’t have the $ or time to go through so many so mine just sit in a jar now to look at (nothing else in the jar like oil or water).
I think there are mehtods to boost those chances hugely as Mike has had great results and works a large number of Ethiopian opal (cheap and easy to get in the USA). I'll be sure to show the good methods as well since that will really help people.
It’s a rhyolitic layer mixed with ignimbrite and other minerals. It’s very hard material. I’ve wasted cheaper bits and am very happy with the sintered bits.
It goes feel like pretty sturdy crust. Certainly not the real loose stuff which I prefer. You are right about the bits. Sintered ones barely break a sweat getting through the stuff. 💪
Cool video! I found rough opals at local rock shop and picked the best few with little idea what I was doing and a dremmel. turns out they were these or mezezo? Do you know how to tell the difference? I cut it slightly wet and hand sanded a lot of it, also saturated it quite slowly. I left the outer ring on going for a cabochon but turns out it may have value as a specimen. I didn’t know about the blues being rare in these but it is full of them in dark and light from light sky blue to darker purples. It’s very rough and odd shaped because I was afraid to ruin it but it only has the fractures it started with. Really cool to see someone more experienced cutting one, I have a few more rough I’ve got to get into
If you sent a few photos through to me at my email roys.rocks@yahoo.com I might be able to tell what you are tackling. There a lot of different pockets of opal around Ethiopia but visually they are pretty different.
Probably will because some of the things I am going to test I have seen work but maybe it was luck? I'll have to try more than once to make sure but thats okay.
Thank you, Roy. I'm busting to see how it turns out. I'm totally wowed by the colour of these opals. You sound heaps better. Now we can treat ya mean and keep ya keen!!!! LOL. Greetings from Dimboola, in Victoria, Australia 🇦🇺 to all you opalites out there.
@@RoysRocks Damn. I could have seen you! LOL. Been hectic here. I don't know how long I am out of commission again. The break in my wrist not going splendidly. Worst part is trying to train my left hand!!! I just get better for long enough to bust something else! LOL. Oh well. 64 years gives one enough time to be experienced in their field. I train doctors!!!!!!!!
@@nancycurtis7315 Yeah it was a big weekend. Had to get an ambulance for poppy and now he is in the Horsham hospital. Hoping he can get a transfer back to Dimmy but they can't find room currently.
I've purchased some Ethiopian crystal opal cabochons (poorly formed by amateurs) , all with cracks for resin testing. They're not the same material as what Pulitzer has. I don't know where to find his opal. I gave my car away to my family, so I don't have a car to drive to the rock shows in Tucson. So I'm missing out on the fairly priced materials. I've done a lot of research about resin treating opals as has Pulitzer. I'm pretty sure his method of treatment can be improved. Some day I'll work with a new resin to treat opals with cracks or that have the potential for cracking. I've been sitting on the raw materials for months now. I don't know when I'll ever get the time to conduct a proper controlled test to prove it works. Decades ago I removed oil from old wood. It would take me a year of nearly daily treatments to get the oil out. I reviewed the old methods and came up with a new material to soak up the oil. I bought two pieces of Ethiopian oil soaked opals for testing. But the opals that I have are nothing like what Pulitzer has. Your videos and Pulitzer's help get me motivated. I may try to start soaking the oil out of the opals. I can start it and forget and refresh it as time permits. A few ideas to ponder. I've found the original paper on why glass cutting with water works so well. It describes the mechanism of action. Lot's of videos on RUclips explain and demonstrate it. Water is your enemy, less you like cracking glass. Resin treatment before cutting might help prevent new cracks from forming, reduce the amount of new cracks or more importantly prevent water from entering the cracks and encouraging crack propagation! Avoid using water. Not using water may help prevent crack propagation. Use a non water based, hydrophobic solvent, maybe liquid silicone. Consider keeping it warm to keep water away. Or use a substance that molecularly locks up the water. Looking forward to learning the safer way of polishing crystal opals. You do a great job! Tks!!!
I should think about buying damaged stones for the stabilisation and treating videos. Would be nice to take them off peoples hands since I know they are hard to sell and they can use the money to try again. Saves me from needing to recreate the issues so I can play with those damaged stones. I do have water methods that work, silicone oils are a great cutting fluid but the cleanup and mess is a bit of a deal breaker. Cracks dont need to form and if they are already there I'd rather just make the split prior to trying to shape a stone. I will cover treatments but they are way down the list of priorities as I would rather show people methods to avoid the need for treatments first.
I don't blame you for not messing about demonstrating how to remove oil or water from opals and demonstrating how to resin treat them. It's not top shelf material. I do believe and I think Pulitzer does as well, that there are beautiful pieces of Ethiopian opals that can't be fully appreciated unless they have been resin treated after water or oil removal. The same goes for turquoise. Today nearly all turquoise is resin treated. If they weren't we wouldn't have much turquoise to make pretty things from. Oil extraction from hydrophane Ethiopian opal: Summary, after 12 days of soaking of what I believe are oil treated Ethiopian opals, that have massive fracturing that reaches the surface and a visible oil film in the bag that they came in. They appear to be oil free. They look sparkly and are exhibiting lots of color that wasn't present before the oil removal process. It looks like there was never any oil treatment and have me questioning if they were oil treated as the adsorbent barely changed color. Maybe this is due to the oil being very clear to begin with, the opals weren't hydrophane or the oil was only on the surface? I'm accustomed to oil extracted from wood staining the adsorbent. I'm going to buy a few more oil treated opals and redo the experiment. After the oil removal process, I placed them into pure new acetone, just to see what will happen. Will they crumble and fall apart? If not, I think they are ready for resin infusion. In the future I'll purchase resin and attempt to develop a process that infuses the resin completely and doesn't cause additional cracking. My oil treated specimens are between 10 mm to 25 mm, small and sickly looking buggers. After more experimentation and I feel that I'm onto something. I would like to try my hand on removing the oil from bigger crystal opals. Pulitzer showed beautiful baseball sized crystal opals, that were stored in water. My thoughts turn to how to remove the water from large hydrophane opals without causing damage? I have an idea that I may try if I can find some inexpensive water soaked opals. A US based RUclips creator sells water soaked opals on eBay. But I don't have the budget to buy some or even one, for water extraction and resin treatment-experimentation. My ROI for experimentation is zero. I can afford the small oil treated opals, as no one wants them. Tks! @@RoysRocks
I've got a 52gram piece of that stuff coming today but it's coming in a jar of water with instructions that "water opal" specimens should be kept in the water. I'm going to try drying it the way you showed in your video on it. I'm wondering if I should try to get the sandstone off before trying to dry it? It actually looks like a piece of boulder opal, it's got such a huge piece of rock it's attached to.
What an interesting nugget! Just watched your last video, been working on opals today! Thanks for the motivation!! This is why I gave up on Ethiopian opal, work so hard just for it to crack while working or while drying or just craze lol.
Well once I show the working methods for this material you might want to get back into it because it can be pretty fun just a bit different to Aussie opal.
I was surprised to hear you call it a black opal (that thing was green) in the beginning. I don't like Ethiopian opal at all, so I probably wouldn't cut shewa anyway. You have been lucky and gotten a lot of nice Ethiopian material on your channel. Every Ethiopian rough opal parcel I've bough, has ended up in the garbage. I absolutely hate it
"Black opal" is just a dark body tone and holding the stone in my hand and looking at it now it is more of a grey and hits an N3 which classes as black in most grading systems. I personally prefer black to be N1-2 only but it extends to N4 in most systems. The stuff I have bought has turned out rubbish as well. All the good stufff on the channel has been sent in (Barbara and Mike). Seems the trick is to buy at big gem shows in the USA which... is a bit tough here in my shed in Aus. I will try a few more online options but its been a string of disappointments so far.
Get a good seller for Ethiopian Opal.. I have opal from all over the world including Louisianian Opal up to Canadian opal etc Ossi opal I have tons. But the best opal from look and quality is my Ethiopian opal.. Give it another try my friend..or not
@V27RV I've bought several parcels of rough, from several different sources. Maybe I'll try again some day. But I generally stay away from anything that's hydrophane. If it can't be worn on a regular basis, then there's not much point in spending my time and energy cutting them and setting them in jewelry. I'll probably get some for my own collection some day. Just not any time soon. P.s. I'm curious as to how you've had a RUclips channel for so long, and yet don't have a single video uploaded. And how on earth you have 3 subscribers if you have zero content. Just genuinely curious. I'm autistic, and generally just ask questions any time there's anything I'm unfamiliar with.
@@redeyestones3738 I’m not a You tuber my friend.. Just love watching and learning from opal channels and enjoying a good cigar while cutting or watching
![Cody Johnson - I'm Gonna Love You (with Carrie Underwood) [Official Music Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/yy9PuYMU29g/mqdefault.jpg)
Now we're talking. Been looking forward to these sets of videos for awhile now. Best to use that Stylo I sent ya and a super gentle carve. I'm talking a very primitive carve so it takes less stress from the constant passes. So far I've had success on that one piece I've shown ya. Though that was the more orange / light brown material. The darker brown Menzo stuff is an absolute nightmare. So I'm just gonna treat it like the most fragile Ethiopian Opal I've been carving.
You'll have to brace yourself because there wont be much gentle stylo work during the torture testing coming up. The aim is to damage quite a few little chunks of the stuff.
I'd try cutting dry...I free-form faceted one before...I wore a mask and made a small mess but the end result was amazing...I'll send video
If I can find the budget for a dust extraction and filtering system this financial year for the business I'll do some dry cutting on all material including ethiopian.
I still need to buy the last silversmithing stuff and a few other rotary tools and flex shafts.
Maybe I really should have done a go fund me for the silversmithing stuff like people have suggested... I'll keep thinking about it.
Hi Roy..I know u not a fan of diamond paste,but for Ethiopian,Diamond paste is best for stabilise and look..your super cerium is the last stage to finish to a perfect Ethio Opal
This one did not make it that far since I was trying to show it explode.
The colour in Ethiopian opal is gorgeous. Why is it valued so much lower than Australian opal? Is it the instability of the material, or the fact that it is not as hard to find- or both?
Both reasons,
plus a few more. Ethiopian opal can absorb your sweat and discolour to a yucky yellow, permanently.
It can crack easily if set in jewellery incorrectly because of expansion if its hydrophane,
And the average wage in Africa is low, and kept that way by the west, that's political I know it ain't fair!!!!
Yeah you are on the money and so is Scott in the reply.
If it was really stable price would soar, though the miners would see little of that money and it would become a blood diamond style situation most likely.
That some pretty nice ethiopian bling. Can't wait to see the big stone get a cut and polish.
Ah the big stone is very crumbly so will most likely end up as many sacrificial pieces for the testing.
There will be some good pieces to cab up the right way as well though.
@@RoysRocks Ahhhh, that's too bad. Bummer.
Shewa opal is not cutting material - dont bother. it will always have cracks and is not stable even if cut.
Mostly true but I do know people that have been successful with it so I'll be trying to get one good one eventually and show people how to boost their odds of success.
Cool. Cant wait to see the next experiment. I bought two of these after i saw your original video. Ones just been sitting in the state it came in. The other one i broke up into little pieces and tried to polish with mixed results. Want to see what worked or didn't for you.
Well I will show off both the methods I have found to work and the ones that dont.
Maximum learning so people can see it all.
အလှမိုက်နေသည်
I'm looking forward to watch your experiments 😊
They will be wild and who knows maybe I'll even be surprised.
Things online can often be misleading.
I'm an opalholic , I can't help myself, I can't stop buying, trying to find that piece with awesome colour and patterns,
I've tried weening myself off with labradorite , doesn't work.
I hoard all the opals I cut, even when I've set them in silver, I still can't bear to see them leave
There is no hope apart from lightning ridge, / lambina /coober p/ white cliffs,, etc etc
Help!!!!! 😂😂😂😂😂
Just found your channel, really good videos
Thanks
Haha join the club (well seems like you are already a member, maybe even a senior one).
I think opal is a terminal illness unfortunately so no getting off the train now.
Very few grow out of it once hooked.
Labradorite is pretty cool, like I find fire agate cool but it just doesn't grip me the same.
Very best of luck to you. I’ve got a nice sized jar of Shewa opals from 15-67 carats each. I tried polishing 3 of them, but they all crumbled like yours. I belong to a couple Ethiopian opal sites and I’ve been told one out of every couple hundred will hold together and polish to gorgeous cabs. Of course I don’t have the $ or time to go through so many so mine just sit in a jar now to look at (nothing else in the jar like oil or water).
I think there are mehtods to boost those chances hugely as Mike has had great results and works a large number of Ethiopian opal (cheap and easy to get in the USA).
I'll be sure to show the good methods as well since that will really help people.
It’s a rhyolitic layer mixed with ignimbrite and other minerals. It’s very hard material. I’ve wasted cheaper bits and am very happy with the sintered bits.
It goes feel like pretty sturdy crust. Certainly not the real loose stuff which I prefer.
You are right about the bits. Sintered ones barely break a sweat getting through the stuff. 💪
Cool video! I found rough opals at local rock shop and picked the best few with little idea what I was doing and a dremmel. turns out they were these or mezezo? Do you know how to tell the difference? I cut it slightly wet and hand sanded a lot of it, also saturated it quite slowly. I left the outer ring on going for a cabochon but turns out it may have value as a specimen. I didn’t know about the blues being rare in these but it is full of them in dark and light from light sky blue to darker purples. It’s very rough and odd shaped because I was afraid to ruin it but it only has the fractures it started with. Really cool to see someone more experienced cutting one, I have a few more rough I’ve got to get into
If you sent a few photos through to me at my email roys.rocks@yahoo.com I might be able to tell what you are tackling.
There a lot of different pockets of opal around Ethiopia but visually they are pretty different.
I love your method, interesting to see if your attempt to fail will fail any the stones will work out fine 😂😂😂.
Probably will because some of the things I am going to test I have seen work but maybe it was luck? I'll have to try more than once to make sure but thats okay.
Looking forward to what comes next
The poor opal isn't 😂
Thank you, Roy. I'm busting to see how it turns out. I'm totally wowed by the colour of these opals. You sound heaps better. Now we can treat ya mean and keep ya keen!!!! LOL. Greetings from Dimboola, in Victoria, Australia 🇦🇺 to all you opalites out there.
I just got home from Dimmy.
Was a rough trip.
@@RoysRocks Damn. I could have seen you! LOL. Been hectic here. I don't know how long I am out of commission again. The break in my wrist not going splendidly. Worst part is trying to train my left hand!!! I just get better for long enough to bust something else! LOL. Oh well. 64 years gives one enough time to be experienced in their field. I train doctors!!!!!!!!
@@nancycurtis7315 Yeah it was a big weekend. Had to get an ambulance for poppy and now he is in the Horsham hospital. Hoping he can get a transfer back to Dimmy but they can't find room currently.
@@RoysRocks Oh hell. Hope he recovers very soon. Ian, I take it?
I've purchased some Ethiopian crystal opal cabochons (poorly formed by amateurs) , all with cracks for resin testing. They're not the same material as what Pulitzer has. I don't know where to find his opal. I gave my car away to my family, so I don't have a car to drive to the rock shows in Tucson. So I'm missing out on the fairly priced materials.
I've done a lot of research about resin treating opals as has Pulitzer. I'm pretty sure his method of treatment can be improved.
Some day I'll work with a new resin to treat opals with cracks or that have the potential for cracking. I've been sitting on the raw materials for months now. I don't know when I'll ever get the time to conduct a proper controlled test to prove it works.
Decades ago I removed oil from old wood. It would take me a year of nearly daily treatments to get the oil out. I reviewed the old methods and came up with a new material to soak up the oil. I bought two pieces of Ethiopian oil soaked opals for testing. But the opals that I have are nothing like what Pulitzer has. Your videos and Pulitzer's help get me motivated. I may try to start soaking the oil out of the opals. I can start it and forget and refresh it as time permits.
A few ideas to ponder.
I've found the original paper on why glass cutting with water works so well. It describes the mechanism of action. Lot's of videos on RUclips explain and demonstrate it. Water is your enemy, less you like cracking glass.
Resin treatment before cutting might help prevent new cracks from forming, reduce the amount of new cracks or more importantly prevent water from entering the cracks and encouraging crack propagation!
Avoid using water. Not using water may help prevent crack propagation. Use a non water based, hydrophobic solvent, maybe liquid silicone. Consider keeping it warm to keep water away. Or use a substance that molecularly locks up the water.
Looking forward to learning the safer way of polishing crystal opals. You do a great job! Tks!!!
I should think about buying damaged stones for the stabilisation and treating videos.
Would be nice to take them off peoples hands since I know they are hard to sell and they can use the money to try again. Saves me from needing to recreate the issues so I can play with those damaged stones.
I do have water methods that work, silicone oils are a great cutting fluid but the cleanup and mess is a bit of a deal breaker.
Cracks dont need to form and if they are already there I'd rather just make the split prior to trying to shape a stone.
I will cover treatments but they are way down the list of priorities as I would rather show people methods to avoid the need for treatments first.
I don't blame you for not messing about demonstrating how to remove oil or water from opals and demonstrating how to resin treat them. It's not top shelf material.
I do believe and I think Pulitzer does as well, that there are beautiful pieces of Ethiopian opals that can't be fully appreciated unless they have been resin treated after water or oil removal. The same goes for turquoise. Today nearly all turquoise is resin treated. If they weren't we wouldn't have much turquoise to make pretty things from.
Oil extraction from hydrophane Ethiopian opal:
Summary, after 12 days of soaking of what I believe are oil treated Ethiopian opals, that have massive fracturing that reaches the surface and a visible oil film in the bag that they came in. They appear to be oil free.
They look sparkly and are exhibiting lots of color that wasn't present before the oil removal process. It looks like there was never any oil treatment and have me questioning if they were oil treated as the adsorbent barely changed color. Maybe this is due to the oil being very clear to begin with, the opals weren't hydrophane or the oil was only on the surface? I'm accustomed to oil extracted from wood staining the adsorbent.
I'm going to buy a few more oil treated opals and redo the experiment.
After the oil removal process, I placed them into pure new acetone, just to see what will happen. Will they crumble and fall apart? If not, I think they are ready for resin infusion.
In the future I'll purchase resin and attempt to develop a process that infuses the resin completely and doesn't cause additional cracking.
My oil treated specimens are between 10 mm to 25 mm, small and sickly looking buggers. After more experimentation and I feel that I'm onto something. I would like to try my hand on removing the oil from bigger crystal opals.
Pulitzer showed beautiful baseball sized crystal opals, that were stored in water. My thoughts turn to how to remove the water from large hydrophane opals without causing damage? I have an idea that I may try if I can find some inexpensive water soaked opals.
A US based RUclips creator sells water soaked opals on eBay. But I don't have the budget to buy some or even one, for water extraction and resin treatment-experimentation. My ROI for experimentation is zero. I can afford the small oil treated opals, as no one wants them.
Tks!
@@RoysRocks
I've got a 52gram piece of that stuff coming today but it's coming in a jar of water with instructions that "water opal" specimens should be kept in the water. I'm going to try drying it the way you showed in your video on it. I'm wondering if I should try to get the sandstone off before trying to dry it? It actually looks like a piece of boulder opal, it's got such a huge piece of rock it's attached to.
ALWAYS remove any crust and get to opal surface to a polish before any drying attempt. It is the only way I have found success with it so far.
@@RoysRocks , I am going to need an Opal miner's jack hammer to get it off the chocolate Opal, Roy. 😆 🤣 😂
I'm really interested, I've got a few pieces like these! Thanks Ron
Ron??? 😮
I get a lot of Ron, Ray and Troy from autocorrect. All three more common names than Roy so you get used to it 😂
What an interesting nugget! Just watched your last video, been working on opals today! Thanks for the motivation!!
This is why I gave up on Ethiopian opal, work so hard just for it to crack while working or while drying or just craze lol.
Well once I show the working methods for this material you might want to get back into it because it can be pretty fun just a bit different to Aussie opal.
Love the colors. Looking forward to what's next.
Good thing the colours never go away... actually I'll probably show a way to lose them soon.
I was surprised to hear you call it a black opal (that thing was green) in the beginning. I don't like Ethiopian opal at all, so I probably wouldn't cut shewa anyway. You have been lucky and gotten a lot of nice Ethiopian material on your channel. Every Ethiopian rough opal parcel I've bough, has ended up in the garbage. I absolutely hate it
"Black opal" is just a dark body tone and holding the stone in my hand and looking at it now it is more of a grey and hits an N3 which classes as black in most grading systems.
I personally prefer black to be N1-2 only but it extends to N4 in most systems.
The stuff I have bought has turned out rubbish as well. All the good stufff on the channel has been sent in (Barbara and Mike).
Seems the trick is to buy at big gem shows in the USA which... is a bit tough here in my shed in Aus. I will try a few more online options but its been a string of disappointments so far.
Get a good seller for Ethiopian Opal..
I have opal from all over the world including Louisianian Opal up to Canadian opal etc Ossi opal I have tons.
But the best opal from look and quality is my Ethiopian opal..
Give it another try my friend..or not
@V27RV I've bought several parcels of rough, from several different sources. Maybe I'll try again some day. But I generally stay away from anything that's hydrophane. If it can't be worn on a regular basis, then there's not much point in spending my time and energy cutting them and setting them in jewelry. I'll probably get some for my own collection some day. Just not any time soon.
P.s. I'm curious as to how you've had a RUclips channel for so long, and yet don't have a single video uploaded. And how on earth you have 3 subscribers if you have zero content. Just genuinely curious. I'm autistic, and generally just ask questions any time there's anything I'm unfamiliar with.
@@redeyestones3738
I’m not a You tuber my friend..
Just love watching and learning from opal channels and enjoying a good cigar while cutting or watching
@V27RV so you have friends who subscribed? I'm Just curious