Faceting an amber gemstone.

In this video i tackle one of my toughest cutting challenges yet. Amber can be a beautiful gemstone, its main drawback is its softness - 2.5 on the MOHS hardness scale, still with care it can be worn as earrings, necklaces or maybe even a ring for the brave owners. Amber is fossilized tree sap and sometimes has insects encapsulated within.

The piece im using for this gem has no inclusions and is a lighter color than some . Care must be used in the dopping process as amber is heat sensitive so cold dopping only. I ended up using epoxy for the inital dopping after trying water soluble white glue which didnt hold. On the dop transfer i sed the white glue which worked well.

A fine lap is a must for cutting and i used a 3000 lap for cutting.
I tried to polish the gemstone using diamond in 60k, 100k , each one wasnt proper but i left the pavillion at 100k . The crown wasnt polished , i left the 3000 grit finish as the final polish.
If you cut amber be prepared for your laps to load up and slow down its cutting speed and get bumpy. This does seem to help leave a polished look i found.

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