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Cutting a 700 carat rare valuable gemstone [video]
- Quinzel 3y agoWell that was cool!
- nickburns 3y agoon sale now! for the low, low price of ~$80k USD. https://www.moregems.com/collections/morganite/products/294ct-massive-museum-quality-morganite-gemstone https://www.moregems.com/collections/morganite/products/294c...
- hnbad 3y agoIt was appraised at $2150 USD. I'm not sure how that translates to the listing price but a 40x markup seems a bit extreme.
- davekeck 3y agoThe video (very end) and the website both say 192k. Where did you see 2150?
- hnbad 3y agoThe appraisal at the end of the video says "$2,375" according to the transcript (was watching without audio) and the sample appraisal (which I guess as your sibling pointed out was just meant as a sample of what an appraisal would look like, in which case I think it would have been better form not to include actual numbers) lists $2150 which is close to that value so I assumed that's the actual appraisal. Given that the sample actually shows a ring and refers to it in the full text, that's obviously not referring to the object but now I'm wondering about the $2,375 figure in the transcript. Is that just a really bad auto-transcription error?
- nickburns 3y agocut morganite retails for ~$300 USD/ct. this finished gem is a smidge over 297 carats.
- hnbad 3y agoThat explains the listed price, it doesn't explain the disparity to the transcript. Given the comments, I presume he said a different figure in the audio track than the transcript (and therefore subtitles) says?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ggruschow 3y agoI think you're reading the "SAMPLE LEGAL APPRAISAL" which is an appraisal for a different item. I think it's just to give you an idea of the form of appraisal they'd provide for insurance purposes.
- nickburns 3y agothis is correct. i found it odd to include that sample appraisal form with the listing at first glance, too. Wikipedia article on morganite says something like ~$300/carat depending on overall quality.
- TylerE 3y agoIt’s it a bell curve, so stuff that’s 4 or 5 std devs out is (potentially) worth much much much more than bull stones.
- jon_richards 3y agoNow I'm chuckling at the image of extremely expensive, perfectly cut, nanometer-scale stones.
- TylerE 3y agoThey’re actually very cheap, but you can literally get diamond sandpaper
- jon_richards 3y agoI'm picturing something more like this. https://researchnews.cc/imagenes/2021/03/19/Selffolding-2.jpg https://researchnews.cc/imagenes/2021/03/19/Selffolding-2.jp... Micrometer-scale, not nanometer-scale.
- Gare 3y agoNobody would waste 250 hours grinding a stone that cheap. It was obvious that there was error in audio transcript. Without any gemstone knowledge whatsoever, I guessed at least $40K.
- IAmGraydon 3y agoThat was my guess too - around $40k.
- hnbad 3y agoOh, absolutely. I wasn't questioning whether it would be sold for the price discussed here. I was wondering why the appraisal was that low (turns out: because the appraisal on the website is an unrelated sample and the appraisal in the video was mistranscribed by missing out several digits so the subtitles were off by orders of magnitude). There are a lot of areas where the label price is based on some underlying much lower value with somewhat standardized factors being applied so I was wondering if there's some implicit "everyone knows this" translation from the "appraisal" to the sale price I wasn't aware of. Hence me pointing out that that would be quite the markup so there is probably more to it than just profit.
- nickburns 3y agoin first-year 'Contracts,' 1L's study that the 'fair market value' of any good or service is defined by Black's Law Dictionary, amongst elsewhere, as "[t]he price that a seller is willing to accept and a buyer is willing to pay on the open market and in an arm's-length transaction [ . . . ]" this definition captures the actual sale price of almost any transaction imaginable quite comprehensively—which is what most people are really asking when curious about the 'value' of a good, like a precious gemstone, or a service. NB: 'value' is defined by the same as "1. The significance, desirability, or utility of something" or "2. The monetary worth or price of something; the amount of goods, services, or money that something commands in exchange." 'markup' as "[a]n amount added to an item's cost to determine its selling price."
- hnbad 3y ago
- bretpiatt 3y agoRough math, $1,000 for the raw stone, $5,000 of travel and time to source... $80k sale price with 250 hours of cutting work, $300/hour for master gemcutter, seems very fair.
- IshKebab 3y agoWhere did you get 250 hours from? I don't think it took him anywhere near that long based on the times mentioned in the video. If it really did people would use CNC for this.
- IAmGraydon 3y agoYeah from the video I believe it was a few days of work.
- IAmGraydon 3y agoYou think this guy acquired a 740 carat raw stone for $1000?
- bretpiatt 3y agoYes, here's an online site where you can see, for someone direct sourcing totally. https://www.gemrockauctions.com/search?query=morganite&weight=700%3A https://www.gemrockauctions.com/search?query=morganite&weigh... 1505 ct for $3999 asking https://www.gemrockauctions.com/products/1505cts-morganite-cab-grade-no-heat-madagascar-1553446 https://www.gemrockauctions.com/products/1505cts-morganite-c...
- yinser 3y agoTremendous weekend post. We need more of this
- MeteorMarc 3y agoSeeing how he handles a scalpel for removing some glue, is frightening though.
- christophilus 3y agoYeah. I kept expecting him to slice a finger with that xacto knife.
- brikelly 3y agoIt makes sense now, but I guess I spent my life thinking this kind of process was actually cutting and not grinding. Well TIL.
- Retric 3y agoThe stage before what was shown may involve actual cutting/sawing and or cleavage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleavage_(crystal) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleavage_(crystal) This allows you to preserve material for making multiple gems where grinding can only result in a single piece.
- farooqib 3y agoIt's awesome to see how happy he is at the end with his work. I love seeing people really into their own craft
- Hnrobert42 3y agoIndeed. I watched the video on 1.5x until the end. When I saw him smiling, I slowed it to 1x just to enjoy the moment with him.
- abeisgreat 3y agoI never understand why people consume content like this accelerated. For me, I feel like if I felt the need to rush through something then it’s not worth consuming at all.
- xzel 3y agoFor me it’s mostly how slow some people talk. This is especially true for some content when I can understand it at a higher speed, for example Dota replays. I feel like I’ll get more out of the time watching two in the same when I can understand 95% of the nuance. I also have ADHD so wanting it to be faster could easily be part of that.
- mozman 3y agoTikTok and YT shorts condition us all to have shorter attention span
- hatrick001 3y agoReally a relaxing video to watch. Loved the transformation
- jvandonsel 3y agoHe seems to be doing everything by "feel". I would imagine that if the stone were 3D scanned it wouldn't be difficult to use some software to determine the optimal orientation to achieve the largest cut stone, for a given cut style.
- mitthrowaway2 3y agoMy guess is a skilled craftsman could get within 3% of the optimum solution.
- MichaelZuo 3y agoI would agree for all the common shapes, maybe not for some very odd asymmetrical shape.
- nickburns 3y agogreat point... but in thinking about your comment, it occurs to me that then it could no longer be considered "hand cut." i found it very interesting that he shared he was hoping for 300+ cts., but had resolved to be satisfied with at least 250. so he did alright after all.
- rkagerer 3y ago294.5 cts in the end.
- jasonwatkinspdx 3y agoHe's making decisions based on a lifetime of experience. I wouldn't be so quick to assume that can be replaced by a simple optimizer. Additionally, maximizing size is just one goal among many.
- dylan604 3y agoThe hubris of any software dev is that code can do anything better. For a large majority of things, I would agree. After all, that's why we made computers in the first place. It's also my tenet of workflow automation. I'm not trying to eliminate a person's job. I'm just trying to make the tedious error prone parts of the job less tedious and error prone so that the person is free to spend more time on the things that they are good at and would be difficult to automate.
- anfractuosity 3y agoDoes anyone happen to know if gemstones such as diamonds are mostly hand cut, or are CNC faceting machines possibly used. There seems relatively few videos of such machines on youtube, such as - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnKcl2rw-qg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnKcl2rw-qg maybe I'm not using the right keywords though. Also - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyNDtjpV2A8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyNDtjpV2A8
- mattficke 3y agoAutomated cutting is used for less valuable stones, or when you need to have multiple stones of the exact same size and shape. Hand cutting is used when you want to maximize the yield, so you use the raw stone to guide the final size and shape.
- anfractuosity 3y agoThanks, that makes sense, when you say 'you use the raw stone to guide the final size and shape' does that mean you might look for things like imperfections in the stone and try to remove those
- mattficke 3y agoLike if the raw stone is elongated you probably don’t want to cut it into a square finished gem, something like an oval cut would have less waste. And instead of trying to decide on an exact size in advance (like, exactly 1 ct), the final gem is whatever it is when the cutting is finished, so if it’s a smidge over you don’t shave it down.
- jasonwatkinspdx 3y agoYes, finding a shape that excludes incursions is a big part of it. In the video he shows how he uses refractive fluids on the rough surface to make it less opaque so he can spot such inclusions more easily.
- aledujke 3y agoI understand that this is how it is, but why? How is not using computerized process giving better yields?
- underlogic 3y agoLooks like the type of cheap cut glass you put on a doorhandle. The whole spiel of what an art it is to prepare and how very rare and delicate it is, that's just a scam to get others to overvalue a piece of rock. It also has no utility whatsoever so where they pulled 80k down from 190k from is beyond me. Taking advantage of someone without the reasoning capacity to value a products utility objectively doesn't increase the items market value in reality. I could clean out a retarded person with an overpriced polished apple, but an apple is just an apple and a rock is still a rock. Of course you can at least eat the apple.
- junon 3y agoYes, things must provide utility to be worth anything.
- ourmandave 3y agoIt's an open secret the value of diamonds is all marketing. GE made the first gem quality diamonds in the 1970s. They can be manufactured in commercial quantities since the 2010s. The largest one so far is 511 karats. So the diamond industry has to market them as inferior, labeling them "lab grown" and suggests they won't retain their value.
- IAmGraydon 3y agoSome people buy things because their beauty pleases them and some buy things to signal to others how much wealth they have. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with either. Have you ever bought something that was nicer and more expensive than it needed to be to serve its function?
- underlogic 3y agoUtilitarian ideology aside, that rock isn't worth 190k, or 80k or even 1k. It's not that pretty. I'd have a hard time parting with $50 unless I thought I could sell it to someone else tomorrow for more - and there lies the rub. The argument goes that the market sets the value, but this is not a case of that. If one foolish person miscalculates and overpays for an item, the market value for that item doesn't recalibrate to what they paid. There's no market for the item at the new price but that's how these sellers paint it. They pull value from thin air not from scarcity or precision skill but simply by conning the naive. It's a scam plain and simple, wrapped up in superfluous details to sow confusion
- kibwen 3y agoTickled that the recipe for polishing a $200,000 stone is 50,000 grit diamond powder, WD-40, and Kleenex.
- lofties 3y agoIt’s 58% off, and currently listed at $89k. What a sale!
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Damogran6 3y ago"It's worth whatever the seller and buyer agree to." More specifically with gemstones "Guaranteed to appraise at double the value for insurance purposes."
- Rinzler89 3y agoAnd 30~ years of skill and experience that can't be easily obtained.
- greggsy 3y agoPrecision calibrated instruments help also
- notyourwork 3y agoKnowing how to use instruments is what separates skill. Giving anyone a specialty tool doesn’t yield expert level outcomes.
- anjel 3y agoA friend inherited a large fine diamond, double digit carat-weight. Rated near perfect by GIA in cut clarity and quality, except for some tiny chips from wear that could easily be fixed by recutting it at the loss of a half carat but its projected such repair would add 6 figures in market value despite the loss in weight. The thing with gem cutters, is if things go wrong, owner bears the loss. Would you take that risk?
- dlgeek 3y agoI mean, the owner also gets the upside. I'm sure they could sell it to a gem cutter who would then assume the risk - but also the profit.
- m3kw9 3y agoSell as is with repair discount, but the smart buyer would know the discount would need to include the risk as well
- staticautomatic 3y agoSurely there’s an insurer somewhere willing to underwrite this.
- anjel 3y agoPut “insuring diamonds“ into your favorite search engine. More holes in those policies than Swiss cheese.
- Karellen 3y agoFor similar work, but 8-10 mins long, and cutting gems into D20s (and then etching the numbers on the faces), check out Hedron Rockworks: https://www.youtube.com/@hedronrockworks/videos https://www.youtube.com/@hedronrockworks/videos (Not affiliated, just found the channel one day, and enjoy the content)
- foobarian 3y agoWhere does one go to obtain the raw 700ct stone of such flawless clarity?
- throwup238 3y agoBy knowing someone at one of the mines. You can find plenty of specimens online [1] but to get the best ones with large gem quality volumes you'll need to know an insider that can inspect the raw gemstones to find ones with large volumes and sell them to you directly. [1] https://www.mineralminers.com/html/mormins.stm https://www.mineralminers.com/html/mormins.stm
- pilaf 3y agoIt's all subjective of course, and not detract from this man's amazing work, but I find the rough stone to be just as beautiful, if not more so than the final polished piece. Especially in those final vanity shots, the shades and imperfections are really beautiful to me. What I would really love to see is a version of the rough stone but with only two opposite faces polished, so that you can see through it like he did at the beginning of the video with the oil, but keeping all other surfaces rough.
- chilling 3y agoif only two opposite faces would get polish, it will just look like transparent stone. IMO the final effect is absolutely astonishing
- HarryHirsch 3y agoThe guy puts methyl salicylate on the stone with his bare hands. Is he not afraid of coagulation disorder - the stuff is absorbed through the skin!
- iancmceachern 3y agoHe's also inhaling a ton of wd40
- IAmGraydon 3y agoI’m not sure if you meant a different chemical, but methyl salicylate is wintergreen oil and is used in food products.
- a12k 3y agoYou're both right. It is used in low concentrations in some food products to give a wintergreen flavor (wintergreen gum, for example), and in topical analgesics (like Tiger Balm, for example) because it absorbs through the skin and acts as a counterirritant to potentially relieve pain, though studies don't see to support this use. It can be deadly if ingested directly (salicylate is the same thing found in Aspirin) in the form used in the video, and I presume one could absorb enough through one's skin that it would also be harmful in strong concentrations as shown in the video. If nothing else, it seems like having that much concentrated methyl salicylate would irritate a lot.
- iancmceachern 3y agoI think the wd40 is way worse...
- HarryHirsch 3y agoIt is, oil mist causes causes emphysema when you breathe it in. I have no tolerance for people operating rotary vane pumps without a coalescing filter.
- zaroth 3y agoThe finished product: https://www.moregems.com/collections/morganite/products/294ct-massive-museum-quality-morganite-gemstone https://www.moregems.com/collections/morganite/products/294c... So curious what the raw material cost!
- shagie 3y agoIt can vary a lot based on quality and size. https://www.mineralminers.com/html/morlrgh.stm https://www.mineralminers.com/html/morlrgh.stm has some larger sizes, though nothing as large and crystal as the one in the video. The linked one has the largest crystal - with inclusions - at 547.1 carats and $1094. You can get smaller pieces in bulkish quantities for about $2 per carat at about 10 carat sizes (side note: its way to easy to find over priced "healing stones").
- n1b0m 3y agoHow do the refractive index fluids work? How can they let you see inside the stone?
- fwipsy 3y agoGuessing based on years old physics knowledge: Without the fluid, the surface of the stone appears foggy because it's diffusing light (like frosted glass.) The fluid creates a smooth surface on top of that which doesn't diffuse light (like clear glass.) The refractive index refers to how much light bends when it enters a substance. To see clearly, the refractive index of the fluid and the stone should match as closely as possible. Otherwise, the surface of the stone would still be visible under the fluid.
- n1b0m 3y agoGreat explanation, thank you
- oliv__ 3y agoOof, I don't like seeing bare fingers so close to that spinning polisher
- DZAIN13 3y ago[flagged]