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Post by stardiamond on Aug 24, 2020 14:29:41 GMT -5
My parcel should arrive tomorrow. Tough buying rough from pictures. I didn't see any decent slabs and have had mixed luck with rarerocksandgems. Sometimes, I am overly optimistic but saw some pieces with potential. A lot of imagination is required. All the rough is small. This is one of the larger pieces that caught my eye.  |
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Post by jasoninsd on Aug 24, 2020 18:45:20 GMT -5
I can see that rough producing several nice pieces!
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Post by stardiamond on Aug 25, 2020 19:51:08 GMT -5
I used the slab saw and the 80 grit wheel to get a flat surface on each piece. Tomorrow I will glue to boards. The other pieces need to be worked on with the trim saw and I won't do that until I have a new blade to replace the one I trim saw slab with. Hard rough kills trim saw blades. The most promising piece so far is the top middle. The one from the previous picture is top right. If I can get two really nice preforms from all this I'm ok.  |
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Post by stardiamond on Aug 26, 2020 11:21:31 GMT -5
I glued up the 6 pieces above. I selected 6 pieces to work on with the trim saw and 5 were not usable.   This one will make a nice cab. Currently, 45mm in length and 10.5mm thick. It is not a preform. I ground the edges to get them even and clean and the same with the top. This is the current shape and is based on the shape of the rock and that I tend to grind in arcs. It needs a bit more clean up but there isn't much I can do with the shape other than change it a bit so it pleases me. Through 220 hard and photographed wet.  |
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Post by stardiamond on Aug 26, 2020 13:35:45 GMT -5
I usually like to work in batches. Glue on the boards is drying. I didn't want to start a new batch so I finished this one.  |
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Post by stardiamond on Aug 27, 2020 12:35:59 GMT -5
I'm done with the slabbing. Middle right is from the piece of rough I was most optimistic and it produced the second best slab, With small rough and facing both sides one slab is what I expect. The pieces on the top row, I wanted to change the orientation 90 degrees to get bigger slabs but when faced, I went back to the original orientation. I won't toss any of this and will work on the slabs in the first two rows at some point. My target for the blind purchase was two nice preforms and I Got that.  |
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Post by stardiamond on Aug 27, 2020 14:16:09 GMT -5
I'm going to work on these.  |
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