this is awesome
oh yes i'm justin and this is black opal direct my family have been teaching and exploring opal since
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what a crazy week how you going i'm justin from black opal direct and welcome if you're new here
don't forget to subscribe this week we have got a beautiful black opal knobby now this knobby
is a dead giveaway of where it comes from in my opinion anyway it actually comes from a field
called jag hill and jag hill produced very very large stones very big knobbies a lot of green
blue and green orange and orange green not a lot of red so there has been some red from jake hill
but nowhere near as much as there has been really large stones of green orange and green and blue so
what a magnificent field it has been over the years and this one this piece here
is an example of it which it has a white crockery top as a cap and nice pouch on
the back with a color bar going right through the middle of it so it's a really great example
i'm hoping that this thing will cut something magnificent and as you can see from the side
there's a lot of blue there's a little bit of green i'm hoping as a trait from jag hill
when you face these bluey sort of stones they can turn blue green that's my hope so
i love this type of opal it's really enjoyable to cut and hopefully you get to enjoy this
one too because i can't see much going wrong because these types of knobbies from jag hill
usually are a very high percentage of success rate so let's get on that wheel and see how she cuts
let's get this oh let's have a quick look at it first
so you can see that white cap that white cap is the jag hill special very very
prominent feature of what jag hill can look like
and then you've got your potch on the back yeah sand here can give us issues and i'm guessing that
probably there's a good chance that half of it will probably get eaten
possibly don't know yet we just have to get into it and open it up a little bit more
so let's get that wheel going and um see what happens come on
i absolutely love these types of knobbies they are
they are the go-to
all right
wow look at that just touched it and all the sands just come off
and there's solid watch behind it wow
oh and look at that now the color's there all the way back there wow that's given me hope hey yeah
yeah yeah
all that color look at that straight color bar what
oh no way look at this i can see a bit of a natural crack there it should come out
not too far in
wow
let's keep going around and around
so you can see the color bar wedges it goes on an angle up a little crack there
but and a crack there so we just need to make sure we can get those cracks out
so the cracks sitting right near that cap interesting
hopefully we get that out
all right
so you can see this crack here going just underneath there that needs to come out
it looks like it goes fairly deep inwards
but if i turn that blue green around that way as i was talking about that possibility
of this being more green than blue from the top is um quite high so
it could be quite good could be looking at something pretty cool all right
i'm going in
here we go
there's oh wow so there's a really good telltale just sitting right there look at that magnificence
jeez
shhh
nice color sometimes the white cap on an opal
can put pressure on the good quality oval and cause it to crack
so by grinding that away takes all of the pressure away from the stone and it won't crack again
yes look at that that magic stone ah wow um i'm pretty sure that most
i can see a bit more of the crack is still there it needs to come out more
um and you we might find it'll chip out when i work on a little bit further
yep just about out you can see there's just some remnants there they'll come out
look at that magic pattern it's almost pallet pattern flagstone chaff and pallet that's great
give it a bit of a shape now
so i might take a lot of that back off because it doesn't need that much back on it
that watch in the middle has gone darker
which means this will definitely be a black opal down inside
i love it i love it i love it when a plan comes together this is so good
what a magnificent stone
good old jag hill producers again look at that beautiful
oh yeah
magnificent we are ready for the dog stick yes come on
so what a what a cracker of a piece just all of the sand and inclusions off around
the outside just cleaned up and that's really a good trait of lightning ridge jag hill opal
it does however have still a remnants of a natural crack that has shown up
i will have to cut it in a fair way so it's not going to be as fatter oval as it is
and the more it dries out the more it seems to be showing that crack up more so a lot of the
time when you have a stone like this and it has a crack and it's wet it's really hard to see the
the crack but once it starts drying out you can spot it so it's good to leave it for a little bit
and let it dry out which is what's happened here you can see it very clearly so um we'll get this
actually i might take this back on the wheel just a little bit more and get
that crack out properly because if i i can almost chip that out now i can see it there
very plain today there we go i've chipped it out and uh you can see where the crack was
so
the question is are the cracks out oh i think that answers your question
that's better now the cracks are out um and we're ready to give it a nice polish
there's nothing quite like it when a plan comes together a purchase a risk but a calculated one
the rock was always going to be the same but how it turned out was up to me
and while someone else might have approached it differently
i approached it with all the knowledge passed on to me from my father
for those of you who never met my dad his name was jurgen he was a very kind man and a great father
he was considered one of the greatest opal cutters on the planet
with skills of carving and artistry that were beyond measure
i only got a few chances to video him before he passed but with him went so much knowledge of
all types of opal and how they cut he knew every field and its formations and how to attack an opal
but even he sometimes studied an opal for weeks at a time before touching it on the cutting wheel
it taught me patience sometimes you should leave a stone for a while and study it before you cut it
sometimes you realize that if you had taken your time you may have got a better outcome
not all of my decisions are perfect nor are they always right
but neither were my dads he always said to me i will never stop learning about opal
because just around the corner there could be a new opal field you haven't seen before
shows you new formations that don't make sense or go against what you've learned already
like the time we discovered witches had knobbies that were formed upside down we had to cut them
backwards we learned a very big and costly lesson that day but it all forms a bank of
memories that help you understand this wild gemstone opal will always keep you on your toes
and i'll be the first to say i have opal fever and it's incurable just like my dad did
here's a question for you if you could have your ultimate opal the best you've ever seen
what colors would they be let me know in the comments below
wow what a beautiful stone let's get these scales going i'm so excited this one's just worked out
beautifully and uh just waiting for the scales to come on to see what it comes to in carats.
drumroll 9.32 loving it loving it what a beautiful stone that dome is nice everything about it is
really pleasing and that's jag hill for you wow very very nice so let's get a calculator
9.32 times
1500 a carat that's a 14 000 gem magnificent i am so happy that's a cracker so well we've
been through some sand lately we've been through some problems some potch coming up in the face
um there's been a lot of issues with a lot of stones we've had and finally ah
we have a stone that just beautifully shaped sand came away it went kapow kapow it was perfect
that's so good i'm so happy this was a cracker i'm glad i got to share it with you guys so anyway
thanks for watching and we'll see you next time hopefully without sand or potch or inclusions you