Paraiba Tourmalines

[Barrett]

Rossman says the green coloring in Paraiba tourmaline is due to Ti and Mn others say Iron..I am not sure if this has been clarified as of today. Copper ONLY produces that cyan/turquoise color in tourmaline. Not green or that blue-green color. As an example those green ones that Hugger posted are about as far away from paraiba as one can get while still having copper in it's lattice. That green is not being produced by copper in the slightest but by either iron or a Titanium/Manganese. Green=Iron or Titanium/manganese chromophores. it's really no different than a regular green tourmaline. It has to have that blue/turquoise/cyan to be a paraiba..whether that be blue-green, green-blue mix or blue(turquoise, cyan, windex, etc.

 

[Art Nouveau]

Interesting discussion. I agree too many dealers are selling tourmalines as 'paraibas' when they are not, technically, just so they can ask a higher price. Would you consider this stone a paraiba? It is certified to be copper and manganese bearing. The last picture shows it next to a ring with a non copper bearing African tourmaline.

AN

 

[blithesome71]

Wow!!! Those paraibas are breathtaking esp. amguy's photos... *drool*

 

[Arkteia]

My question refers more to cuprians. Say, it is not a "paraiba", but a copper-containing tourmaline, bright but without the "trademark neon glow". If you have two absolutely equal, blue tourmalines, bright, one is copper-bearing and the other is not, does the fact that one is copper bearing automatically draw the price up? In short, is the price of copper-bearing tourmaline higher than the price of equal in color and glow non-copper-bearing one?

 

[Barrett]

Here are some more examples I pulled. these first 2 are from ebay and are lab created paraiba tourmalines. I have circled the "neon"/"glow" areas. You can see the body color of the stones looks like any normal tourmaline but it's when you catch the light coming off the facets you see the "glow". The lab created ones are made to mimic the good natural ones. The bottom picture is Gene's stone http://www.precisiongem.com/html/html/ParaibaTourmaline.html
You can see it's a body color blue but I have circled the areas which show the glow. It's a Nigerian and not nearly as vivid as the brazilian ones on the preceding page I would still label it for sure as a paraiba tourmaline. Nice stone!
Now go to ebay and type in "paraiba tourmaline" click it to 200 so it shows 200 items on one page..scroll down and look to see how many show anything resembling the stones I circled on the preceding pages and gene's stone or that are the color of the rough/crystals I posted..look for that neon/glow areas like I circled. You start to see some towards the last pages at the buy now best offer but only a handful out of the 17 pages of 200 items. The rest are all crap cuprians, apatites, or just junk.

 

[Barrett]

Here are a few more..these most of you have seen from Africagems www.africagems.com/brazilian-paraiba-314.html

Do you notice a trend..all the areas I have circled from these stones which are from Brazil, Nigeria, and Mozambique all show the same or very close color from the light reflection. Paraiba really means color when referring to these gems. Contrary to what people think paraiba refers more to color than copper content.

 

[chrono]

My question refers more to cuprians. Say, it is not a "paraiba", but a copper-containing tourmaline, bright but without the "trademark neon glow". If you have two absolutely equal, blue tourmalines, bright, one is copper-bearing and the other is not, does the fact that one is copper bearing automatically draw the price up? In short, is the price of copper-bearing tourmaline higher than the price of equal in color and glow non-copper-bearing one?

Crasru,
Yes, it is currently a marketing ploy to raise the price just because a stone is copper bearing, even if it looks like a regular tourmaline. Compared to a glowing non-copper bearing tourmaline? If they are from the same vendor, probably not. If from a different vendor, it depends. Remember, the glow comes from the copper, so if it doesn’t contain copper, it really cannot glow. What we are seeing is actually the bright open axis colour and good saturation, which in itself is uncommon for a blue tourmaline. However, as of late, I’ve seen the market awash with these and wonder if it’s because of the new undetectable irradiation treatment…

 

[Art Nouveau]

There are some blue/green non copper bearing tourmalines from Afghanistan that glow a bit. I remember Tourmaline Lover posted a glowy loose stone previously. What causes those to glow if it is not copper? I have seen some of paraibas on Africagems'website at the Intergem shows. I believe some of them are Marc's father Andrew's stones. He has set ones too. There are beautiful, but not in my price range.

AN

 

[arjunajane]

There are some blue/green non copper bearing tourmalines from Afghanistan that glow a bit. I remember Tourmaline Lover posted a glowy loose stone previously. What causes those to glow if it is not copper? I have seen some of paraibas on Africagems'website at the Intergem shows. I believe some of them are Marc's father Andrew's stones. He has set ones too. There are beautiful, but not in my price range.

AN

AN, I would also be interested in what you have mentioned above. I recently posted my blue-green Afghani tourmaline (from the Gamata mine), and although nothing like the glow of your beautiful cuprians you have shown, I do believe it shows a decent amount of 'glowy' appearance.

Does anyone know, do these stones have trace amounts of copper, or is there another cause that would create them to have an (albeit less intense) glow?

btw, I do apologize in advance if anyone feels my gem doesn't belong in the paraiba thread, I know its not paraiba nor cuprian! I hope no one minds, AN just bought up a question I have wanted to ask is all..

pics of my Gamata blue:

 

[T L]

Another thing to note about paraiba tourmalines. True paraibas glow in all light sources. It doesn't matter if it's cloudy out and a huge thunderstorm, they will glow. The only place they will not glow is in a totally 100% enclosed room with no light. That's the amazing thing about them. Most gems only appear to take on more saturation in certain lighting.

 

[LD]

Just following on from TL's post - glow can happen in many gems. However, the GLOW of a real Paraiba Tourmaline can't be compared to any other gem. It's truly phenomenal and not only glows but SCREAMS. Look at Amguy's photos above where he's circled the whole gem. That's actually what a PT looks like. To be honest that photo looks like it's been altered but it's a very good example of what you should see. The colour is also what you should expect.

Anything less and you're talking a nice Cuprian or a great Indicolite.

I promise you, once seen, it's never forgotton! I know what sounds dramatic but like Amguy if I had £1 for every person who showed me their "Paraiba" which was purely a very nice Cuprian/Tourmaline, I would be an incredibly rich woman!!!!

 

[T L]

There are some blue/green non copper bearing tourmalines from Afghanistan that glow a bit. I remember Tourmaline Lover posted a glowy loose stone previously. What causes those to glow if it is not copper? I have seen some of paraibas on Africagems'website at the Intergem shows. I believe some of them are Marc's father Andrew's stones. He has set ones too. There are beautiful, but not in my price range.

AN

AN, yes, that was a very saturated stone, I remember it well. I think we have to remember that it might have been taken in optimal lighting though, who knows what it would have looked like in another light source. It was beautiful though and a prime specimen from that region, but now that I reflect back, and that I have seen true Brazilian material, I have to say even that stone isn't as fine as a top Brazilian paraiba. I have an Afghan tourmaine, and it looks great in some lighting and really does have a bit of neon to it, and in others, it looks less saturated. A true paraiba will hold it's own in any lighting.

They also look really fake in color, very garish. It's like someone dipped a stone in a radioactive blue wash. I'm not kidding.

 

[chrono]

To AN,
To me, the tourmaline in your picture is lovely. It is a great example of a cuprian or indicolite but definitely not PT material.

To AJJ,
My Mahenge, spessartite and a couple of other gems also glow but are they copper bearing? No. They aren’t even tourmalines. Many gems might appear to glow under certain lighting conditions (fluorescence under UV or sunlight, backlighting, etc) and usually stones with intense saturation will appear to glow as well. However, this glow is different from the glow of a Paraiba where the intensity is just plainly ridiculous. A good example will be as LD suggested – think eBay photoshopping where the stone is so altered it looks fake.

 

[Barrett]

Do you see in the picture below of Soberguy's fantastic turquoise the color comparison to the paraibas. What is turquoise??...a hydrous phosphate of copper. Color is pretty much identical.

Glow is an adjective for vividness(TL correct me if i am wrong). No stone really glows as there is no internal light source. Only thing i can think of that would make a stone literally glow would be one that shows fluorescence in the visible light spectrum..say..something akin to a Burmese ruby. What we percieve as glow or neon is just extreme vividness aka. saturation. Thats why the Batalha mine paraibas were so "neon" With 1%-2.5% copper they were saturated with copper molecules which in turn equaled excellent saturation of color in the gemstones.

Arjun, your blue tourmaline is one of the nicest stones posted on PS in a while in my opinion. It lacks the vivdness of the paraibas i posted since it's colored by iron. Iron can and does produce the same color in tourmalines as copper does but it's a poorer coloring chromophore than copper is. I guess another example might be green beryl. Green beryl is colored by iron but slip in some chromium and then it's suddenly an emerald. Although iron produces the same green color it lacks the kick that chromium does. You will never see a non chromium(vanadium) green beryl surpass a top quality emerald. Iron just isn't as good a coloring chromophore as copper or chromium.

 

[T L]

This is probably the finest non-pariaba, non-copper bearing, indicolite I've ever seen by far. It's the Afghan tourmaline that ArtNouveau alluded too above. 12.73 carats, and it sold for around $3800 originally way back when (I think at least a few years ago). However, it still can't hold a candle to true top Brazilian paraiba. 99% of all the indicolite I see has a grey mask, and this one clearly does not.

 

[arjunajane]

To AN,
To me, the tourmaline in your picture is lovely. It is a great example of a cuprian or indicolite but definitely not PT material.

To AJJ,
My Mahenge, spessartite and a couple of other gems also glow but are they copper bearing? No. They aren’t even tourmalines. Many gems might appear to glow under certain lighting conditions (fluorescence under UV or sunlight, backlighting, etc) and usually stones with intense saturation will appear to glow as well. However, this glow is different from the glow of a Paraiba where the intensity is just plainly ridiculous. A good example will be as LD suggested – think eBay photoshopping where the stone is so altered it looks fake.

Hey C,
thanks for your reply. I didn't mean to imply my gem or other nice indicolites must be copper bearing..more just wondering something I have thought to myself, out loud
Good point though, many mahenges etc also have a different type of glow.
Previous to this thread, I have to admit I hadn't really found the screaming 'fake' paraiba type glow very appealing (please folks, don't throw anything too pointy). - personally preferring the more muted (if you can call it that) appearance of cuprians. But than again, before this thread I had not seen the crystals and gems posted by Amguy - now, I get it! Hopefully one day I will get the chance to see one in person.

 

[arjunajane]

Glow is an adjective for vividness(TL correct me if i am wrong). No stone really glows as there is no internal light source. Only thing i can think of that would make a stone literally glow would be one that shows fluorescence in the visible light spectrum..say..something akin to a Burmese ruby. What we percieve as glow or neon is just extreme vividness aka. saturation. Thats why the Batalha mine paraibas were so "neon" With 1%-2.5% copper they were saturated with copper molecules which in turn equaled excellent saturation of color in the gemstones.

Arjun, your blue tourmaline is one of the nicest stones posted on PS in a while in my opinion. It lacks the vivdness of the paraibas i posted since it's colored by iron. Iron can and does produce the same color in tourmalines as copper does but it's a poorer coloring chromophore than copper is. I guess another example might be green beryl. Green beryl is colored by iron but slip in some chromium and then it's suddenly an emerald. Although iron produces the same green color it lacks the kick that chromium does. You will never see a non chromium(vanadium) green beryl surpass a top quality emerald. Iron just isn't as good a coloring chromophore as copper or chromium.

Amguy, thank you very much for answering my question and explaining about the iron vs copper/chomium - I really enjoy learning this stuff; why my gem looks the way it does. Your explanation about glow and saturation is also very helpful for understanding this topic, as folks do so often say these gems appear 'lit from within'.
(I see you have actually addressed my question partially back on pg2 too, so apologies as I did not see that before posting.)

Also, I really appreciate your comment about my tourm - that means a lot, especially coming from yourself


Gorgeous photos btw - that Roger D hexagon is just sublime!

 

[Nomsdeplume]

This one glows, but does it glow enough?

http://www.litnon.com/viewgem.php?gemid=7971&id=34302

 

[chrono]

Looks like a very nice cuprian to me but not up to the level of what a Paraiba is.

 

[MAC-W]

What are your thougths on this one?

it says its from the original Batalha mine.

 

[T L]

What are your thougths on this one?

it says its from the original Batalha mine.

It's okay, not very fine quality, and very sleepy.

 

[Lovinggems]

What's a neon tourmaline? Is it a new term?

The stone is very nice especially one that was cut by John Dyer, but I'm wondering if the stone has a glow factor to it?

http://johndyergems.com/catalog_pages/gemstone-Tourmaline562.html

 

[T L]

It's very pretty, and great for an indicolite, but true top Brazilian paraiba out glows that by a thousand miles.

Here's a video that kind of shows a good example of that "glow" these stones are famous for. I don't know the origin of this stone.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZd-0nL8WYg&feature=related

At 4:37 in this video, he shows three untreated, old mine Brazilian paraibas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZd-0nL8WYg&feature=related

 

[Barrett]

Great example, TL..you can't even see the facets since the color is so blinding.

 

[T L]

Well, I thought a video would be more helpful than a still photos, but again, these stones really need to be seen in person to get the full effect.