Post by yingh » September 6th, 2006, 5:40 am
Earlier I started a topic to share my experience of red spinel inquiries. Impulsively, I bought both of them and now would like to share the second half of the story. 

To begin with, here is a link to the original thread that were mostly around pricing. Related Discussion

Now the face-to-face encounter - and sorry, no pictures yet - just received the second one today where I don''t have a camera.

For easier reference, I will call the ACSstone.com one (the less expensive one) A, and the AJS one B.

COLOR:
A: although stated in description to expect slight orange hue, I honestly did not see any with naked eyes. However, the purple hue is much stronger than I expected that it is almost a rosy color from some viewing angles.  It is still a very pretty color.

B: stated to be top red, I expected it to be redder than it actually is.  Maybe it is unfair since we have a rainy day here today and all I got to view the stone was under incadescent light (office lighting), yellowish table lamp light, and daylight without the sunlight.   It has this visible orange or even brown hue when viewed in office lighting.  It appears to be medium to dark red in the other lighting. Still a lovely red, but I yet to see the brigher red as portraited at vendor''s website.

CLARITY:
Both stone has visible inclusions to naked eyes.
A: inclusion visible from window from top view, a big distraction.
B: about 3 inclusions on the pavillion that are less obvious but still visible from top view, affect light reflection.

CUT:
A: a rather flat topped native cut (pardon my layman terms), a big window that is beyond my tolerance.
B: clearly the winner. Nice cut, although I think the table is a little too small.

Tomorrow I will take some pictures and post back.  Looks like we will have a little sun tomorrow!