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4 prongs and 6 prongs setting for diamonds

LorealJohn

Rough_Rock
Joined
Aug 11, 2016
Messages
1
Hey,
Isn't it safe to have 6 prongs diamonds than 4 prongs diamonds? Which type of diamond setting would you choose? I felt, in favor of security, 6 prongs diamonds are better. I have seen from an article http://www.pheradiamonds.com/four-prongs-vs-six-prongs/ 4 prongs diamonds has more luster and sparkling as it has more area to reflect light. Then how about 6 prongs diamond? How do you choose a diamond? Based on its luster or security?
 

Gypsy

Super_Ideal_Rock
Joined
Aug 8, 2005
Messages
40,225
Okay so I'm not sure how many questions are in your query.

First, it's not just the number of prongs that impact the security of the setting. It's the metal, the design and the construction. And it's your diligence and maintenance of the setting. Making sure you keep the ring clean, that you learn to self check your stone in the setting (very easy), and that you have the ring checked by a local jeweler every 6 months to a year.

In general in larger round stones ( 7.5mm plus or so) we recommend six prongs. But many people have safely and happily set their large stones in four prong settings.

There are some six prong settings that are less safe than some four prong settings.


Regarding your last questions. "How do you chose a diamond"... that's a longer question. I assume you are talking rounds. I will post a tutorial for you for that. I'm not sure what you meant by "luster" versus "security" for STONE selection. Or for SETTING selection. So please clarity that.
 

Gypsy

Super_Ideal_Rock
Joined
Aug 8, 2005
Messages
40,225
Round Diamonds 101:

The entire purpose of faceting a diamond is to reflect light.
How well or how poorly a diamond does this determines how beautiful it is.
How well a diamond performs is determined by the angles and cutting. This is why we say cut is king.
No other factor: not color, not clarity has as much of an impact on the appearance of a diamond as its cut. An ideal H will out white a poorly cut F. With round diamonds even a GIA triple Excellent is not enough. And you must stick to GIA and AGS only (HPD in Europe is good as well). EGL is a bad option: [URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/egl-certification-are-any-of-them-ok.142863/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/egl-certification-are-any-of-them-ok.142863/[/URL]
So how to we ensure that we have the right angles and cutting to get the light performance we want?
http://www.pricescope.com/wiki/diamonds/diamond-cut
Well one method is to start with a GIA Ex, and then apply the HCA to it. YOU DO NOT USE HCA for AGS0 stones generally, though you can. In general, AGS0 trumps HCA though as one examines the actual stone and the other does not.
http://www.pricescope.com/wiki/diamonds/holloway-cut-advisor
The HCA is a rejection tool. Not a selection tool. It uses 4 data points to make a rudimentary call on how the diamond may perform.
If the diamond passes then you know that you are in the right zone in terms of angles for light performance. Under 2 is a pass. Under 2.5-2.1 is a maybe. 2.6 and over is a no. No score 2 and under is better than any other.
Is that enough? Not really.

So what you need is a way to check actual light performance of your actual stone.
That's what an idealscope image does. http://www.pricescope.com/wiki/diamonds/firescope-idealscope
It shows you how and wear your diamond is reflecting light, how well it is going at it, and where you are losing light return. That is why you won't see us recommending Blue Nile, as they do not provide idealscope images for their diamonds. BGD,BE, James Allen, GOG, HPD, ERD and WF do.

The Idealscope is the 'selection tool'. Not the HCA.
So yes, with a GIA stone you need the idealscope images. Or you can buy an idealscope yourself and take it in to the jeweler you are working with to check the stones yourself. Or if you have a good return policy (full refund minimum 7 days) then you can buy the idealscope, buy the stone, and do it at home.

Now if you want to skip all that... stick to AGS0 stones and then all you have to do is pick color and clarity and you know you have a great performing diamond. Because AGS has already done the checking for you. That's why they trade at a premium. Some AGS0's are better than others though, so pay attention to any ASET or IS provided.

In general with rounds, you will want a table 60% or less. A depth between 59 and 62.4. Crown angle 33.5-35. Pavilion Angle: 40.6-40.9 (there is a little give on this). And the crown and pavilion angles must be complimentary which is what the HCA checks for you.

On color:


It is important to remember is that color is graded FACE DOWN. Where there is NO light return. Not face up where there is light return and refraction. You wear diamonds set. FACE UP.

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Within one color grade, even the labs can't agree on the color grades of stones and something could be a "high" H or a "low" E. Within 2 color grades it is hard. Not impossible. But very hard. And it gets harder once set. If you are talking ideal rounds, or any stone with ideal light return and no sharp corners it gets harder still because the ideal light return masks body color.

Generally we say to be conservative stay above H if you DO NOT KNOW YOUR LADY'S COLOR PREFERENCES.

If you are talking fancy shapes without ideal light return (because there is no 'ideal' for EC's Radiant, etc) it's a bit different.

This is how I think of it.

Ever gotten one of those HUGE paint fan decks? Where there are literally 100s of colors of whites? And when they are RIGHT next to each other you can TOTALLY tell that one is bluer/colder and one is a bit warmer and which one is one is TOTALLY warmer. One there's one that's slightly greener. One that's slightly pinker? But really. They are all white?

Then you pick one after agonizing over this white or that white and when it's on the walls and people are like: Oh. You painted again. And it's STILL white. Great.

And you're all... BUT it's BLUE white. Or it's a WARM white now. It used to be ____ white. It's TOTALLY different.

It's like that. You are talking about shades of white. D is colder... J is warmer. But it's all white.

YES. If you have an accurately graded F and an H THAT HAVE THE SAME PERFORMANCE you are going to be able to tell them apart when you compare them side by side. Just like you would be able to tell if you painted your walls a warm white, but painted the crown molding a cold/straight white. But both are STILL white, you only see the contrast because of the proximity. But it's very slight, you could set an F center with G sides and never tell the difference. And even H sides depending on the setting and the size of the sidestones... especially with round brilliants.


I want you notice all the qualifiers thought. I'm talking about stones with the SAME performance. An ideal H will out white an F that has compromised light performance from a poor cut.

NOTHING impacts the appearance of a diamond as much as cut. CUT is king.

You want the shinest whitest and brightest diamond out there: Cut is King. No other factor, not color or clarity or anything else impacts how white bright an shiny a stone is.

On Clarity: http://www.goodoldgold.com/diamond-clarity
Clarity Vs2 or Si1 and eyeclean is as high as you need to go in a round. So set that as a floor. And verify eyeclean with vendor or images and vendor (best). An Eyeclean SI1 will look just like an IF to the naked eye. So... really anything over VS2 and eyeclean is just because you want higher clarity for some personal or cultural reason (and that's fine of course, just make sure it's an educated decision) or because you are getting a good deal on a stone because higher clarity stones can be harder to move (especially in lower colors). So make sure you don't put a CEILING on your clarity. All you need is a floor. And with rounds, in general that floor is Si1 or Vs2.
 

dan1230

Rough_Rock
Joined
Aug 4, 2016
Messages
26
WOW! What an amazingly useful amount of information all summed up in one post! Thanks Gypsy!
 

AdaBeta27

Brilliant_Rock
Premium
Joined
Sep 7, 2004
Messages
1,077
Wink and other jewelers have said that if you want 4 prongs, make them 4 heavy prongs. There are numerous variations on how to do that, some of which have a metal ring under the diamond for support. The reason people caution against 4 prong settings is if you loosen / bend / break one prong, the diamond can easily tilt in the mounting and slide out. If you have 6 prongs, it's a big tougher to lose the diamond.

There are a lot of heavy-weight 4 prong settings that would be very secure. The problematic ones are lighter weight stamped mountings. I have easily bent prongs in the lightweight Tiffany type settings like the picture I attached. This type of setting is very common and that's why there are a lot of cautions about it's better to go with a 6 prong than a 4.

Gypsy covered the diamond issues. All I have to add is that the "warm" colors are not necessarily bad, unless the recipient dislikes them. I own diamonds from D down to M, and I like them all. Lots of people on here have large J or K diamonds that they like. People with olive or darker skin tones often say they find the warmer diamonds more complimentary than the colorless ones. The warmer diamond are more chameleon-like in that they sort of change color in different lighting. My M diamond was cut by Brian Gavin. Sometimes it's very white-looking, and sometimes it really shows its actual creamy pale yellow tint. Either way, I love it. But pale yellow diamonds aren't for everyone.

In that picture, above, that H looks very scary tinted face down but H actually will face up very white when mounted. I have 2 H color diamonds that look disturbingly brown face down, but very white face-up. The I color range is truly getting into ivory or antique white range, and I is where most people can start to notice tint. Round diamonds, especially today's superideal cuts, wash tint very, very well. If you wind up looking a cushions, or Asschers, or princess, or marquise, or pear, be aware that deep diamonds and diamonds that have pointy ends concentrate tint much more. Tint will be concentrated in the ends of a marquise, or pear. But seeing a tint and being bothered by it are two different things, and you can certainly save a lot of money by going down either the color scale or the clarity scale.

This is open to dispute, but I and some other owners of AGS graded diamonds feel that AGS grade a bit softer on color than GIA. This is another facet of the issue that even experts can disagree within one color grade. There are vendors like Good Old Gold that have a colorimeter to kind of give you an idea of whether the diamond color is what its report says, but in the end, "diamonds have to be seen," as Diamonds by Lauren says.
 

AdaBeta27

Brilliant_Rock
Premium
Joined
Sep 7, 2004
Messages
1,077
Two more things:

I refer people to NiceIce.com, Education, The Fast Track section for a good quick read on selecting superideal RBs. We have the "Pricescope cheat sheet for rounds" thread here that more or less was derived from Todd Gray's (NiceIce) criteria.
[URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/preferred-specs-cheat-sheet-for-rounds.88548/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/preferred-specs-cheat-sheet-for-rounds.88548/[/URL]

You can buy a diamond with Very Good cut rating or one that lacks the hearts & arrows patters, or has a big 60% table or whatever. But those are harder to buy sight unseen over the Internet because they are more individual. Same goes for antique diamonds: Performance and "personality" are all over the road, and you have to see them to decide. The modern superideal H&As are pertty much cookbook, but even they can have variations, too, depending on their proportions and what the cutters have done with minor facets.

If you wind up looking at J or lower colors, my advice on choosing a metal for the setting is "Let the diamond decide." In other words, put that diamond up against white metals or yellow gold or rose gold (if you're considering that) and see what goes best with it. Warm, diamonds are less neutral than the colorless and the upper end of the near-colorless range. They are more likely to be affected by a brown, gray, green, or other undertone that might sway your choice of metal.
 

motownmama

Ideal_Rock
Premium
Joined
Jan 9, 2008
Messages
8,207
I'm not sure if this was mentioned, but I think a diamond looks more round with 6 prongs and ever so slightly squarish with 4.
 

Diamond_Hawk

Brilliant_Rock
Trade
Joined
Apr 8, 2014
Messages
1,229
motownmama|1471016680|4065165 said:
I'm not sure if this was mentioned, but I think a diamond looks more round with 6 prongs and ever so slightly squarish with 4.

We have heard this, as well, from some customers - though I love the look either way.
 

Winks_Elf

Brilliant_Rock
Trade
Joined
Nov 28, 2008
Messages
1,675
Sticking strictly to a 4 vs 6 prong for a round, I prefer the 6. I personally think it is a richer look, as it echos the shape of the stone. 4-prongs tends to give a bit of a squared off look to a round. Plus it is more protective. Once you go over a carat, 1.5ct with a round, I think a 6-prong is a better idea for your investment.
 
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