How to safely handle melee

[alisonia333]

I was wondering if anyone had any tips on handling diamond melee. I have a little parcel of old cut melee stones, and I wanted to take them out and measure them and look at them under the loupe, maybe roughly group them together by size and color (there's a huge range of color, I'm just talking about rough sorting). Anyway, I've searched this topic on google and PS and I can't seem to find any tips. I have the stones folded up in tissue paper and taped, but when I got them back from my jeweler (they were from a piece I dismantled) the SA warned me that if I take them out to look, they might "jump" out of the paper. So now I'm scared they're going to jump away if I open it up! Sorry if this has been asked somewhere else, I definitely searched and came up empty.

Thanks!!!

 

[bunnycat]

I'm not sure exactly how small the stones you have are, but the smallest stones I've looked at loose have been about 2-3mm (3mm is about 10 pts) and I have locking tweezers to handle them with. You could probably open them (carefully) at a desk with a central drawer the drawer pulled open (and cleaned out) to catch anything that may jump a little.

 

[oldminer]

Tape aa white piece of printing paper to your desk top or desk pad. Buy a fine tipped, tweezer, one with a rather sharp pointed end, that has somewhat delicate spring tension. You then work low and close, over the paper where you have poured out the stones, and use your loupe and tweezer slowly and gently to see each stone and to separate them. Periodically, take those you have already sorted and place them in the separate papers or containers you wish to store them in, so if you disturb the arrangement you won't lose all the work you already have done.

You can pick small diamonds up with a "diamond scoop", a little miniature dust pan that jewelers use along with pushing the stones with your finger tip or tweezer into the tray. You can also utilize diamond's love of oil to press your finger into the pile and many will stick to it long enough for you to put brush them off into your storage packages.

You need to have lighting right ahead of your forehead so that your movements with the loupe, and tweezer are limited and not tossing the stone far from you if it might jump, and a few will prove they are alive by doing just that, no matter how subtle your moves. Have fun.

 

[John P]

Ditto everything Oldminer said.

You should get everything as clean as possible first. If you have a pristine parcel you're all set, but if the content was pulled out of jewelry it likely accumulated a lot of dust, grease and residue which completely changes perceived color and pique. Boiling is preferable, but diamond boiling is a pretty specialized (and dangerous) service which is uncommon stateside. For your purposes, even taking the time to hand-clean the lot using isopropyl alcohol and a microfiber cloth will help. It's extremely tedious, and difficult with the smallest goods, but it can make a meaningful difference.

Do be aware that tweezing melee involves pressure on slick, tiny surfaces. Once in a while an anxious little guy will pop out. These ricochet-rocks seem to have minds of their own. Logically, the more you tickle, squeeze, lift and flip things the greater the chance this will happen. That's why I use a standing loupe for sorting melee (pictured below). It permits you to push/pull goods and lift them only a small distance. It also leaves both hands free. A standing magnifying glass or headset magnifier can work well too.

I also put a dark hardwood floor into my lab. One purpose was to cancel all light reflections from beneath. Another - you guessed it - was to insure against prolonged bling searches. If ever a diamond pops away we just listen, shine an LED flashlight in that direction...sparkle...there it is. So you might consider your surrounding environment when you break out the bling.

I don't know what the world record for melee-ricochet-distance is, but I know the impressive leaps I've seen in diamond offices from Surat to Antwerp.

 

[kenny]

We're always told to not let our diamonds touch when stored.

Yet I often see pics of pros with hundreds of polished diamonds, not just melee, just tossed together like in a bag of rice.
Why don't diamonds scratch each other?

 

[oldminer]

Diamonds do become "paper worn' over time if they are left touching, but the rapid nature of melee use allows a reasonable amount of time for average quality diamonds of tiny sizes to rub one another without noticeable effect. I suppose if one were making super fine melee, there may be a way to limit the interaction between stones. I suppose putting fewer together in one inner flute might help, but I have not seen isolation boxes such as used on Signity CZ stones which really works well but not what diamond dealers would want to do except in an extraordinary situation.

 

[alisonia333]

Thank you so much John Pollard, Oldminer and Bastetcat--I really appreciate your detailed responses!! I ordered fine tip gem tweezers and a diamond scoop on amazon just now. I'm trying to decide whether these stones are close enough in size and color for a ring (there's about 30 stones, I think 33 total but it looks like there are a couple of duds from what I saw at the Jeweler's) or whether I should be thinking some sort of DBTY type arrangement. I am going to wait for my tweezers and stuff to arrive, set up some white paper and some small containers a little lamp, my loupe and my calipers inside a shallow drawer that I can pull right out of desk and put on top of my kitchen table.

John: As far as boiling diamonds, I think you're probably talking about some sort of special acid bath or something, but what about just putting them in a pot of boiling water? Would that dissolve away the grime? I suppose it might be cumbersome to get them in and out of water, though, I'm not exactly comfortable pouring it all through the strainer! I do have regular isopropyl alcohol and a polishing cloth, but I'm not sure if I'm confident enough to clean them by hand like that!

Bastecat: I don't know how big the stones are exactly, one SA mentioned they looked like they were 23 points and one said 7 points...I really have no idea, hence the digital calipers, so I'll at least have a better idea of mm measurement anyway. I tested them on stones I knew the average mm diameter of and they appeared to be very accurate.