ripped off on setting? professionals come in...

[sydney]

Is this right?
My original platinum e-ring which held a .75 is being reset to fit a 1.5. It was custom made from scratch and the head can''t just be saudered on/off-it must be totally recrafted. They are charging me about $1200 to reset it- I thought my platinum could be reused but was told they couldn''t use all of it because of the "manufacturing process that is involved with platinum and the need to add more alloy in the refining process so as to prevent air bubbles etc etc". The reason why this seemed fishy to me is that I don''t understand how restting my ring- custom or not- could cost just as much as my setting when we originally purchased it. Thoughts?

 

[denverappraiser]

I can’t really address whether it is possible to replace just the crown portion of the ring without seeing the piece but this is not entirely out of the question. It depends on the design and the way the ring was constructed. It’s correct that platinum is difficult to recycle and the metal cost is not the biggest expense of a custom platinum setting.

If you think the jeweler is lying to you about the need to replace more than just the head, show it to a different jeweler and see if you get a different story.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

 

[Modified Brilliant]

Platinum prices might be higher since you purchased your ring also.

www.metrojewelryappraisers.com

 

[strmrdr]

the shouldnt use any of the old ring, just use fresh and take the old in trade as scrap.
Which for the price sounds like what they are doing.
Depending on the design the price sounds not too unreasonable.

 

[Cehrabehra]

Date: 11/15/2006 7:16:48 PM
Author: denverappraiser

I can’t really address whether it is possible to replace just the crown portion of the ring without seeing the piece but this is not entirely out of the question. It depends on the design and the way the ring was constructed. It’s correct that platinum is difficult to recycle and the metal cost is not the biggest expense of a custom platinum setting.

If you think the jeweler is lying to you about the need to replace more than just the head, show it to a different jeweler and see if you get a different story.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

just since it''s kinda on topic - is it reasonable to recycle gold?

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Date: 11/15/2006 11:31:09 PM
Author: Cehrabehra
just since it''s kinda on topic - is it reasonable to recycle gold?

No, not usually.
Especially if casting is involved - which is the way most things in USA are made.
To cast one usually needs a big lump (maybe 100 rings worth in a large production house - the heavier the better) to force the molten metal into the mold - and we would never compromise everyone elses gold or platinum quality by adding some unknown metal to the this ''tree stump''.

look here at some of these pics
http://images.google.com/images?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=IBMA,IBMA:2006-14,IBMA:en&q=gold+casting+tree

And in the case above - it is likely the jeweller has an entire cast mount that means an entire new ring will have less labor to make it - than soldering in a new setting which probably means cutting out the setting you like for the bigger stone and hfitting it to your old shank.

 

[Kay]

Date: 11/15/2006 10:01:30 PM
Author: strmrdr
the shouldnt use any of the old ring, just use fresh and take the old in trade as scrap.
Which for the price sounds like what they are doing.
Depending on the design the price sounds not too unreasonable.

If this is the case, maybe you should ask how much of an offset you are getting for the "scrap" value of your current setting. You might want to just keep the original setting and put a colored gemstone in it.

 

[Cehrabehra]

Date: 11/16/2006 12:41:45 AM
Author: Garry H (Cut Nut)

Date: 11/15/2006 11:31:09 PM
Author: Cehrabehra
just since it''s kinda on topic - is it reasonable to recycle gold?

No, not usually.
Especially if casting is involved - which is the way most things in USA are made.
To cast one usually needs a big lump (maybe 100 rings worth in a large production house - the heavier the better) to force the molten metal into the mold - and we would never compromise everyone elses gold or platinum quality by adding some unknown metal to the this ''tree stump''.

look here at some of these pics
http://images.google.com/images?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=IBMA,IBMA:2006-14,IBMA:en&q=gold+casting+tree

And in the case above - it is likely the jeweller has an entire cast mount that means an entire new ring will have less labor to make it - than soldering in a new setting which probably means cutting out the setting you like for the bigger stone and hfitting it to your old shank.

the reason I ask is the other day when I went into my jewelers this woman was there and she was having two fairly large (about 2" long) italian horns made for her dh and herself... she told the jeweler she wanted solid so he made solid and they''re HEAVY and she said they were too heavy so he said he''d melt them down and recast them as hollow (he''d recommended hollow but her exp with hollow horns was that they were very thin and fragile) and I thought I''d read here you can''t reuse gold - but if it''s the same gold you just used, is that okay?

 

[denverappraiser]

The best way to recycle gold is to chemically extract the gold component from the other metals and redo the alloy. This isn’t all that difficult but it’s logistically more sensible to do it in fairly large batches, say a kilo or more at a time. For practical reasons this means that the jeweler is usually going to give you credit for the gold content of your existing piece and replace it with new gold with which to make your new piece. They will accumulate these sorts of trade-ins as well as shop scrap until they have a reasonable load to ship off to the refiner who will process it and return it as ‘new’ metal that they can then use the next customer’s job. The whole process works pretty well and it only loses a few percent of the metal and some modest refining fees. It’s usually possible to simply melt the old piece and cast with it but this does tend to cause more trouble than the savings in refining fees would justify unless you really want to have the same gold atoms in the new piece as the old for some sentimental reason.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

 

[Cehrabehra]

Date: 11/16/2006 10:53:58 AM
Author: denverappraiser

The best way to recycle gold is to chemically extract the gold component from the other metals and redo the alloy. This isn’t all that difficult but it’s logistically more sensible to do it in fairly large batches, say a kilo or more at a time. For practical reasons this means that the jeweler is usually going to give you credit for the gold content of your existing piece and replace it with new gold with which to make your new piece. They will accumulate these sorts of trade-ins as well as shop scrap until they have a reasonable load to ship off to the refiner who will process it and return it as ‘new’ metal that they can then use the next customer’s job. The whole process works pretty well and it only loses a few percent of the metal and some modest refining fees. It’s usually possible to simply melt the old piece and cast with it but this does tend to cause more trouble than the savings in refining fees would justify unless you really want to have the same gold atoms in the new piece as the old for some sentimental reason.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

thank you neil for that I think I will just request that fresh gold be used.... just in case. I''m assuming the "does tend to cause more trouble" refers to porosity issues?

 

[JohnQuixote]

Date: 11/16/2006 11:08:18 AM
Author: Cehrabehra

Date: 11/16/2006 10:53:58 AM
Author: denverappraiser

The best way to recycle gold is to chemically extract the gold component from the other metals and redo the alloy. This isn’t all that difficult but it’s logistically more sensible to do it in fairly large batches, say a kilo or more at a time. For practical reasons this means that the jeweler is usually going to give you credit for the gold content of your existing piece and replace it with new gold with which to make your new piece. They will accumulate these sorts of trade-ins as well as shop scrap until they have a reasonable load to ship off to the refiner who will process it and return it as ‘new’ metal that they can then use the next customer’s job. The whole process works pretty well and it only loses a few percent of the metal and some modest refining fees. It’s usually possible to simply melt the old piece and cast with it but this does tend to cause more trouble than the savings in refining fees would justify unless you really want to have the same gold atoms in the new piece as the old for some sentimental reason.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

thank you neil for that I think I will just request that fresh gold be used.... just in case. I''m assuming the ''does tend to cause more trouble'' refers to porosity issues?

It does. For instance, if someone just took 2 rings and melted them down to make one ring they would wind up with terrible porosity.

The way to do it is to separate all the metals out through refining, smelting and purifying. This is best done in large volume (as was said). There are companies who purchase scrap metal and do this as a speciality.

 

[pyramid]

I heard of someone whose sister is Manager in a jewellers in Norway, and she sent her sister her wedding/engagement ring in yellow gold to be changed into white gold. She believes the has the same original gold in the new white gold ring. So can this refining be done on a smaller scale if you know the refinery (e.g. a jeweller in the know) or would this have been probable just a case of melting down the gold and adding alloy and therefore porosity problems? Or are things done differently in Norway?

 

[denverappraiser]

Nah, it’s the same in Norway. It *IS* possible to very small individual batches of a few grams but it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to do it in most cases. The cost of refining would be more than the value of the metal recovered. There is no way to make yellow into white without separating the metals first unless you count rhodium plating as being sufficiently close.

Some items, like die struck gold wedding bands and unsold tourist charms will melt and cast into something else fairly well without needing to refine the metal. , especially if you’re not too picky. The problem comes when the piece has several parts soldered together, a sizing seam or two, etc.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

 

[pyramid]

Thanks denver appraiser. So does refining have to be done at a refinery or can a jeweller do it with know how then?

 

[denverappraiser]

Here''s a do-it-yourself kit for jewelers who like to do this kind thing themselves.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

 

[pyramid]

Well there we go then. Maybe she got it done like this or maybe at a refinery, I don''t know if she is sentimental towards the gold so maybe it just went amongst the jewellers to the refinery and hers got made with the batch that came back, maybe she didn''t pay anyway if her sister was having it done.