The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1884-01-10
Diamond Cutting.
A Chicago dealer said to reporter:


gree of brilliancy. We've sold carat
stones here as high as $500, while other
carat stones may be bought for $50.
We claim that the American method of
cutting diamonds enhances the value of
the stone, on the average, by twenty
five per cent. The tools used in our
business are the diamond cleaver, used
in chipping off this or that edge of the
rough stone, useless for its ultimate
shape; the cutting stick, the cutting
box, the diamond reducer, the gauge
for measuring diamonds, very exact
instrument the revolving disk, the set
ting bench, the hand-clamp, the
tweezers, the block, files, screws, etc. -
"And how about the method of cut
ting?" was asked.
1.-The first operation is to put two
rough stones on the cutting sticks, i'm
bedded in cement, and place them over
the opening of the cutting box That
is, as you see, mahogany box, silver
faced, eight and one-half by three
inches, with an opening having fine
sieve on The bottom. The two diamonds
are rubbed against each other by hand,
so as to gradually cut smooth surfaces
into each other. Diamond cuts dia-
mondo is an old saying, and, in fact,
nothing but diamond will do the cut
ting. In shaping the rough diamonds
In this way very much depends upon
nice judgment on the part of the
workman in determining on the number
of facets, their length and breadth, and
the best manner of cutting the stone so
as to give the greatest possible bril-
liancy and not to spoil the reflection,
thing which is very easily done. The
superiority of American diamonds re-
suits entirely from the exact workman
ship and the clever management of the
facets. To accomplish this our excel
lent tools are necessary. When /
mention that the benches are firmly
fastened to the floor in rectangular
position, that they are of solid iron,
and that our revolving disks are so per-
fectly adjusted as to cut to the one
thousandth of an inch, you viii get an
idea of what mean.
''Now, in shaping the rough stone It
is often advisable to cut off piece, be-
cause it makes the stone irregular in
shape and is useless. In that case an
aperture is sawedinto the diamond, and
then, by inserting a very sharp steel
tool, the superfuous piece is chopped
off. Next, the stone, having had its
edges roughly ground is put on the set
ting bench or .Feststeller,' as the tech
nical Dutch name is, and then it is
placed on top of ball of pure tin solder,
held in the hollow of 'Dupp.' This
solder is heated over a spirit burner till
it is soft enough to be perfectly pliable.
With the tweezers this soft tin is shaped
firmly around the diamond. so that it
will not shake in the least, because if it
did in the slightest degree the stone
would be irretrievably spoiled. Next it
IS put into the hand-clamp and held
down to the revolving disk, which moves
. with speed of $500 revolutions per
minute. With all this speed some dia-
monds are so hard that they have to be
ground for one entire month to get the
facets they are to have. There is a
bracket holder to press down the dia-
mond to the flying steel disk, which
again is impregnated with diamond
dust, mixed with oil. This we get from
the mines-that is, the bits of diamond.
The dust is made in the reducer. As
you see, a steel mortar of cylindrical
shape, closing air tight around the pes
tie, so that the latter moves up and
down in the opening horizontally, and
none OF the dust is lost. When ground
to powder it is mixed with oil and ap-
Piled on the surface of the revolving
DISK. It's the most perfect mechanism
extant which we introduced here. 1t is
the exceedingly great speed with which
the disk turns that grinds the diamond
VI course, the greatest possible atten-
ton, trained hand and eye and a firm
touch are required besides all these in
struments and our gauge for measuring
the width of the facets, so as to cut a
diamond perfectly.
''Here is finished stone," continued
the informant, exhibiting diamond
of beautiful fire and having seventy
five facets in all. THAT is worth about
$500 1t is only about carat in
weight, but what work there was to
that! 1t took four weeks to cut If.
That's all the secret there is to
beautiful diamond the cutting. We
got two beautiful large diamonds from
New York, but slight mistake had
been made in grinding their facets, so
that the light in them was too much
broken up, and there was but little fire
IN them. We couldn't sell them and
they lay six years in the drawer. Now.
since we began cutting ourselves we
had them recut, and they have sold
readily at much higherpr than we
asked for them before, though materi-
ally lessened in size. How do we get
our diamonds. We buy them rough in
heaps and pay about fifty or sixty dol
lars per carat for them. After the
cutting they have lost about one-half
in weight, and there may be some worth
but fifty dollars carat, while Others
are worth $3.50 per carat. The
greatest diamond expert cannot tell
beforehand how a lot of rough
stones may turn out when cut. |
It's therefore matter of speculation,
and spectators do the buying of the |
rough stones, some of the European
houses keeping agents right at the mines
IN Brazil, South Africa and the East
Indies. TO buy up the products. After
buying lot, we may have made very
profitable or an Improbable venture. it
all depends onluck. ~ Chicago Herald.