Elbaite Tourmaline and their value. Any idea?

[JewelryLover]

JL - you can argue if you want but the GIA have graded this diamond as having yellow fluor and that's what I see. It may be paler in some places but it's still yellow.

I think you're misunderstanding me. I dont say that your diamond doesn't got yellow fluor, I can see that. But I'm refering to your picture, and even how yellow the fluor is - I can see that the top does look white in the picture (and it's the picture we're talking about). There's two different colors that I can see at the picture, one above the red line and one beneath. I'm refering to the color above the red line.

 

[LD]

Please JL re-read my post. This diamond does NOT have white fluor. You can say all you want that it does but I'm telling you as the owner of the diamond that it does NOT and the GIA agree with me.

 

[JewelryLover]

Please JL re-read my post. This diamond does NOT have white fluor. You can say all you want that it does but I'm telling you as the owner of the diamond that it does NOT and the GIA agree with me.

Still, it's not the fluor of your diamond I'm discussing. I can see that it DO got yellow fluor. It's just the top color I'm refering to! That are looking like white. Even if the diamond got green, yellow, red or blue fluorescense - the top do look like white to me. I'm just trying to point out the color, nothing to do with your diamond or the fluorescense. Just the top color that are looking platinum white (ice cube white). I believe you as the owner of the stone, and I do believe GIA. I'm not saying that your diamond got any white fluor, because I can see that most of the diamond look yellow. Still, the top look white in picture.

 

[LD]

Please JL re-read my post. This diamond does NOT have white fluor. You can say all you want that it does but I'm telling you as the owner of the diamond that it does NOT and the GIA agree with me.

Still, it's not the fluor of your diamond I'm discussing. I can see that it DO got yellow fluor. It's just the top color I'm refering to! That are looking like white. Even if the diamond got green, yellow, red or blue fluorescense - the top do look like white to me. I'm just trying to point out the color, nothing to do with your diamond or the fluorescense. Just the top color that are looking platinum white (ice cube white). I believe you as the owner of the stone, and I do believe GIA. I'm not saying that your diamond got any white fluor, because I can see that most of the diamond look yellow. Still, the top look white in picture.

IT IS NOT WHITE. IT IS PALE YELLOW. THIS DIAMOND HAS VARYING STRENGTHS OF FLUOR FROM PALE YELLOW TO A STRONGER YELLOW. THERE IS NO WHITE. PLEASE RE-READ MY EARLIER POST.

 

[JewelryLover]

Please JL re-read my post. This diamond does NOT have white fluor. You can say all you want that it does but I'm telling you as the owner of the diamond that it does NOT and the GIA agree with me.

Still, it's not the fluor of your diamond I'm discussing. I can see that it DO got yellow fluor. It's just the top color I'm refering to! That are looking like white. Even if the diamond got green, yellow, red or blue fluorescense - the top do look like white to me. I'm just trying to point out the color, nothing to do with your diamond or the fluorescense. Just the top color that are looking platinum white (ice cube white). I believe you as the owner of the stone, and I do believe GIA. I'm not saying that your diamond got any white fluor, because I can see that most of the diamond look yellow. Still, the top look white in picture.

IT IS NOT WHITE. IT IS PALE YELLOW. THIS DIAMOND HAS VARYING STRENGTHS OF FLUOR FROM PALE YELLOW TO A STRONGER YELLOW. THERE IS NO WHITE. PLEASE RE-READ MY EARLIER POST.

If you re-read my posts, you can clearly see that it's not the fluor I'm discussing - IT'S THE PICTURE! How the picture are turning out. I can see that is it yellow fluor, but what so ever - it's still looking white IN THE PICTURE. I'm using a 1920x1080p monitor, so the color wont turn out wrong if it's pictured that way. Lets not discuss the fluor of your diamond anymore, I'm not here to argue.

 

[LD]

Here's proof - I do not intend to reply in this thread any longer after this post.

The top photo is a photograph of the fluor. As you can see it's yellow.

The bottom photo is when the gemstone is incorrectly lit and it can be made to look like it has white fluor. There is NO white fluor. This demonstrates why I believe that the white you are seeing is NOT fluor. I strongly suggest that the white you are seeing is from the background you have used and the way you have used the lighting.

 

[JewelryLover]

Here's proof - I do not intend to reply in this thread any longer after this post.

The top photo is a photograph of the fluor. As you can see it's yellow.

The bottom photo is when the gemstone is incorrectly lit and it can be made to look like it has white fluor. There is NO white fluor. This demonstrates why I believe that the white you are seeing is NOT fluor. I strongly suggest that the white you are seeing is from the background you have used and the way you have used the lighting.

In this top picture I can clearly see the yellow fluor all over. I couldn't in the other one.

 

[JewelryLover]

If this isn't White Fluor - I dont know what is. Picture taken on my hand just so there wouldn't be a white background that would affect it's color. Still the picture isn't good, but you can clearly see that it turns white. There's not a single particle that yellow.

 

[chrono]

JL,
I am sorry but from all your pictures so far, your stone does NOT fluorescence.

 

[JewelryLover]

JL,
I am sorry but from all your pictures so far, your stone does NOT fluorescence.

Okay, then we just say that it dont fluorescense then. But why does it turn white? The blue color totally disappears when the UV is hitting it. Any suggestions?

 

[chrono]

It is faintly white probably due to something else (picking up the colour from something else) but it does not fluorescence white. Actually, it looks almost inert to me. When it is inert, the base colour, in this case it is blue, will not look blue and may look like something else but not glow.

 

[JewelryLover]

It is faintly white probably due to something else (picking up the colour from something else) but it does not fluorescence white. Actually, it looks almost inert to me. When it is inert, the base colour, in this case it is blue, will not look blue and may look like something else but not glow.

Okay. I do understand what you mean about that's it not fluorescensing. I thought it were just a faint fluorescense, but maybe not at all as you say. I'ts just that I have never seen a gemstone (glass, synthetic, or whatsoever) go white (totally colorless) under UV before.

 

[Barrett]

Lordy lordy not this debate again.....
Lets break it down amguy style
This is my personal opinion and doesn't reflect the views of Pricescope, my friends, or LD whom I plan to marry one day.
That is not a paraiba tourmaline you have there! Your stone is green. Silly labs be calling green stones, "paraibas". pfffttt
...but amguy are you crazeeeeee??? Let's review past postings to see why
Rossman says the green coloring in Paraiba tourmaline is due to Ti and Mn others say Iron..I am not sure if this has been clarified as of today but it doesn't really matter. Copper ONLY produces that cyan/turquoise color in tourmaline. Not green or that blue-green color. That green is not being produced by copper in the slightest but by either iron or a Titanium/Manganese.
Green=Iron or Titanium/manganese chromophores.
It's really no different than a regular green tourmaline. It has to have that blue/turquoise/cyan to be a paraiba, in my opinion.
Make sense?
Greens, purples, and violets are not worthy of the term "paraiba" unless they have been heated to blue or will result in a blue after heating.
We all know that Cu+2 is the acting coloring chromophore in Paraiba tourmalines. If the tourmaline was just colored by Cu+2 alone it would be that fantastic glowy turquoise blue to blue color every one loves. When you trend towards the green colors you are incorporating Mn and Ti into the lattice and when you move towards the violets, and purples you are adding Mn to the lattice. When you are buying Paraibas you are buying for the copper but when you get these other transition elements into the fold they sort of muddle and displace the y-site which could have been a good place for the copper molecules. So when you have say an Mn+2 molecule in place of a Cu+2 molecule you are downgrading the effect of the Cu to produce the "neon"/"glow".
Green paraiba? It doesn't really make sense The Cu+2 is producing a turquoise or blue color stone but you have a green one in you hand. Where is the color the copper molecules are imparting on the stone? Don't see any blue just green, or purple, for that matter. If you have a blue-green stone or a green-blue stone then you are getting some effect from the copper molecules but as you move closer to the green end you get less paraiba-like.
---Cu(copper)=turquoise(blue)="neon"/"glow"
---Less blue/turquoise in the stone = less copper acting as a chromophore = less "glow"/"neon" effect.
Of course many other variables are involved as well but we don't have time for that.




-If the color is not a "vivid color grade" then it can't be a paraiba.
The reason Paraiba took the world by storm was the unusual "vivid plus" color that went above and beyond stones with just the "average vivd" color grade
(please note that 1/10th of 1% of all tourmalines mined ever receive a vivid color grade and I am being sarcastic by saying "average vivid".
-Iron can and does produce the exact same color as copper in tourmalines.
- It's all about color. If your stone ain't got the pop(color that won't stop ) then your stone ain't no different than anyone else's. Copper? Who cares. You can't see it can you??(needles???..so what, they are hampering the stones clarity and not helping it at all save for IDing it)
- Copper has been found in tourmalines since the 1930's. I used to have a list around here of locations that have copper in tourmalines that are not in Nigeria, Brazil, or Mozambique.
- Mauvco cuprian/paraiba-like tourmalines were being sold for 2 years prior to anyone even knowing that some contained copper. Plenty of nice neonish tourmalines were sold for pennies on the dollar before anyone knew what was going on.
- Very few have ever seen a real true knock-your-socks-off "heitorite" paraiba tourmaline. Most every paraiba mined from the majority of the Batalha mine, as well as every other paraiba location in Brazil and Africa, were nothing like the stuff they mined 30 meters down in a small area in the Heitor Mine, Batalha, Brazil. Those are true paraibas.
Brazilian paraiba deposits the Mulungu and the alto dos Quintos averaged only .60% by weight(once again numbers are close)..thats anywhere from 3-4 times less copper by weight than the Batalha(heitorite) finds. Thats the same with Nigerian and Mozambique material. Even the best Mozam material never approaches the Batalha Heitor mine material. You have never seen a paraiba until you have laid eyes on a heitor paraiba.
The crazy thing is the highest percentages of copper in tourmalines were found in the Mauvco Mozam ones, which were upwards of something like 3.2% by weight copper! yet even those super high Mozam ones never approached the Batlaha ones which had half the copper. no one really knows why that is but something to do with chemical makeup that is for sure

 

[JewelryLover]

Pictured next to a 9 carat Pear diamond, color "H", no fluorescense. The blue gemstone turns maybe to a color of H-J. Close to the pear. So it's probably not fluorescense it got. Whatsoever, it's very close to the "H" color!

Now I hope everyone understand that the blue color disappers. The pictures might get bad because to the strong UV, or that the camera is unable to focuse in that light atleast. It's much easier comparing it to that "H" color of the diamond.

 

[chrono]

The colour you are seeing is the natural effect the UV light has on all stones that have no fluorescence.

 

[JewelryLover]

The colour you are seeing is the natural effect the UV light has on all stones that have no fluorescence.

Okay, so the blue "disappears" because it's normal then in blue stones? Because rubies for ex. dont loose their color because of UV, netiher to Tsavorite, or Sapphires either.

 

[mimi72]

This thread has "moved on", but back on the topic of heating - the rough that was posted earlier (see below) heated to the stone shown in the LM setting below. This is the ring of a PS'er named Widget. I think this color is more Windex blue, whereas the color on the Kaufman de Suisse (sp?) ring and Art Nouveau's now-iconic Moz tourmaline ring (it's all over the internet) is what I'd call more of a Carribean blue. That is, more green in the latter two. It also depends on the quality of the photo, the angle of the stone and the light. The third photo of Widget's ring by LM looks more green. Richard Wise once told me that the nicer a gemstone is in person, the harder it is to photograph.

 

[JewelryLover]

This thread has "moved on", but back on the topic of heating - the rough that was posted earlier (see below) heated to the stone shown in the LM setting below. This is the ring of a PS'er named Widget. I think this color is more Windex blue, whereas the color on the Kaufman de Suisse (sp?) ring and Art Nouveau's now-iconic Moz tourmaline ring (it's all over the internet) is what I'd call more of a Carribean blue. That is, more green in the latter two. It also depends on the quality of the photo, the angle of the stone and the light. The third photo of Widget's ring by LM looks more green. Richard Wise once told me that the nicer a gemstone is in person, the harder it is to photograph.

Thank you for the pictures and information. Do you know if it's possible to heat Green Copper bearing Tourmalines to enhance their color?

 

[mimi72]

I've only read about the purple ones being heated to acheive the desirable blue color.

 

[JewelryLover]

I've only read about the purple ones being heated to acheive the desirable blue color.

Okay, thank you!
I will heat different type of gemstones and will make a topic about it. Mainly Sapphires, but in plenty of different colors!