Restoring Shine to Scratched Stones With Gem Shine

For this week’s #tooltalktuesday I wanted to show off a potential solution for when you accidental scratch a stone or make it matte unintentionally - Gem Shine Polishing Wheels. These wheels are designed for removing light surface scratches from softer stones. They are impregnanted with 2000 grit diamond polishing paste and are meant to provide a finishing polish. I’m not a stone cutter and I trust members of our community will jump in here to provide further knowledge but my experience has been when I get a slight scratch I remove it using sandpaper (going up in grit through 1200 or higher) and then I use this wheel to get a shine back on it. So if you accidentally hit your stone with sandpaper, or a wheel and dulled it, or you put a stone in the tumbler and it got dull that way this could be a potential solution. The manufacturer describes it as working on softer stones like onyx and opal. In my example I needed to get a shine back on this pretty piece of Sugalite which has a MOH hardness of 5.5-6.5 and it worked well! Thank you to @chromarocksjewelry who shared this with us over a year ago, it is something people ask me about frequently! You can purchase these wheels from our friends at @stullerinc or @gessweinco they come in a pack of five and a mandrel $22-$25 they are worth having around just in case. I mean comment if you’ve ever broken, scratched, destroyed a stone?!? 🙋‍♀️🤦‍♀️ #metalsmithsocietytooltalktuesday #jewelrytools