How to cut your own Turquoise Cabochon

This is the corresponding page to our video on “How to cut your own Turquoise Cabochon”, which, is located at www. This video gives you complete instructions of how you can easily cut cabochons for your own collection, for sale or to put into your own jewelry. This page will give you all of the information and sources to find the products and supplies you will need to cut your own Turquoise cabochons as well as other types of gemstone cabochons.

How to cut you own Turquoise Cabochon

If you have not viewed this video please view our all-inclusive video on how to cut your own turquoise cabochon below:

In this video you will learn how you can easily cut your own turquoise cabochon, start a wonderful new hobby or trade and enjoy your life! Our family has been doing this for over forty years – Turquoise brings Happiness, Good Health and Fortune to its beholders, (a quote that has been profitsized worldwide for thousands of years by Shawmen, Tribal Leaders, Medicine Men, Healers and more). This is a good thing to do and you will be glad you choose to do it!

Turquoise Cabochons – Cabochon Cutting Procedure

Show procedures, supplies needed, machines, ingredients and where to buy all. Quick how to Do.

1. Picking the rock and cutting / slabbing

There are many sources to find your Turquoise or other rough gemstones of your choice. Durango Silver Company, Rock Shops, Gem Shows and Ebay.

There is only one Turquoise producing mine left in the United States that sells direct to the public, the Kingman Turquoise Mine. You can buy Kingman Turquoise from Colbaugh Processing located in Kingman, Az. They are great people and are the miners of Kingman Turquoise. Talk to Josh Colbaugh and tell them John and Dillon sent you, he will take good care of you! (866) 928-4650 Check them out on the web at www.colbaugh.net

2. You will need a 6” rock saw and we suggest a Covington. Here is the link to Covington, however, you may get it cheaper at Kingsley North or on Ebay. You want to use a fairly thin “centered” diamond saw blade, get a good one as they saw better and last way longer than cheap blades. http://covington-engineering.com/lapidary-equipment/saws/trim-saws/6-trim-saw-grinder/

http://www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/category.php?catID=1036 – both 4” and 6”

3. Cut 1/8” Slabs and inspect you slabs for fractures under a bright light and magnification. Now is the time to saw or clip the obvious fractures out of your stones.

4. Back slabs with Devcon Plastic Steel Putty, let dry for 12 hours. Cut the excess off the edge of the stones so you do not put extra wear your grinding wheels. You can buy your Devcon at Advancedtools.com

We use a different backing material.  Here is the information: 

5. Dop – put your backed slabs on 16 penny, cement coated nails and medium Starbond super glue – we use medium weight for bonding stones to nails. http://www.starbond.com You can also find medium weight super glue at the hardware store.

6. Cutting machine and wheels:

We recommend the 6” Cab King from Kingsley North or Ebay - $1195. This is an all in one 6 wheel machine that is quiet and smooth running do to its long shafted direct drive motor. It comes with diamond wheels, however, they do not last long and are inferior to Nova Wheels. When your wheels wear out,(quite a long time,) buy Nova Diamond Wheels as they are far superior and last way longer. They are about $110. each but if you buy a set they will give you a deal. We have found them on Ebay for as cheap as $65.00 each.

http://www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/product.php?id=94163&catID=90

http://www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/product.php?id=96566&catID=1078

7. For your final polishing you will need to use a lapping wheel on the end of you Cab King or make yourself a motor and shaft to setup that will turn slower and save your Sapphire powder. For now, use your Cab King and get a leather pad to apply to the lapping wheel that come with the machine.

8. Polishing – we recommend Sapphire powder for polishing, however you can also use tin oxide, but, you will not get as good of shine on your cabochons. Here are two places to get lapidary and jewelers supplies;

Tin Oxide - TIN OXIDE 1/2 LB Pkg item # 287-TOBH $15.95 at Indian Jewelers Supply https://ijsinc.com/c-1075-powder-compounds.aspx
Sapphire Powder – 3oz. $30.00 Rio Grande Jewelers Supply https://www.riogrande.com/Product/sapphire-powder/200090
9. Cleaning, Buffing, removing from sticks, grinding and sanding backs. Once you have completed the cutting and polishing process you will need to clean and remove the stones from the dopping sticks. You can simply clean with warm soapy water (Joy Soap) or you can lightly buff you stones with a buffing machine and Zam Jewelers Rouge, which, you can get from Rio Grand or Indian Jewelers Supply.

10. As in video, either carefully snap the stones off sticks or heat the nails just enough to release the stone from the stick.

11. Make certain to grind the excess glue from the back of the stones.

12. Clean up all of your messes and you will be anxiously ready to cut more as this is a wonderful as well as profitable hobby!

Jewelers Supplies and Lapidary Suppliers that we use for lapidary supplies:

Rio Grande Jewelers Supply – jewelry and lapidary supplies - https://www.riogrande.com Call and get their free set of catalogs.
Indian Jewelers Supply – jewelry and lapidary supplies http://www.ijsinc.com/ Call and get free catalogs.
Kingsley North – lapidary supplies - http://www.kingsleynorth.com/skshop/category.php?catID=88 Call and get free catalog.

We hope we have helped you and we wish you well on your new hobby or venture. We will be producing more videos and informational pages in the future, so, make certain you go to DurangoSilver.com and join our E-Mail Club located at the top of the home page – check the box to receive information on cabochons.

Also, check out these links to related pages about Turquoise and How to cut your own Turquoise Cabochon.

DurangoSilver.com Facebook | Turquoise Learning Center | Turquoise Cabochons | Buy Turquoise Cabochons and Rough

If we have done you well you can return the favor by liking us patronizing us on Facebook and referring your family and friends to DurangoSilver.com. If you find an old high-grade natural Turquoise collection, we would love a chance to go in partners on the collection. Our expertise could save you a lot of money.
We wish you well in all of your endeavors,
The Hartman Family

Visit our Video directory to see more Turquoise related Videos

Check out our Turquoise Bracelets Video on Youtube!

Turquoise Cabochon Examples

Above and to the left is a lot of hand cut natural Cerrillos Turquoise cabochons from New Mexico, USA. This lot features two smaller freeform blue / green Turquoise cabs and one larger blue / green Cerrillos Turquoise cabochon cut by John Hartman of Durango Silver Company.

To the right is a large museum quality natural Number 8 spiderweb Turquoise cabochon from Nevada, USA. This stone is absolutly amazing and is AAA high grade. Stunning. This stone was hand cut in Durango, Colorado USA by John Hartman.

If you have enjoyed this video, take a look at some other Turquoise Related Videos we have created:

Turquoise and Silver Jewelry Videos - Links to other videos

We hope you have gained some useful knowledge from our Turquoise Bracelets video. We invite you to learn more about Silver Jewelry, Indian Jewelry and Turquoise Jewelry by following the links in our Learning Center which has many other informational pages that we have written on topics related to Southwestern Silver Jewelry. In addition, we would like to invite you to join our E-Mail Newsletter - about once every other month we send out a Newsletter to inform our members of what's happening with Durango Silver Company, new products, specials for our members and more. We also have a monthly drawing from our members to Giveaway free Turquoise Jewelry from our company. Please take a moment to become one of our friends and future winners in our giveaway by signing in below.