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Fakes & FraudsGem kunzite crystals: how to rule out any heating treatment?

6th Jan 2011 10:13 UTCValere Berlage

As a collector, I do not want to put a penny for any treated stone (color enhanced or modified), and I do not want to sell any either. This rule apply both for mineral speciments and jewelry. (I am quite tricky on this, as for me a stone is a piece of nature)

As I might have the opportunity to get a good gem kunzite soon, how to be sure its color is natural?

Thanks for any information!

Valère

7th Jan 2011 22:06 UTCRock Currier Expert

Valere,

Treatments can get rather sticky. Does specimen of fluorite that has silicone spray on it qualify as a treated specimen. How about one with oil on it, that is natural petroleum oil that was present in the pocket when the crystal was collected? Now if someone uses gasoline to remove all traces of the natural oil that was on the specimen, is that specimen treated? What tests would you propose to tell the difference? And suppose your colored Spodumene crystal got almost white over the years and a dealer bought it from you and zapped it with radiation to bring back the color, is that specimen treated? And if so, what tests would you propose to determine if it was treated?

Oh, by the way, I don't like treated specimens either, but it is just so much fun to play devil's advocate sometimes that I just can't help myself.

8th Jan 2011 01:33 UTCPaul Siegel 🌟

Valere,

Unfortunately more gem materials are treated than are not and limiting your collection of gems to untreated ones will be limited in variety. Also, some methods such as low temperature treatment are not detectable but assumed. Back in the paleolithic age when I was a gem dealer for an AGTA company we were required to note if the stones we sold had been treated and the method used. If I remember correctly garnet was one of the only stones that did not receive any treatment other than cutting. I advise that you pick up a good reference book about gemstone enhancements and processes. I recommend "Gemstone Enhancement" by Kurt Nassau.

Best,

Paul Siegel, FGA, GG

8th Jan 2011 02:08 UTCJolyon Ralph Founder

Is putting a Hackmanite out in the sun for a few minute to make it purple again "radiation treating"?

technically... yes

8th Jan 2011 02:55 UTCAdam Kelly

Dig them up yourself.

Unfortunatly, the only way to be sure.

8th Jan 2011 06:49 UTCValere Berlage

Hi All!

Obviously a tough topic, with no easy answer! The only certain answer is Adam's: 100 certitude will only be reached by digging the crystal myself... Some can tell with tanzanite, champagne topaz... if natural or enhanced (with a lot of experience, and by a good knoweledge of the locality), obviuously with kunzite, it is a lot more difficult!

A second difficulty is that what is allowed and what is not? Each collector has one different opinion about that and that opinion even changes from one mineral to onother! So no concensus and endless debate!! More questions than answers...

Rock, Jolyon,

Nice "teasing" answers

Washing, cleaning or removing part of the matrix, clay, rust, broken cristals, even with acid or other chemicals... is a treatment, but that does not change the natural color of a stone and saves the cristals, it is often the only way to reveal the true color and is not modifying Nature job. To remove can me OK (that's my opinion only) even if it is better to avoid overwashing or overtrimming (I like better a Oganja cuprite with its malachite coating left, or a piece keeping part of it's 'parasit" associations, this adds scientific information to the piece and its parageneses and provenance. To remove oil on a speciment or to stabilize a piece, no problem to me, but to dip a speciment in oil to fill the cracks, for me it is no (only a personal opinion)! To put a speciment which lost its natural color under the sun to get back the ORIGINAL color, why not? this is a very special situation, and this is not enhancement like making a turmaline deep pink with X rays

Subtle color differences, the comparaison with many crystals from the locality, when there is matrix, black quartz can be suspicious...I imagine these tests can provide answers. Probably the professionnal gemnologist can study the inclusions.

Repair, even reconstruction can be allowed on some big and fragile tourmaline or amazonite speciments, often coming broken or apart out of the pocket...

Voilà! I am looking after that book now!

Valère

8th Jan 2011 22:04 UTCAdam Kelly

Valere,

Yes this is a slippery slope.

Everybody has their own opinions.

I like minerals as natural as possible.

Find it, wash it, love it.

20th Jan 2011 01:27 UTCKristopher Dingfield

I can only hope the people I buy from are as honest as possable. I like you, rock and probably many others prefer "natural" stones, but if I know the truth when purchasing I pass on that truth if breaking down a parcel for sale. I think I have followed other threads on kunzites and other gemstones in regards to treatments ect. on other posting under fakes, frauds, ect. I like to browse these threads for info. I don't have as much knowledge on this subject though and hope others on here can add more of thier 2 cents on the topic because I too am interested on clues to watch for or "suspect" gem minerals.

20th Jan 2011 01:41 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

I must intrude with a little rant here (not directed at any individual personally). I can't count the number of times, when a gem or mineral's authenticity is questioned, we hear responses like, "But the dealer who sold it has an impeccable reputation!", or "I trust my supplier", etc, etc. Unfortunately, this is meaningless. Or less than meaningless. And the next time I hear it I might scream. The vast majority of gems come through a long supply chain, and the dealer you buy a piece from may be more honest than Abe Lincoln, but he is most unlikely to be the original source, and he probably handles a large volume of material, and no way can he get each piece reliably tested, so his honesty and reputation are fairly irrelevant. And a lot of dealers don't want to hear that; it takes a lot less effort to just trust your supplier than to carefully investigate something yourself. But we the buyers must become more knowledgeable ourselves about what we collect, and more observant, or else switch hobbies. It truly is a case of caveat emptor, in all senses of those words.

20th Jan 2011 05:36 UTCValere Berlage

I can 100% agree with Alfredo Petrov words. I think everything is summerized here.

There are many suspects gem minerals, sometimes offered by well known high reputation dealers who probably do not know themself the history of the speciment, and the rule of silence sometimes prevails when there is a doubt that can not be scientifically clarified.

Gem minerals is a far more difficult discipline than collecting classic metal bearing minerals, And it seems it is very difficult to appreciate some gems without the help of gemnologist, many years of experience or the visit of the deposit (since matrix is sometimes modified by treatment) or self collecting or straight out of the mine. Fortunately, many gem spieces can not be treated too!

I take the words of Alfredo as the final conclusion of a slippery, very emotional and endless subject, that can go far from the initial question!

20th Jan 2011 09:35 UTCRock Currier Expert

Valere,

A friend of mine, Bob Bartsch did a mining project back in 1965 at the Pala Chief Mine. He left a bunch of mine run Spodumene that was a not very pretty greenish color in the sun and toward evening put it in a box and stuck it under his cot in the tent. Later that night when he went to turn in he saw the tent glowing and thought he might have left a flash light on in the tend. When he opened the tent flap to see, he saw it was the Spodumene in the box that was glowing. During the day it had apparently absorbed enough UV from the sun to start a process that turned the stuff pink and radiate light for some hours afterward. So Bob's kunzite was heat treated. Would that heat treatment make any of those specimens unacceptable for you collection? Does anyone know if it is possible to detect heat treatment of Spodumene? If so I would guess that it would not be easy to detect such treatment. Click on the images to see the full page view so you can read the captions.

Bob Bartsch at the Chief Mine 1965

Chief Mine access road 1965

Camp at Chief Mine 1965

Chief Mine drilling 1965

Chief Mine dike 1965

Chief Mine pocket 1965

Chief Mine pocket 1965

Chief Mine Spodumene 1965

Chief mine underground 1965

Kunzite crystal, mined 1965

Chief mine, mine run pocket material 1965

Chief mine kunzite 1965

Chief mine tourmaline, mined 1965

22nd Feb 2022 00:03 UTCShaun Kirby

Wow. I didn't even know that was possible. Imagine coming back to your tent to find a box full of glowing stones. That is awesome. Also, Bob was stacked. Oh my.

20th Jan 2011 10:09 UTCSpencer Ivan Mather

As a gemmologist I collect cut gemstones and crystals of the same, and these days it is difficult to buy a gemstone that has not have some sort of treatment to enhance it's colour, I try to get as genuine a gemstone as possible, but as I said it is very difficult. In some instances it is desirable to posess gemstones that have been altered as well as genuine, if you are a practicing gemmologist then having these stones in your collection will help you in your job of identifying gemstones!

Spencer.

20th Jan 2011 10:24 UTCValere Berlage

Hi Rock

Fabulous story and pictures! Many thanks

To the question if the heat and light of the sun makes a speciment unacceptable for me, the answer is no! Many minerals change over time because of light, oxygen..., and not only gems, And that's not a problem for me!

Val

20th Jan 2011 11:57 UTCKnut Eldjarn 🌟 Manager

Valere,

your wrote: ""To put a speciment which lost its natural color under the sun to get back the ORIGINAL color, why not? "

But life is not meant to be easy...

A number of minerals have unstable colours as a result of i.e. natural background radiation in the rock where they formed. This is the case with most natural champagne coloured Topazes and many smoky quartzes. Such crystals (as well as many pink apatites etc) loose this natural colour with exposure to daylight. Would it be acceptable to give these minerals the same irradiation artificially as they got naturally in the pocket where they were formed and thus restoring the original colour? And if so - how would you know that an artificially irradiated Topaz with a light champagne colour was original coloured this way and not just a natural colourless Topaz ?

Knut

20th Jan 2011 13:11 UTCValere Berlage

Knut,

Very difficult question, where to fix the limits? Many collectors have differents opinions about that, and will make their own choice hoping they are informed...For instance, many will accept heated tanzanites when the sample has many other qualities. What is acceptable is a matter of personnal choice. Of course, the best is no treatment at all and keep the samples in the dark (like red silvers, vivianites and some vanadinites...).

I read there are subtle differences between natural champain color and artificial champain color (However, I have not the expertise to evalute this). To my opinion, a naturally colorless topaz treated to give it a color is a fake. A tourmaline of pale pinkish color on white quartz treated and becoming a flashy pink tourmaline on smoky quartz is a fake. A aquamarine treated to become an "heliodore" is a fake. Regardless of this, they are beautiful, and so, many will have pleasure with these.

When these changes are impossible to detect, each collector will make his own opinion and take his own risks and choices. True, life is not easy.

To my opinion, the magic and beauty of minerals is linked to their natural origins, this is subjective.

30th Jan 2011 23:07 UTCcascaillou

in my humble opinion:

rare=valuable

off-color stone: commonly found thus low value

intensely coloured: rare in nature thus quite expensive

treatments (that are cheap to run btw) might make a boring off-color look great, but won't ever turn it into anything like rare.

That is to say that if the original stone has low value, and considering treatment is low cost, then treated stone is still low value.

Unfortunately, some treatments (notably heat/irradiation/diffusion) might not be detected, even in the lab. That is a real problem when it comes to the pricing stones I think.

30th Jan 2011 23:25 UTCcascaillou

let's add that, at the present time, this problem has no solution, because we lack the mean of detections for such treatments. Therefore I shouldn't be calling that a 'problem' when it's nothing but a sad matter of fact :-(

1st Feb 2011 04:18 UTCAnonymous User

As far as I know there is no way possible to detect irridation in kunzite(pink) nor tourmaline. Green spodumene depending on depthness of color, location, etc. then you can assume irridation especially pakistan material. 99% of all pink tourmalines that come from pakistna/afghanistan are irridated light pinks and colorless crystals. Just like Alfredo post states, so many times have I heard "well these pinks are untreated and from afghanistan" so your dealer said(by the way excellent post alberto). Thery have been zapping kunzite, topaz, and tourmaline for years now at the Pakistan Atomic Energy building in Lahore, Pakistan where they irridate food. I would say pre-2007 or 2006 then your afghan material is probably unirridated. Your deep "patroke" green apodumene=irridation, your cognac or deep brown topaz from pakistan=irridated, most of you good pink kunzites from afghanistan(not all mind you but most now)=irridated, almost all your pink tourmalines(99%) from afghanistan=irridated..natural deep pink tourmalines from afghanistan are actually quite rare, especially when compared to the amount that comes out and that you see on the market. Green diamonds must be tested in rough form to determine irridated or natural. I don't do diamonds but thats what Chris Smith at AGL told me. They look for the natural radiation burns or marks or something that can't be seen after it cut.

As for your kunzite crystal it's irridation and not heat which does it although I was told that on some of the pinks they heat after irridation to help bring out color or something but not sure about that. If someone knows if they do heat some pinks after irridation then let me know.

Here is a batch of irridated spodumenes that my old dealer had sent to Lahore. I had asked him to show me a pic of a batch when they got back to Peshawar. These were all irridated at the exact same time. You can see the varitaions of color and sat. I thought I had a before pic but can't find it.

http://www.varockhounder.com/uploads/201101312011911.jpg

Here is a irridated crystal of kunzite from afghanistan that I have pics of. From maybe 2 years ago. I don't remember but I think I took the pic because the color was so neon when backlit down the c-axis. Looks like a 20-30 gram crystal
http://www.varockhounder.com/uploads/2011013120118252.jpg

http://www.varockhounder.com/uploads/2011013120118679.jpg

http://www.varockhounder.com/uploads/2011013120116836.jpg

Again great post alberto! Everyone thinks "there guy" has nontreated stones or he told me they were natural, etc. See it all the time and I know better

9th Feb 2011 04:30 UTCJamey Swisher

As Jason points out, there is no way currently to ID that most any stone has been irradiated. When they used irradiation that left behind radiation it was much easier, a Geiger counter, lol. Now with the use of Cobalt-60 and E-Beam irradiation methods there is nothing left behind sadly! A majority of all stones coming out of Pakistan/Afghanistan in certain colors are all being irradiated as are a large majority of materials coming out of Brazil. They regularly irradiate tourmaline, topaz, spodumene family, beryl family, quartz family, topaz, and another I can not remember off hand, sorry.

As Jason stated, all those nice dark bright pink tourmaline coming out of Pakistan are most definitely irradiated! From what I understand as well,m is there are NO dark and bright pinks like that, they are mainly all very very pale that they look almost white/clear or just very light colored pink until after irradiation. Same goes with a large amount of the rubelite and red tourmaline on the market from all over. Many of these watermelon and other bi-color or tri-color tourmaline crystals are being irradiated as well to achieve the colors! They are even irradiating tourmaline now to get those nice indicolite colors as well!

A lot of times heat is used to anneal the color and make it either permanent or much more stable. Sadly though, many of these materials, especially the Kunzite and topaz, will typically fade in sunlight and/or over time in color.

Sadly, most of these "vendors" overseas in these areas are not concerned about telling the "truth". They just want to sell and they typically lump any of these treatments under heat only! Same thing the Thais have been doing with diffusion, beryllium diffusion, lead glass filling, flux healing, irradiation, etc. They list treatment as "heated" or "heat only". They is a reason to buy from only trusted sources. And if a deal seems too good to be true then odds are it is! There are deals to be had, but not "deals of the decade" on a daily or even weekly basis, lol.

9th Feb 2011 05:05 UTCAnonymous User

It was you Jamey that pointed out to me a a good while back about the indicolite now being zapped. I double checked that info a few months back and sure enough it was true. You were the first I heard it from. Keep up the good work.

9th Feb 2011 05:17 UTCJamey Swisher

:). I try. I may not get into the field much except locally due to my disability, but I have eyes and ears all around the globe, rofl!

13th Feb 2011 09:26 UTCValere Berlage

Many Thanks to Jason and Jamey for these great gemnology lessons, going straight to the point!

Very precious data!

Valère

18th Feb 2011 04:40 UTCJamey Swisher

Not a problem. One of the main reasons I learned was to be able to share the knowledge and help others. :). Too many are all hush hush about everything and that gets the Industry and the mineral side nowhere! If all would just work together instead of trying to compete, we would all be much further along in our knowledge, lol.

On a side note, also beware of the glass now that they match the closest RI and color to that of the real thing and cut into crystals, rough, etc. Also quite a bit of dyed materials and diffused materials surfacing everywhere! Even newer irradiation methods, for example, that amber colored sapphire rough and cut showing up all over, is from what I understand, irradiated to achieve the color using some sort of X-Ray technology, some reports say the colors will/can fade, others say they can but some do not. But they have glass now from RI lower then quartz all the way up to an RI of 2.1! And ANY color they could want! I just got some in the other day that looks identical to top grade Amethyst with some looking like a more purple Tanzanite/zoisite and some that looks identical to the nice teal fluorescent Paraiba tourmaline. Some very scary stuff going on out there right now. Many of our soldiers in Afghanistan are being sold emeralds and rubies that are merely dyed silimanite! Diffused tourmalines even! So just use caution on ANY deal that seems too good to be true! For example, another cutter purchased some Tsavorite rough out of Tanzania from a reliable source, well it turned out to be a high RI green glass broken and shaped into nodules and pieces like real tsavorite and sold as the real thing!

10th Apr 2011 00:00 UTCJed

Kunzite is NATURALLY light sensitive mineral. And it's color is not stable - it is it's nature.

I have an Afgfhan kunzite crystal which was almost colorless with some yellowish tint. After 3 years on the shelf (no direct sunlight as it was far from the window) it turns to the intensive pink.

It is natural process,

I believe, any treatmet which mimic natural process -especially heat treatment - is not a problem. These crystals already were very hot and cooled down long before any human appeared on Earth. Many of them were naturally irradiated. They possible already changed colors many times in their "life". When in their long history their color was more "natural"? Why not to restore it ? Until it's composition and crystal structure is the same it is natural.

10th Apr 2011 00:41 UTCMatt Neuzil Expert

I thought there were ways to tell under microscope that something has been irradiated under controlled conditions?

10th Apr 2011 00:46 UTCJed

If it has intensive green color and doesn't contain Cr - it has been irradiated..

26th Apr 2011 07:02 UTCJamey Swisher

That is just not correct. Vanadium and copper both can cause intense greens. That is not a viable way to tell, sorry, unless specifically referring to spodumene.

Any greens, blues, dark pink, spodumene coming out of Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Brazil can almost be guaranteed to be either Cobalt-60 or E-Beam irradiated. Plain and simple, but sad. And the colors are NOT stable either, they will fade over time and quickly pdf exposed to sunlight.

Massive amounts, if not almost all, of material coming out of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Brazil in the quartz family, tourmaline family, spodumene family, apatite family, scapolite, and beryl family have been either cobalt-60 irradiated or E-Beam irradiated. They are even irritating lapis now to deepen the colors, lol. Also some X-ray irradiating going on.

10th Jun 2011 14:24 UTCPeter Lyckberg Expert

Rock! Thanks for incredible images!!!! I was at the Oceanview Mine last week and dug pockets w kunzite and morganite. Well, I should write spodumenes. In the same pocket everything from deep purple to purple and blusish to light pink to green and yellow, and yes, spodumens do change color, sometimes very quickly in light.

There are many many pegmatites in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Hundreds have been exploited, thousands not yet! Pakistan has very few places producing any quantity of tourmalines with the exceptions of the Stak Nala (especially in the 90s) which anyway only has a little of pink color in sections of crystals. The great majority of tourmalines sold in Peshawar are from deposits in Afghanistan. Many deposits DO HAVE NATURALLY pink to deep pink tourmalines! For instance Paprok produced many crystals with deep red interior but many pockets overgrown with lighter pink. Light pink to colorless are traditionally among the gem dealers treated, but most specimens not. Radiation treatment in Pakistan took place already long time ago! The man having treated most of it is a good friend of me and Rock! Rock was his and his brothers first honest and serious partner in the west! This man is always honest about treatments but the number of people dealing w the stones until final destination may not be knowledgable enough or serious enough to pass on the information.

There is much incredible natural deep purple and blue kunzite ins some of the pegmatites in Afghanistan. There are also deposits producing natural green, blue, greenish-blue, pink, deep purple. One deposit produce only colorless quartz and colorless spodumene and thus material from this mine is irradiated to make smoky quarty and yellow-green ugly spodumene! I know such specimen! I have followed the production in this part of the world rather closely the past 25 years and seen quite a bit, not like Rock, but everything from specimens to gem rough.

The best natural afghan kunzite is the best I have ever seen! I showed a photo in my lecture on gem pegmatites at the GIA research conference last week of it! I may publish it some time in the future.

There are in fact many aspects of the origin of color in any mineral, some more well known than others. Of course the basic chemical composition, impurities and the valence of impurities but also position of any element, vanacy in any position. The color can be changed in many ways from natural sunlight and heating, natural irradiation, a spectrum of man made irradiation and heating. We can re arrange impurities or vacancies by heating etc. I would suggest interested to also subscribe to Gems and Gemology where many interesting articles and abstracts appear. For this years sumemr issue the abstracts from this years research conference will appear soon.

......................

Just me

10th Jun 2011 14:30 UTCPeter Lyckberg Expert

Valere! Do not worry about that one Kunzite!!!

3rd May 2013 17:29 UTCOwen Lewis

That's interesting Elliott, thanks. The questions that a prospective purchase should expect answers to are

1. Cerificate of authenticity from a reputable lab? I.e. This is Kunzite.

2. Certification from a *major* lab (GIA or similar) that the colour is proven natural in origin and with an opinion as to its stability.

Without these, and at the price level expected, no one shoud touch it.

As has been said before in this thread, Kunzite is notoriously colour unstable and without a detailed and expert investigation of this piece and the causation and stability of its very unusual colour, I think it's best considered conservatively as an ephemeral curiosity of uncertain causation and life expectancy.

There are always a few who will pay over the odds for the unusual but this one shouts 'trouble' to me.

3rd May 2013 18:00 UTCRob Woodside 🌟 Manager

The only blue "kunzite" I am familiar with is very blue, more so than these. Unfortunately they quickly turn pink if not kept in the dark. Very strange stuff.

12th Aug 2014 04:58 UTCAnonymous User

what might this be

12th Aug 2014 06:22 UTCDoug Daniels

A bunch of fragments in a sea shell. Nothing to do with kunzite.

12th Aug 2014 07:10 UTCAnonymous User

Well that's a start!

GodBlessU genius.

Your direction is

Underwhelming.

If You have the chance

To be right or kind>>>

Always choose kind.

~Wayne Dyer

12th Aug 2014 11:55 UTCWayne Corwin

Lacona

A few better photos and a few tests would help for your ID ;-)

12th Aug 2014 12:36 UTCOwen Melfyn Lewis

Yup. ID of a photo usually requires a sharp image and perhaps knowledge of the locality form where the specimen(s) were collected.

Putting them in a coloured shell makes for a pretty display but is a seriously bad idea/arrangement for an ID photograph. The stones will seem to pick up random colours from the shell.

If you are seriously interested in a good ID, lay out not more than about four of the pieces, not overlapping, on a sheet of clean matt white paper and take two or three really sharp pics of them with the camera firmly mounted as close as possible to the stones without the shots going fuzzy on you . Do not photograph in direct sunlight but either outside on a cloudy day or inside a room not too far from the window (but no direct sunlight , once again). Take the pics between say 10 a.m and 2 p.m (i.e. avoid dusk and dawn.

If you want to bring those pics back to this forum with whatever info you have on their place of origin, I'm quite sure you'll get some good help. Failing all else, if you want to PM me on the Mindat system, I'll give you a snail address you can send two or three for me to test them for you with no charge, Short report and some pics under the microscope too :-)

For the moment all I can say is I'm pretty sure that your stuff is not kunzite - and they are not diamonds either ;-)

12th Aug 2014 13:05 UTCAnonymous User

Thanku guys.

I will do that.

Much appreciated.

And Owen, I will send a couple to u.

Thanks again.

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