Create a high saturated solution of salt in water. Amber will float. Fakes and close relatives (of amber not yours ;-) will sink....
Em
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Create a high saturated solution of salt in water. Amber will float. Fakes and close relatives (of amber not yours ;-) will sink....
Em
Oooh! Just like testing for witches ;)
lol, good tip though some of the fakes are very clever i always used to burn the back of mine to see what type of smell they gave off, not a good idea at all.:-D
Now all I need is a duck.Quote:
Originally Posted by mizgeorge
Quaaaaccckkkk :D
:ROFL:
A handy tip Em, thanks. I'm off to look for my amber now and give it a good dunking...
and I'm steering clear of the lot of you ;)
Also if you rub it, it gets static-y AND smells of pine.
You can also of course heat up a pin and stick it in somewhere where it won't be seen, if you smell pine... it's real.
I got ripped off on e-Bay with a ring that was supposedly Amber and it's just glass... extremely hard to spot a fake by looking at it!
There are lots of clever fakes out there now though as they seem to have gotten wise so I generally give buying anything semi-precious from anyone other than people who really know what they are doing.
Also did you know that fake Citrine is made by heating up bad quality Amethyst until it goes yellow...
So many pitfalls... such a shame but it's like everything these days, where there's money there's fraud and fakery!
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Interesting tip, I don't know if the heat or taste tests work on copal...this is a "close cousin" of amber and looks very similar and is natural tree resin, but is nowhere near as old...so should be much cheaper. The float test does work with it (as long as you remove the silver first :D)
Em
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Right on Emma! Copal smells far more like pine if heated, and doesn't scorch as much either.
Stones have been heat treated for a long time to alter or enhance their colour. The only thing your seller is obliged to tell you is if they have been altered in a way that could be affected by your working with them, wearing them or cleaning them.
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We had a lady come in this week with a pendant she wanted to match up with some amber earrings...but it didn't look like amber. I cut up some tissue paper and showed her one of my pieces would pick up the tissue. It held a charge.
We rubbed her piece and it didn't pick up tissue paper.
Repeated the experiment twice, just to be sure. She was dissapointed but glad to know the truth. Wouldn't fancy being the shop it was bought from! :(
Sure must be Jason!
Ben- interesting thoughts, you are right about pine resin....will have to go do some research....
Em
Turns out not pine after all....
"Copal is a type of resin produced from plant sap, often from members of the genus Copaifera. The term is particularly identified with the aromatic tree resins used by the cultures of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica as ceremonially burned incense and other purposes.[1] More generally, the term copal describes resinous substances in an intermediate stage of polymerization and hardening between more 'gummy' resins and amber.[2] The word copal is derived from the Nahuatl language word copalli, meaning "incense"."
Copaifera actually means copal-bearer...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Koeh-047.jpg not too pine like at all :confused:
Em
"Amber should be distinguished from copal. Molecular polymerisation caused by pressure and heat transforms the resin first into copal and then over time through the evaporation of turpenes it is transformed into amber."
I guess so Ben, although some prehistoric plants are still around, so who know. I don't think amber is particularly species associated (but I stand ready to be corrected!)
Em
Wow wow, so much info but all so helpful , Jason you scare me you know so much, i feel like quite a thicko :'( I'm off to try that trick on amber that i have bought xoxox
OMG my beautiful little piece of what i thought was amber has gone down like the titanic, I am not impressed, thanks for the tip emma, i would have hated to have gone to the bother of making something with my fake fake fake :(|
There are alot of fakes out there....don't forget it could still be copal (which is amber minus a few thousand years or so)
Em
Hi, I visited the amber museum in Southwold last week. They have quite a few fakes on display there. One point they make is that if you look at amber with inclusions you should expect to see signs of struggle as the insect would naturally try to escape. Well worth a visit.
welsome to the forums maureen :D:~:, used to go to southwold as a child, never been there since. Shame :(
Hi Maureen, welcome to the forum.Quote:
Originally Posted by Maureen Darling
You are almost a neighbour as I am about 12 or so miles from Northampton in a little village called Felmersham in North Beds.:welcome:
Lorraine
I know Felmersham! I trained at Bedford Hospital North Wing/Luton & Dunstable Hospital. Lived in Dunstable.Quote:
Originally Posted by lorraineflee
I am another near neighbour in MK. Have been to Southwold many many times, from when I was a small child. I love it!
Em
Quote:
Originally Posted by EmmaRose
Woo hoo.. my fairly large bag of baltic amber chips float... obviously I didn't leave them in the bag :dance:
Real Amber can also not be 'real'.
True amber is fossilised, there are alot of amber products being sold that arent actually fossils. The very dull opaque amber is often probably not really a fossil, even in many circumstances this is not a perfect way to judge the purity of amber.
If you can gene splice the DNA from any embedded insects into frog eggs and generate a series of dinosaur eggs then I guess it's not a fake (at least from the Hollywood point of view.)
Neil