Handle material from overseas

[night man]

Will be going to Afghanistan soon and was thinking. There are a lot of stones and such that are native to the area such as lapis. I was wondering if anybody would be interested in some of it, I thought it could be used for handles or something. It sells for dirt cheap over there.

 

[KnifeMaker.ca]

Just googled lapis and sure, it's interesting and attractive. We're always interested in something unique. Any idea what would be involved in shipping?

It would be very cool to encourage something other than opium as an export.

Rob!

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

I'll buy some if the price is fair.

I'd really be interested in the dark blue with pyrite inclusions, the less calcite the better. Lapis is a nice stone to work with and my supply is getting low!

 

[night man]

The way the military postal system works is not like intenational shipping. It still cost me one stamp to send a letter home so the shipping wouldnt be bad and the price will be great. If I can get some I will post again about it. It will be later in the year.

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Be aware that all that glitters is not gold.

I regularly verify and appraise gems and minerals that the GI's bring back from Afghanistan, and they are regularly ,or almost always, either synthetic or treated in some way.

Just because Faquir the driver takes you to Paqui his cousin,...who worked in the mines before the Russians came,......and buried this box of rare lapis in his garden........and will sell it to you cheap......well you get the idea.

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Be aware that all that glitters is not gold.

I regularly verify and appraise gems and minerals that the GI's bring back from Afghanistan, and they are regularly ,or almost always, either synthetic or treated in some way.

Just because Faquir the driver takes you to Paqui his cousin,...who worked in the mines before the Russians came,......and buried this box of rare lapis in his garden........and will sell it to you cheap......well you get the idea.

Thats right! Most stones you will see will be too soft, fractured, dyed, stabilized, you name it.

A lot of the "Lapis" seen in jewelry is just block ("plastic") or what they call reconstituted stone, essentially plastic with maybe some pyrite (almost worthless) and maybe a sprinkling of chalky worthless lapis.

I'm guessing you would most likely come across stabilized lapis, which can be ok if represented as such. They often dye the stone during stabilization which is no good in my opinion. A dead giveaway is to put the stone in a sealed container for a few hours and then smell it, some stones will reek of epoxy if they were stabilized by some of the cruder processes.

Of course I figure you probably know this if you are going to buy, hopefully this helps someone.

By the way, the reconstituted stones I have seen for sale from knife suppliers are completely fake, consider them to be plastic. (to be honest I've never sent any off to be analyzed so I'm only 99% on this but I have seen loads of block. When you cut it you will know because it smells like burning plastic) It ticks me off they market them that way. I saw some recon "dino bone" the other day that was so bad... laughable.

Two of my favorite stones to cut, opal and turquoise are faked so often I don't like to sell them to the public anymore. I'm tired of explaining why my stones cost much more than the fakes the tourist shops usually sell as real.