Meleke Stone (Jerusalem Stone) Questions

[fernwood]

Has anyone worked with this before?

A relative of a friend wants a Silver ring made from it.  
The ring would be the Meleke Stone with an inlay of Turquoise.  
Prefer a cab style setting, but are open to anything.

This is a softer stone, but hardness can vary.  A very dense limestone.

The person is open to having their rock stabalized.  They understand the Meleke may not take a glossy polish, even when stabalized.  

I told my friend I would post here and see if anyone would be interested in learning more about this project or offer some pointers.  

I don;t know if what they want is even possible.


Thank you.

[rmf]

Not sure what you are asking. If it is LS then you would polish it the exact same way you would polish petoskey stone. (Diamond to 8000, or conventional polish with tin oxide mixed with oxalic acid). Hopefully the stone would take a polish as good as Petoskey stone or silver lace onyx.
If I were going to make a ring stone and with turquoise and you may want to back with black onyx and set in a bezel to protect the stone since it is real soft.
I have not yet tried the sodium silicate stabilize method yet but if I were to stabilize I try that.

Just me but I would do a pendant not a ring, (if the customer will allow it) since stones in pendants take less abuse than ring stones do.
That reminds me maybe I need to get a new ring stone for my phone. Or was that ring tone?

[fernwood]

I am not going to attempt to do this. Just asking others for some advice to pass on to my friend, or if anyone else would be inteerested to contacting the person who wants the ring.

Thanks for the advice, I will pass it on.

[rewdownunder]

Why do you tin oxide mixed with oxalic acid? What is this used for? Is it useful to polish limestones?

[slavey1023]

I want to purchase the meleke stone even if it isn't jewelry please slavey1023 at g mail is my email

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