Online Faceting Designs & Diagrams: Angel Cross

Angel Cross by Jeff R. Graham

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year
Design 2002/2003 (for all of my customers)
I thought a cross was an appropriate design for the season…

Angel Cross - Cutting Remarks

If you have tried to cut some of the old cross designs (Fred Van Sant's come to mind but there is a few others)… Then you know that most of the cross designs are not meet point and can be problematic to cut. I have had a lot of people ask me for a better cross to cut, so here you all go… Enjoy it…

One of the things I wanted to do was design a cross that is easy to cut (for a cross) and meet point so it is repeatable and dependable. The "Angle Cross" is what I came up with… Notice that this is designed for Quartz, which I think is about the best material for a novelty cut like my "Angel Cross".

Quartz is inexpensive and easy to find, but most importantly it is available in larger sizes which works best for a design like this. Quartz offers a nice selection of colors, I especially like Rose de France and Ametrine. Rose Quartz is nice also, so is clear.

"Angel Cross" has a slightly better light return in Topaz, and Tourmaline as well as other higher refractive index materials and can be cut in them with no changes.

It is important that you establish a center point correctly, in other words over the center of the dop. An easy way to do this is to cut the entire pavilion at 42.7 degrees and then re-cut the tiers that are lower to the center point (cam point) that you have established. P8 can be roughed in a little earlier to establish the L/W=1.266, although it is not that critical and P7 cut to just point up with P6 will establish the L/W for you…

Note: On frosting the finish you get will depend on the lap you use and how worn it is. I use a well worn 260 (darker blue in the diagrams) grit for a coarse frost and a 1200 (lighter blue in the diagrams) for a finer frost…

This is designed for the cross on the crown to be frosted… There are a lot of different variations of frost combinations that will work, but here are a few of the obvious ones. These example are all frosted on the crown you can of course experiment with frosting the pavilion too…

Above left to right… Frost the entire cross - Frost the entire cross but polish the table - Frost the underside and either the left or right side of the vertical facets for a very interesting 3D effect (this one is neat).

Above left to right… Frost the entire outside of the cross - Frost the entire outside of the cross and then use a finer frost on triangular accent facets (lighter blue) polish the rest of the cross (this is the one I like) - Frost the main body of the cross and use a finer frost (lighter blue) on the accent triangular facets.

Enjoy cutting your "Angel Cross"… Drop me an e-mail to let me know your results and what you've cut, or feel free to inquire if you have any questions or need some help regarding this design.

Random - Cosine - ISO

Detailed faceting instructions by Jeff Graham available at The Rock Peddler