carving jade

[Ken Barnes <barnestrav@xxxxxxxxx>]

Justin,

I am sure you will get better notes from people more expert in carving
jade than I.  My understanding is Jade is not that hard, it is just
tough.  Granite is hard, for example, but brittle.  You can break
individual crystals, and that is the secret to chiseling granite -
pulverise the crystals.  Steel, on the other hand, is not hard, it is
tough.  You cannot pulverise it.  You hit it and it takes a dent but
also bounces back to some extent.  Jade is the same way.  The structure
is somewhat fibrous and flexible (though you will never feel the flex).
 I was doing some kerf cuts and had an isolated piece of jade that was
less than a quarter inch thick and my 1.5 lb hammer bounced off the
piece.

Jade will eat many diamond blades pretty quickly.  Marble blades
(surface sintering) will be ruined in minutes.  A normal turbo blade
will last longer, but this is very blade dependent.  Jade-specific
blades are fabricated with a softer matrix to hold the diamonds, so the
matrix will erode more readily to expose the diamonds.

Water cooling is necessary.  I know one guy who uses lapidary oil as a
coolant - he says it cuts like butter (well, cuts like normal stone).
It makes a real mess if not contained in a lapidary setup (closed
system).  A friend of his uses diesel fuel to lubricate the cutting
(1/30th the price of lapidary oil), but he has his lapidary system set
up in the middle of a field, because it keeps catching fire.

In any event, wear a mask (it can contain asbestos), and carve safe.

Ken Barnes