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Golddiggers Black Hills Gold jewelry

Our company offers exquisite hand crafted jewelry at factory direct prices. Skilled artisans craft our jewelry from 10 karat gold in yellow, rose and green hues. The colors are made by carefully controlling the alloy process. For yellow gold we use 10 parts pure gold plus 7 parts silver and 7 parts copper. This amalgam retains the color and resistance to corrosion and tarnish of the pure gold and adds the hardness to make the jewelry durable for longevity that allow it to last for years to come with daily wear. Designing the jewelry starts with a master craftsman who makes a master design.

Once the mold has been cut the design can be easily duplicated by injecting hot wax into the mold and allowed to cool. The wax is then removed from the mold and checked for defects. If the shape is perfect and the wax is free of defects it can be attached to a wax spindle called a tree. Jewelry parts can be added to the wax spindle and it starts to look like a tree with larger waxes at the bottom and smaller designs higher up. Once the tree is full we invest the tree. That is carefully placing the tree in a fine grain type of plaster slowly and gently to insure that no bubbles are drawn into the investment. The investment is contained in a stainless steel casting canister. After the investment has hardened we place the canister in a burn out oven which heats the canister until the wax from the tree is entirely and cleanly vaporized. This leaves an opening in the investment just like the original design. Molten precious metal is then vacuum injected into the opening of the investment in the kiln. Temperature is crucial in casting with factors such as rate of heating, duration peak temperature and rate of cooling all influencing the quality of the finished casting. When the cast item and investment has cooled enough for the metal to harden, the investment is quenched with cold water. This has the effect of shattering the investment inside the canister to enable easy removal of the tree of gold.

Next we clip the cast jewelry components from the tree. The parts of the tree that are not used for jewelry are called the sprue for the branch like parts and the button for the root like part. We send those parts in to refine the gold and convert the gold back to casting grain. We grind the jewelry components when needed to flatten the part that connected to the sprue and then tumble the jewelry to smooth and prepolish the pieces. In tumbling the jewelry is placed inside a rotating drum with media designed to smooth the surface of the jewelry much like rocks are tumbled in lapidary work. We use gradiated polishing media to first remove coarse imperfections and then to polish the jewelry smooth. The leaves used in black hills gold are first stamped from gold strip. The strip is made of 10 karat gold that has an alloy with either a green or a rose hue. More silver and less copper in the alloy of regular yellow gold produces the green in black hills gold. Less silver and more copper produces a rose color in the gold.

To stamp the leaves we use a press with various dies allowing us to have leaves of many shapes and sizes to enhance our jewelry. After the leaves are stamped from the gold strip we attach them to a post or dop stick with a wax that allows us to wriggle the leaves. In our jewelry the leaves are hand wriggles by skilled goldsmiths. If you look closely at a leaf on black hills gold you can usually tell if it was hand made or if the leaf was textured by a machine that rolls the strip between two rollers under pressure which thins the strip and impresses regular markings into the strip surface from one of the steel rollers. In hand wriggling the leaves are each pressed on a sharp blade which gives the leaves a frosty surface. After the leaves are wriggled our engravers hand engrave them.

That process uses a sharp blade to add the veins in the leaves giving them a natural appearance. Hand engraved leaves are very uniform in depth of cut. We do not use the fully automated process some manufacturers use to roll the strip for texture and machine engrave the leaves with rotating cutting wheels. The leaves are tacked to the jewelry items by hand using an electric spot welder and then firmly attached with gold solder and a torch. The items we make are soldered and are very durable yet intricately detailed and beautifully unique. Some items continue on to stone setting if they have gems used in their design.

In stone setting we use diamonds, amethyst, citrine, peridot, opal, onyx, garnet, topaz and several other gems in various cut, carat, color and clarity. The cut of a gemstone refers to the shape of the stone. We use several popular cuts such as round ,brilliant, marquise, pear, oval, princess and cab. Carat refers to the weight of the gemstone. Incidentally, carat and karat both came etymologically from the carob seed which was used in times of antiquity as a standard for measuring weight. Now we deal with stone weights in Carats and points where 100 points equals one carat. Gold measures fineness in karat to show the percentage of gold in the item and the weight is measured either in grams or the more common pennyweight. The abbreviation for pennyweight is dwt where the d is from an ancient coin called the denarius which was used as a small value coin in the roman empire. In ancient trade five pennyweight was equal to one half shekel.

Gold diggers maintains high standards for purity of color in the gemstones we use in our jewelry and deal with suppliers from all over the world to bring you the finest stones at affordable prices. In gemstones clarity refers to the absence of faults in the gemstone. Small particles of material visible inside a gemstone are known as inclusions. Other faults in clarity can come from minute stress fractures made while the stone was forming in the earth. In some gemstones you can notice foggy areas which can be from microscopic impurities trapped inside the stone. Some of the faults can be removed or minimized using common industry practices. Inclusions can be cut away from a gemstone when it is shaped. Stress fractures can be minimized by treatment with oils or plastics which fill and hide the faults. Foggy areas and color inconsistancies can be minimized or removed with careful heating in some gems. At Gold diggers we purchase quality gemstones from reputable suppliers who use only industry standard acceptable practices. To bring the jewelry to a high luster we hand buff the metal with gray buffing compound to further smooth the surface. Then we use red jewelers rouge to impart the sparkle from the mirror like surface of the gold.

Our jewelry is made in many standard forms such as gold rings, pendants, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, anklets, toe rings, and thumb rings. We offer rings that vary from size 3 up to size 16 depending on design. With each Gold Diggers pendant or necklace we include a complimentary chain. The chains are ordinarily 18 inches long but we can usually accomodate requests for longer or shorter chains depending on your specification and the placement of the jumpring. We make earrings in many styles using lever backs, french hooks, jackets, or 14K posts. Our sterling silver earrings come with sterling silver posts. The standard nut or back for our earrings can be either metal or clear plastic. Our bracelets are designed to be seven inches around. We can often adjust that if you requre an extra link or so for perfect fit.

Anklets are cut to nine inches but can be similarly resized on many items. Toe rings are open in the back to allow a perfect fit while our thumb rings are formed to offer comfort to match their eye catching style. Each item of Gold Diggers Black Hills Gold is complete with box and ready to be presented as a gift to someone you love. We offer a thirty day satisfaction guarantee on your purchase or we will refund the amount of your jewelry purchase less shipping costs on items returned in original condition. We stand behind our jewelry with a lifetime warranty against manufacturing defects. The beauty and value of Black Hills Gold jewelry has made it a favorite among people ranging from western jewelry collectors and rodeo fans to motorcycle afficianados. It is the perfect gift to bring enjoyment to those you care about for years to come.