After the pavilion is polished, the stone is removed from the dop. It’s reattached to a second dop with a pointed impression with room for the pavilion with wax and a bit of crazy glue to allow the top half of the stone to be faceted.

     The new dop with the stone on goes back onto the arm of the machine to start cutting the facets of the crown. Notice you can still see a little wax in the middle of the stone from where the original dop was stuck onto it.

     The cutter then polishes all three rows of 16 facets that make up the crown of the stone. The sapphire is now beginning to sparkle like a faceted gem.

     The next step is to cut and polish the table, the flat spot on the top of the stone. On this machine, cutting and polishing the table requires the use of an adapter that is plugged into the arm of the machine. Because sapphire is so hard and the table is relatively large, it takes a long time to cut and polish. A large gem that is carefully cut for precision and maximum yield may take up to 6 hours to cut, from start to finish.

     The last step is to polish the "girdle" or edge of the stone.  A lot of cutters don't bother, but a polished girdle adds extra brilliance and also makes the gem more attractive when the stone is set in a mounting where the girdle shows.