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DIAMOND TESTER
INSTRUCTION MANUALS
To buy this item go to DIAMOND
TESTERS
THERMAL TESTER
DIAMOND TESTER
If you have problems with a diamond testers
scroll down to troubleshooting
POWER
Supplied with battery inserted. To change battery slide battery
cover open, insert one PP3 battery.
INSTRUCTIONS FOR USE
Gently remove the thin rubber protective cap from test tip.
Turn knob just enough for it to click. Wait for the READY
light. This will take a few seconds.
Continue to turn the knob to set the sensitivity (see below).
Press test tip firmly onto the top of the diamond at right
angles. Do not attempt to scratch the stone or you will break
or bend the test-tip and such damage is not covered by the
guarantee.
If lights remain static you do not have a diamond;
If the row of lights light up rapidly (and there will be a
bleep) you have a diamond.
Before the next test you must wait for the READY light
Both the stone and the diamond tester must be at room temperature.
Repeatedly testing a stone warms it until a diamond will no
longer read DIAMOND. The same applies to stones taken from
a hot shop window. Conversely, very cold stones (especially
large stones) will read DIAMOND e.g. if brought in from outside
on a cold day. You MUST wait for the diamond tester and stone
to return to room temperature or you WILL get wrong results.
Replace the protective cover after use.
'TOUCHED SETTING' SAFETY FEATURE
Hold the diamond tester like a pen. Make sure that you are
touching the metal plate on the back.
Now if you miss the stone and touch the setting by accident
there will be a piercing alarm.
If you do not do this, touching the metal will register DIAMOND.
SETTING THE SENSITIVITY
You can adjust the sensitivity to allow for cool temperatures
or large stones.
METHOD 1: Set the LED lights to start on the number indicated
on the chart on the back of the diamond tester.
METHOD 2: If it is not cold simply memorise the following:
SMALL STONES (under 5pts) Set LED lights to No.6
MOST STONES (6pts to 50pts) Set LED lights to No.4
LARGE STONES (60pts upwards) Set LED lights to No.2
Only if it is cold (below 10 degrees) need you look at the
chart.
METHOD 3: You will soon learn that the starting number is
irrelevant. If the LED lights light up rapidly and dramatically,
you have a diamond; if they do not move at all you do not
have a diamond; if they creep up slowly an painfully and bleep
'diamond' (especially with a large stone) then either you
have set the sensitivity too high or you have a corundum (ruby
or sapphire).
IMPORTANT: It is the SPEED the lights move that tells you
if you have a diamond, the exact starting point is not important,
you can therefore see if you have a diamond even if you start
the lights at the wrong number. Small diamonds (especially
if warm) will react very slowly, a large stone (any stone)
will react dramatically if cold. Do not become obsessed about
the lights 'tipping' into red and bleeping, it is the SPEED
the lights move that tells you if you have a diamond. You
will soon get the 'feel' of the machine - it's like getting
the 'feel' of gears on a car or bicycle, you might know, academically,
that you must change to a lower gear when going uphill (like
starting on a lower number when testing a large diamond) but
you don't have to refer to a chart.
TROUBLESHOOTING
The
Battery: if the lights fade or don't light up at
all, or if only some of the segments light up, or if the lights
zip up-and-down, change the battery and
use a good quality battery.
We have
had these returned with every conceivable type of 'wrong'
battery, marked HIGH POWER or SUPER or EXTRA. Those
bought from boot sales and bargain stores last 1 to 2mns,
similar bought in supermarkets
can last several minutes.
You must use
a good quality alkaline battery such as Duracell or UCAR. They cost about £4.00 instead of £1.50 to £2.50 but they do
last several months (providing you remember to switch the
diamond tester off after each use).
If
you are still having problems with the diamond tester then
feel free to send it back, but if we find the problem is
the battery we will charge £4.50 for a new battery + £2.50
for return postage.
The
Lights: There are three big holes, the bottom one is
labelled READY and has a light in it, the middle one is label
BATTERY and has light in it, the top one has no label at all
and has no light - this hole is not used, it serves no purpose,
it is not supposed to have a light in it. (The
reason is that the casing is standard, it is used by many
manufacturers for many different machines, and when it is
used to make a diamond tester the extra hole isn't used -
it's cheaper for manufacturers to use a standard casing and
not use some of the 'holes' than to spend several thousand
pounds getting a new casing made).
Temperature: The stone and the tester MUST be the
same temperature, ideally room temperature, but definitely
the same temperature. Repeatedly testing the same stone
warms it until, eventually, a diamond will no longer read
diamond. If this happens wait at least three minutes
for the stone to cool down. Similarly, testing a stone taken
from under the lights of a hot window, or having been brought
in from outside on a cold day, or even a small stone on a
hot customer's finger - you will get false readings, you must
wait for the stone to reach room temperature.
Continuity: hold the diamond tester with your finger
touching the metal plate, then if you miss the stone and touch
the metal setting by accident you will hear a rapid-pip alarm
(and the LED lights remain static) - however both hands
must touch the metal to create a 'circuit' - i.e. do not wear
rubber gloves, do not 'test' the machine on metal objects
sheathed in plastic.
Sight: you must place the tip at right angles in the
centre of the stone, if you repeatedly hear the rapid-pip
sound (rather than the bleep-bleep sound) this means you are
missing the stone and touching the metal. You may need to
find your reading glasses, you may need a magnifier, you may
need to find someone with a steadier hand, you must
place that tip firmly and at right angles in the middle of
the stone.
Not covered by the guarantee: breaking the tip, cutting
or pulling out the wire that connects the battery (though
we do have spare connectors), dropping it, soaking it in tea
or coffee or leaving it in the rain.
The tip: treat it with care, keep the protective cap
on it when not in use (and put it back in its pouch), do not
try to scratch the stone with the tip - it will bend
if you do that! If you bend it, it is better to bend
it back with jewellers pliers rather than throw it away, but
if you then snap the tip off you will have to throw
it away. Bending or breaking the tip is not covered by the
guarantee. There no reason to ever bend or break the
tip if you treat it carefully, these diamond tester do last
many years...providing you don't bend or break the tip.
TIPS IF SPENDING HUGE AMOUNTS OF MONEY ON DIAMONDS
We sold a diamond tester to a man who went out to South Africa
to buy 'bargain' diamonds from a 'contact'. After a very long
time haggling they agreed a price (I think it was $50,000.00),
he tested the stones, they registered DIAMOND on the tester,
they were sealed in a container and the he signed across the
seals. The money was transferred into the seller's bank account
and the following day the buyer collected the stones. The
seals on the container were still intact. And guess what?
When he got them back to England he found they weren't diamonds
at all. The customer rushed the diamonds over to us, we tested
them on five different diamond testers - they were not diamonds.
There are precautions you must take if you are spending large
amounts of money and know nothing about diamonds.
Most importantly, if the deal seems too good to be true,
it's because it is too good to be true, "Cheap Diamonds" are like
"cheap gold" or "cheap cash" - they simply
don't exist. Well, perhaps if you go, in person, to the mines
in the most war-torn parts of the world, traveling for days
through barren land, braving road blocks and gunmen...
Do not let that diamond tester out of your sight, even for
a minute. They can be tampered with (by re-soldering wires
inside) so that everything reads DIAMOND. Our man in South
Africa managed to return to England without the diamond tester,
it had been "mislaid in the confusion" - what a
surprise!
Keep on your person a genuine diamond (it need not be large)
and a paste (glass) and a sapphire (a small synthetic sapphire
will do) and test each of them before testing your purchases.
You will then know if the diamond tester has been tampered
with. It is also possible, with any machine made by man, that
the machine develops a fault - so use those four stones to
check the machine.
Tricksters have been know to store stones in ice to cool
them so that the diamond tester falsely reads DIAMOND. Try
touching the stone gently against your upper lip to see if
it feels icy cold, try clasping it in your warm hand and chatting
to the sellers for five minutes. If they're become agitated
it might be because the stone is rapidly reaching room temperature
and is about to register NOT DIAMOND on your tester.
These precautions do not apply in everyday dealing where
the amounts of money involved are relatively small, there
is no need to become paranoid!
MOISSANITE
TESTER
The stone must be absolutely
clean, preferably by cleaning with a cotton wool bud soaked
in alcohol. A layer of grease can give a false reading,
showing diamonds to be Moissanite.
A very small number
of stones were giving a false reading. It has been found
that the solution is to carry out the test whilst shining
a UV light (included) on the surface of the stone. The
UV light does not have to be touching the stone, simply
stand the it on the table facing the stone and make sure
it is switched on.
Hold the tester with your
thumb over the test button and your finger touching the
rear metal plate.
Squeeze your fingers so that
you are pressing the test button.
The yellow 'testing' light
should show. (No yellow 'testing' light? - change battery)
With your other hand hold
the metal part of the jewellery (or stone holder, supplied)
Place the probe in the centre
of the stone as far away as possible from the setting
/ metal stone-holder (if the probe is very close
to metal, it can arc and give a false reading).
IMPORTANT
A MOISSANITE TESTER is designed
to test stones that have already been tested with
a DIAMOND TESTER and have already shown up as 'DIAMOND'.
Some customers return their
MOISSANITE TESTER complaining that, "All sorts of
things show up as Moissanite even though they can't possibly
be Moissanite!". They are right. Parts of the human
body, children's toys, lumps of rock from the garden -
all sorts of things show up as Moissanite but none
show up as 'DIAMOND' on a DIAMOND TESTER.
DN1 COMBINED
DIAMOND AND MOISSANITE TESTER
The combined
DN1 diamond and Moissanite tester is not like our diamond-only
tester. With the diamond tester you can be significantly
'wrong' with the settings and still get a clear result,
with the DN1 you must follow the instructions very precisely.
Providing you do this, the DN1 should prove a reliable and
invaluable tester. But if you don't follow the instructions
very precisely you will simply get wrong results.
INSTRUCTIONS
Turn on with knob (this
is merely an on/off knob, it does not adjust anything)
Wait until WAIT light
goes off and READY light comes on
Hold the DN1 so that
your fingers of one hand are touching the metal plate and
the other hand is touching the metal of the jewellery (or
if the stone is not mounted, the metal of the stone-holder).
Place the test-tip firmly
in the centre of the gem stone, and at right angles to the
stone.
Simulant or non-diamond:
no reaction
Diamond: buzzer + green
light for about six seconds
Moissanite: within ½
second tone will change + light changes from red to green
TROUBLESHOOTING GUIDE
The DN1 tests
for diamond (thermal conductivity) then ½ second later it
tests for Moissanite (electrical resistance). These are
two entirely different principles, so if you remove and
replace the test-tip within this one second you will confuse
the machine.
Touch the test-tip
firmly onto the stone and at right angles, be careful that
it doesn't slip. Do not press hard (as if trying to scratch
the stone) - you could bend or snap the tip (not covered
by the guarantee).
The stone must
be absolutely clean, preferably by cleaning with a cotton
wool bud soaked in alcohol. Greasy stones give a wrong results,
cleaning by rubbing against your shirt is not good enough.
The tester
is designed to test diamond-like gemstones. You may wish
to experiment to see how many substances and household items
have the same electrical resistance as Moissanite - a 'Moissanite'
reading on these does not mean that the tester is broken
since such substances / items cannot possibly be confused
with diamond.
Unlike our
diamond-only testers, the DN1 does not have a 'touched metal'
safety feature, this means that if you miss the stone and
touch the metal by accident you will get a 'Diamond' reading.
Be quite certain that you can see the test-tip and the stone
clearly even if this means finding your reading spectacles
or using a magnifier.
If the yellow
READY light fails to show or if it flashes, change the battery.
The diamond test works on heat, use a good quality alkaline
battery (the energy used to heat the tip will drain a cheap
battery in minutes).
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