Grading Opal Rough. Subscribers Ultra Low Budget $50 Lightning Ridge Rough Opal Parcel.

[@kenoathiog1156]

You’re a good man, Roy!!! Huge thanks for having such a detailed (as always) look at them- & keeping my slightly amusing notes attached 😂. All great info for this beginner- & looking forward to the vids to come 👍👍👍

[@RoysRocks]

I'm looking forward to cutting a handful of these. Hopefully end up with a few polished gems! Especially green/black ones.

[@nancycurtis3230]

Thanks for the look at them. 50 bucks isn't a lot of money. If one comes up ok, it's 50 dollars worth of fun anyway. 🙂

[@ThatOpalGuy]

No doubt. I've paid over twice for far less.

[@RoysRocks]

Yeah when he said he was disappointed I thought it would just be sand but its far better than he made it out to be.

[@kenoathiog1156]

@@RoysRocks yeah- was the first look - dry & without my glasses on. Also, being a total newbie, I don’t have a real sense of stones with more potential that they might appear from the outside. I can’t wait to be able to work with them so that I can develop more of the skills! 👍🤞

[@jeffholmes1362]

Wow , not sure how you could be disappointed for $50, I think that’s a bargain for a low grade parcel, that’s a buyer you’d go back to I think. You got $50 of fun just reviewing them 😂😂😂. Thanks for sharing, some great videos to come

[@RoysRocks]

Well since I met with him I think he has bought another $50 parcel from the same seller. May as well. Gotta love a gamble.

[@bentationfunkiloglio]

Your recommendation that new opal buyers avoid low-cost ($50 range parcels) is probably good advice ...with the caveat that beginners find an experienced buyer to help review prospective purchases. I've seen quite a few people make really expensive (by my cheapo standards) mistakes. Having said that, I love the adventures associated with trying to find nice gems in low-end rough opals.

[@RoysRocks]

I think all us opal addicts love the thrill of the chance when it comes to cheap parcels and hunting for a random gem. Getting some experienced eyes to just have a quick couple second glance at a potential buy is a great idea but I do have one past bad experience where that backfired... The experienced seller *_bought it_* before telling me it was a decent parcel!!!

[@bentationfunkiloglio]

@@RoysRocks Guess there are slime balls everywhere. I’ve encountered one or two sellers who fall into this category, salting junk parcels with nice looking but unusable off-cuts, etc. However, 90% in the opal community have been cool peeps so far.

[@pkgoldopalhunting]

at least you can pick them up in your fingers i have paid like $130/$140 for parcel and half it the size of a pea and rice grain size 70% ,dont know how they expect you to cut that so good to see you looking at cheap parcel

[@RoysRocks]

True I didn't even think of the size. I have seen "rough cutters" for $50 which were really just chips.

[@pkgoldopalhunting]

@@RoysRocks yes mate small chips and they say rough which have had been rubed a lot to you se a slight tiny flash and nothing else i think rough it not rubes is that correct

[@RoysRocks]

@@pkgoldopalhunting Yeah once you see every piece has been rubbed and checked thoroughly you know you are in for a disappointing ride.

[@pkgoldopalhunting]

@@RoysRocks i bigining to see this

[@davidariamirroarkyoung]

It looks like a excellent parcel for price.

[@RoysRocks]

Ah even just a few years ago it was soo much easier to get great low budget parcels. These days you need to try a lot harder or snag no reserve auctions that everyone misses.

[@davidariamirroarkyoung]

@@RoysRocks seriously I was going to go to the big show in Arizona this year a friend was there two days before I left and said don't bother it's insane prices with bad quality

[@anthonymcclain6475]

I've spent thousands on rough (possibly tens of thousands ssshhhh don't tell anyone) gambles are fun because they're gambles but if you are trying to cut a gem...a specific gem especially then rubs might be a better choice...I personally am having to meet and greet with every miner or opal seller or cutter I can become friends with on social media because I don't know about everyone else but opal is borderline addictive. Hi my name is Anthony and I am an opalholic....

[@RoysRocks]

Haha welcome to the club fellow opal addict. I can comfortably say I have spend thousands... maybe even tens of thousands at this point on opal and lapidary in general. Yet... I still hunt low quality parcels for a surprise every now and then 🤣

[@rachelruggieri5491]

I saw inside the second stone in the black potch pile while wet 12:20 some red sunflash color. If that milkyness is taken down it could get brighter. It may be sunflash but red is red. It’s just a tad above the rubbish pile in my opinion.

[@RoysRocks]

Yeah saw that during editing but it may just be an odd camera effect because to the eye it just doesn't really show. Still might be worth a check because you are right, red is red.

[@JSGilbert]

I wish I could find $50 parcels that looked half as good.

[@RoysRocks]

Ah its getting harder nowadays for sure. Gotta snag those no reserve auctions and get really lucky now.

[@Famo59]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts 💭 on that parcel of Opals Cheers Famo59 👍🍻🤓⛏

[@RoysRocks]

No worries hopefully there is some good info in the analysis for others trying to find value in their parcels.

[@anthonymcclain6475]

Informative as always ..you still have to be,in my opinion anyway,the nicest guy in opal 😂

[@RoysRocks]

Thanks man. I try to be informative first and nice second... somewhere down the list is a skilled carver 👌😆

[@anthonymcclain6475]

@@RoysRocks aww you know better than that... you're the gold standard of freeforming with a rotary tool! When I complain about using a Dremel to someone they always say..." Well Roy can do it!" 😂

[@RoysRocks]

@@anthonymcclain6475 Well I'm going to keep on working on the craft so much more improvement to come. Decades of fun to come (and hopefully gems).

[@anthonymcclain6475]

@@RoysRocks I'll be watching!

[@karenjones7111]

Thank you..

[@drfill9210]

Hmmm what are your initials backwards? 😆

[@RoysRocks]

No worries Karen. 👌

[@Algoldprospecting]

I’m cutting opal now. The sand drives me nuts

[@RoysRocks]

Sand has a mind of its own sometimes and can be really tricky.

[@CookingWithCows]

Perfect for practice. If you can make back 50% of your investment as learning material, that's good enough. Unfortunately most low price parcels won't give you that return by a long shot, so yeah.. maybe save up a month or 2 more and buy a better parcel

[@RoysRocks]

Most of my old beginners parcels were easily paying for themselves but nowadays it seems to be getting harder.

[@pedrobaillie3307]

Hi roy thanks for you're knowledge you have shared with me i was wanting to get you're thoughts on buying a $70 jar of of smaller pieces with lots of colour other jars had larger stons with some colour here and there the smaller pieces lots of colour seller got me to communicate by txting which has held me back aswell as loosening my debit card had 2 wait 7 days

[@RoysRocks]

If you have a way of using the small stones then good colour is never a bad thing. Selling through text is a strange method? Not something I have ever tried.

[@gazzog6252]

Hey man is black opal direct reasonable with there cheaper parcel, also nice vid man ,love the alien vid to bro well done

[@drfill9210]

Black Opal direct have high quality stuff, but it's definitely not cheap. I regularly snap up bargains for a dollar which cut some pretty epic stones. What you are paying for with bod is material in which all of the guesswork has been removed. It therefore depends on how much you value stone selection.

[@ThatOpalGuy]

I have bought 2 of Justin's beginner parcels. The first had 40 stones, many with color. None are too green, but I am a novice. A few were total garbage and a few were in the middle of color and garbage. I've gotten a couple of dozen really cool stones. I'm cutting every one of them except for our five that are the garbage stones. The second parcel had ten stones. Five are big potch knobbies, witch hat variety. Five are smaller with fainter blue/ purple colors in white crystal. One has the liturgies to yield a good stone(unlikely to recoup the parcel cost, but im a beginner). I will carve every one, for experience. Each parcel cost 100 US, plus shipping. Totally worth it. A small price to pay to stay my personal opal journey. As another person commented here, it's best if you can buy in person. But most of us cannot. I recommend checking out opal auctions. The people selling there post videos of each parcel, which is better than buying parcels unseen, which is how Justin's beginner parcels are sold.

[@ThatOpalGuy]

@@drfill9210 Justin had good judgements in what he prices for his parcels. Maybe someday I'll take the risk. See my comment here about his beginners parcels.

[@drfill9210]

@@ThatOpalGuy of course! I've probably bidded against you at Opal auctions... Yeah I think what you are saying is Justin reduces the risk. There is real garbage on the auction site that sometimes attracts huge dollars... One or two bidders just target a particular seller and buy regardless. That means that sellers products are way riskier...

[@ThatOpalGuy]

@@drfill9210 true, but I got 2 pieces from Seda Opals, one was 5.8 carats (i got for 78$) and the other was 4..4 carats (30$), both shipped together. They both have clear bars that run the length and width of each stone. I'm running the smaller one now and it will make a very nice stone. So you're right, buyer beware and definitely know when to stop bidding.

[@nichoaspolites]

If u was going to get a small 200 to 250 bundle where would I buy one as I'm in Melbourne and am more of a gold prospector so getting into opal is hard

[@RoysRocks]

Depends on the type of opal you are after. I have fave sellers to cover the whole range of aussie opal.

[@nichoaspolites]

@@RoysRocks what would be a good started to try and rub myself

[@ThatOpalGuy]

Hey fifty bucks is starter material. I sand, grind, smooth, polish EVERY possible rock. It's not likely to produce lots of great stones but the idea is to develop the skill and techniques to NOT stuff up the good stones you do end up getting in the future (and wasting precious precious opal and $$).

[@drfill9210]

Me too. I will try to extract a stone from the rough no matter what. Also I'm not scared to cut early. Means more often than not you can get 4 or 5 mid sized gems out of expensive garbage- if you made a mistake bidding for something 🤣

[@ThatOpalGuy]

@@drfill9210 I think even plain potch pieces can be beautiful.

[@kenoathiog1156]

Absolutely- I just grabbed these (was actually 2x 100 carat parcels… and actually $45 total before postage) purely as starter material for my practice/ learning. I certainly wasn’t looking to make money from it- but I was attracted to the green on black sparkly one to possibly use in a jewellery project if it worked out. I don’t have the skills or experience yet, so it’s awesome of Roy to share the process - and for me to cross check my thought process with his. He knows what he’s doing for sure!!

[@ThatOpalGuy]

It's great that Roy takes time to do this for people. I like my starter parcels because i know I'll make lots of mistakes learning and I won't be wasting potential valuable color.

[@RoysRocks]

It is exactly what I did when I started too. Many terrible "cut and polished" coober pedy potch stones were harmed before the making of this youtube channel thats for sure.

[@pedrobaillie3307]

Hi roy do you have anyone that can sell me a rough parcell with a chance of finding a decent stone or 2 please roy thanks

[@RoysRocks]

Depends what kind of material you are looking for?

[@pedrobaillie3307]

Thanks Roy i know how little time you have with work and the channel i really appreciate your reply after watching you're video on the $250 parcel you bought for jewellery do you think he would sell me a 250 parcel after the last purchase had glass and useless rock's in it

[@CockatoobirdmanBill]

Looks like some of the junk I bought in the past. You just can't tell from a photo or a vid on the inter net. I like hands on but 8390 miles for me I like so many others have no choice.............Be well and be safe......PS did you get back to work?

[@RoysRocks]

At $50 I reckon he has done well. I reckon the big multibar green/black might just pay it off in one hit. Fingers crossed 🤞 Also yeah back to work... wish I was still in quarantine 🤣