What Does A Fire Opal Look Like

Transparent specimens have a good luster.

What does a fire opal look like. The orange stone is about 7 x 9 millimeters in size and was mined in oregon. Triplets are often glued on to a black plastic glass or vitrolite backing. The real opal and the non opal layer attached to it. These three stones show the color range of fire opal a name given to specimens of opal with a fiery background color.

Fire opal is a term used for colorful transparent to translucent opal that has a bright fire like background color of yellow orange or red. The fire opal is a term not commonly used within australia but most famous source of fire opals is the state of querétaro in mexico. From a side view a real opal should look solid. Opal is a hydrated amorphous form of silica sio 2 nh 2 o.

Any information would be appreciated. I was wondering what kind it is perhaps it is too expensive to be an opal solid on the other hand maybe it is. Look at the back of the opal does it look or feel like a kind of hard black or grey plastic. These opals are commonly called mexican fire opals.

Its water content may range from 3 to 21 by weight but is usually between 6 and 10. Doublets and triplets however will look layered. Like the traditional opal fire opals can occasionally display signs of iridescence in very bright light. The orange and yellow stones have a sleepy translucence while the red stone is semitranslucent almost opaque.

Doublets have only two layers. Our opal earrings look like the surface might be a chip of brilliant colours in the sun that at a point looks like a diamond however the opal is not straight through. Because of its amorphous character it is classed as a mineraloid unlike crystalline forms of silica which are classed as minerals it is deposited at a relatively low temperature and may occur in the fissures of almost any kind of rock being. Fire opals like other opals are relatively hard rating a 5 5 to 6 5 on the hardness scale.

Fire opals have a very low density lower than that of glass with which it is sometimes confused. Opalescence is often used to refer to play of color but the term should only be used to describe the milky iridescence of common opals which do not. Doublets are a little more difficult to identify as they often use a natural potch black colourless opal or ironstone the brown boulder opal host rock backing. It may or may not exhibit play of color the color of fire opal can be as vivid as seen in the three stones shown here.

Fire opal is a transparent to translucent opal with warm body colors of yellow to orange to red. Although it does not usually show any play of color occasionally a stone will exhibit bright green flashes. You should be able to see a thin regular line where the two layers are joined together.