'Linde' Sapphire - value?

[Robert McDaniel]

I have been following this group for several months and would like to see
if someone can give me an answer. Many, many moons ago (more than I like
to think of) my parents gave me a White gold ring with a Linde Sapphire
(size = 9mm x 7mm - cab setting). As my parents have never been rich, I
know the value is probably low. I also know that the Linde is an
artificial gem. But that ring has set my prefs for carbochon (sic?)
settings rather than faceted gems. Can anyone give me some general info
on such a stone? Thanks in advance!

[Peter W. Rowe]

rmc...@news.dorsai.org (Robert McDaniel) wrote:

First off, while it's a synthetic stone, as you know, it IS sapphire.
chemically its the same as natural star sapphires, and thus shares
their hardness and high durability. The star, by the way, is a
reflection from minute needles of rutile aligned with the three short
crystal axes of the hexagonal crystal structure. The linde is easy to
identify, both because in common with flame fusion sapphires, the
growth marks are curved bands in the stone, and because Linde kindly
put a nice trademark L on the back of their stones. If it doesn't
have that L, it was made by someone other than Linde Air Products, a
division of Union Carbide. They have not been in that business for
some time now, as well, so the Linde brand stones are now only found
in "old" stock or used pieces. They tended to be a little more
uniform and densely packed with those rutile needles than some of the
other makers.

As to value, it depends on the size. They typically sold, retail, for
between 10 and 50 dollars, again depending on the size and markup...
The natural star sapphires and rubies, of course, are many times
higher in price, except perhaps for the lower and smaller qualities of
black star sapphire, which is sometimes fairly cheap.

Hope this helps.

Peter Rowe