How To Repair Diamond Jewelry At Home (DIY)

Repairing your diamond jewelry at home can save you a lot of money and restore some of the more simple problems with your diamonds. Want to remove a common ring dent? Or how about how to close a large jump ring that has come loose? 

These are easy repairs with the right tools and need little knowledge of what's causing the problem in most cases. If you're wondering if you can repair diamond jewelry at home, keep reading for some helpful tips and tricks.

Steps to Repair Diamond Jewelry at Home

1. Get a Repair Kit

No one likes spending money on repairs, but it's not impossible to fix a diamond ring or bracelet yourself. Even if it's not your favorite thing to do, repairing jewelry at home is a relatively simple process that requires only a few essential tools and a little time.

Here are some of the tools you'll need:

• A jeweler saw with a fine-toothed blade; you can find this tool in most hardware stores or obtainable online. It makes exact cuts and produces very little heat. The saw can be used in place of a drill press (though a drill press might work better because it creates less friction).
• A jeweler's glass. This will help you inspect your work, especially when things go wrong. All diamonds are cut differently and would naturally vary slightly in size, so you want to make sure they fit correctly before setting them into a ring.
• A diamond file and emery cloth are used to smooth rough edges and remove tiny chips from the stone's surface. Diamond files are designed for filing down edges and uneven surfaces. Emery cloths are meant for polishing smooth surfaces. 

2. Clean the Stone

Diamonds are easy to wear but hard to keep looking good. Cleaning diamonds yourself is a great way to keep your jewelry looking and feeling great. The real trick is to clean the stone without harming it. When cleaning a gemstone, it's essential to use the appropriate cleaner. You don't want to remove any of the precious minerals from the stone, but you do want to remove dirt and grime.

Majority of the people aren’t aware that diamonds are pretty fragile. They can crack or chip if the wrong kind of cleaner is used on them or if they're not completely dry after cleaning. Therefore, always ensure to put on gloves when cleaning diamonds.

3. Drill out the Jeweler

It's possible to fix your jewelry yourself. It is possible to cut off your ring with a jeweler's saw if it is damaged. However, if the stone has been fractured, you'll need to open up the piece to access the jewels, which will necessitate drilling out the setting.

You can do this with a diamond drill or a jewelers' saw. A diamond drill is a lot bigger, so it'll take longer, but it lets you take care of it in one go. A jewelers' saw is smaller, making it easier to maneuver, but it's not as powerful as a diamond drill.

Put on the proper safety gear: goggles, gloves, and eye protection to start drilling out your ring. Then stand the call on its point and turn off the power to your drill press. With your handkerchief in place over your nose and mouth, you'll need to set the bit (the small metal cylinder) on the drill chuck and carefully turn on the power.

Turning on the power will make sparks fly, so keep that handkerchief handy as well. When you see sparks coming out of the tip of your bit rather than just from where you're touching, it's time for another adjustment. 

4. Replace the Jeweler with a Filler

While diamonds are an investment, you will eventually wear your investment out. This means that you'll need a new piece of jewelry sooner or later. The amazing part is that it’s possible to repair every single piece of jewelry.

The most common repair is to replace a stone or piece of metal with a filler material. This is usually done by melting and pouring the filler into the hole and forming it into shape. The filler used is generally made of either gold or silver. Both metals have been used for centuries as fillers for gaps in diamond jewelry, but over time, gold has become more popular than silver because it does not tarnish as much as silver does.

5. Drill out the Filler

To keep jewelry from shattering, you need to drill out the filler material within the diamond itself. Once you've done that, your diamond will be safe from chipping and breaking. You take extra care not to damage the surrounding stone in the process.

You have two options for drilling out the filler material: do it by hand with a dapping tool (used to shape gemstones) or a powered rotary tool like a Dremel. Each method has its good and bad side, but they both require skill and tolerance. In either case, it's best to get help if you're not sure what you're doing; ask around for advice from people who know what they're doing.

6. Replace the Filler with a New Piece of Jewelry

While diamonds are one of the rarest materials on earth, they're also one of the hardest to repair. Chunks of the diamond will take on minor scratches or missing sections, and even replacing them with a new piece of jewelry may not do the trick.

It's so difficult to repair diamonds that some jewelers won't even try. Repairing them at home is an alternative. However, it's beyond measure at times, and the only option is to get a new piece of jewelry.

7. Polish Your Gemstones Again

There are a few ways to restore diamonds, but the most common is to polish your gemstones.

Diamonds aren't like other gemstones. They're more complex than anything else that's typically used for polishing. So you usually have to use an abrasive material perform the polishing.

Polishing diamonds is done in two ways: wet or dry. Wet polishing is done in oil and water. Dry polishing uses different abrasive materials, including cork, walnut shells, sandpaper, and steel wool.

Conclusion

When it comes to repairing jewelry at home, one of the main concerns is quality. You don't want to make repairs that look obvious or that will damage your jewelry in the long run. Luckily, if you're going to repair diamond jewelry at home, this can be a surprisingly easy task, provided you know what you're doing.