Cubic Zirconia Care

Clean your Cubic Zirconia rings and jewelry with warm, soapy water and a soft brush or an ultrasonic cleaner. Be sure to dry the cubic zirconia stone to keep its brilliance and shine. Remove your CZ jewelry when doing heavy work such as gardening or moving. Keep them in a fabric-lined box for protection and to keep other gold jewelry pieces from scratching it. With these tips, your cubic zirconia jewelry should last you for many years.

Cubic Zirconia History

Cubic zirconia rings and other cubic zirconia jewelry are lovely substitutes for diamond jewelry. It has an interesting history combining science and beauty. Two German scientists discovered it in 1937. However, it was not until the 1970's when Russian scientist found a way to create it in a laboratory. Cubic zirconia did not become popular until the 1980's when Swarovski & Co. began making them in mass quantities.

A cubic zirconia is made through a complicated process and is a made up of zirconium oxide and yttrium oxide. Together the two chemicals create a beautiful, radiant crystal. It takes almost 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit to melt the two chemicals together and the most important process is cooling. The chemicals must be carefully cooled in order to create flawless crystals.

The cubic zirconia is a beautiful substitute for those who cannot afford a real diamond or just simply prefer not to spend that much. It has a little less sparkle and brilliance, but with more fire and color. Also, a cubic zirconia weighs 75% more than loose diamonds with the same carat weight. Cubic zirconia stones are durable, brilliant, and beautiful. Most people cannot tell the difference. One of the ways to tell the difference between a zirconia and a real diamond is to look at the cubic zirconia under a 10x magnification. You can see the facets do not point properly and where facets intersect, it is not a straight line, but the intersection is more rounded than the diamond's facets. Other ways to tell the difference are doing a specific gravity test on an un-mounted stone, marking ink on the top of the stone (the ink beads up on a cubic zirconia), when gem-printed a cubic zirconia photograph's reflective and refractive patterns, and when measuring heat conductivity, a cubic zirconia registers red on the indicator (a diamond is green).

Cubic zirconia has a hardness of 8.5 of the Mohs scale of hardness. Cubic zirconia is clear and is brilliant. There are even some cubic zirconia that come in almost every color of the rainbow.

Shopping for Cubic Zirconia

When buying cubic zirconia rings or other jewelry, look at the size and the clarity of the stone. Top quality cubic zirconia stones should have beautiful fire and brilliance, while lower grade cubic zirconia stones are no different in appearance than glass. There are many different colors of cubic zirconia stones, one for every color on the rainbow. They are available in many shapes and sizes. Cubic zirconia is relatively hard, but always protect them from scratches and hits. Let's look at the many styles and sizes to see which cubic zirconia piece suits you most from Bofacets.com.