Text Box: Most industrial grade diamonds are not useable for drilling purposes as they come raw from nature until they are mechanically, thermally, and chemically processed and conditioned to toughen them and give them a more uniform shape.

 

 

 

Text Box: Some 30 or so years ago the industrial diamond market was such that the diamonds available to the bit builder were identified by their sources so when you asked for "West African" stones you knew what group of mines the diamonds came from. The current day market does not allow that distinction. Natural point diamonds from 30 years ago at left and current day natural point stones (right). The ones at left were from West Africa and the ones on the right are called West African today even though their source mines may well be in Australia.