Featured amber, amber simulant, or ...?

Some wanna-be amber beads turned up recently as a necklace fragment with no clasp. They tested positive for dirt, but negative for bakelite. They desperately want to be amber, but they don't fluoresce very well. Some are mixed opaque and translucent and some are just opaque. They feel heavier than I'd expect amber to feel. Copal?

 

Have you try the electrostatic capacities ?

 

...sometimes.... I didn't think to do that with these; they were just made into a new necklace and earrings. I'll have to try the tissue paper trick, and of course my tongue. Right now the nose is out of action.

 

It's a formula for the right density, it's 25 cl water and 4 grams salt.
Amber is very electrostatic compared to some resins, if you have those two results positive, your item is amber at 80% but can be reconstituted amber too…
If you add the test with the heated pin you win 10% more because reconstituted amber react with the heat due to the residues of the solvent used.

 

Exactly, if you get the quantities wrong, it'll fail the test even if it is amber.
We don't generally recommend hot pin tests here, because of the disastrous results to some materials.

Maybe a silly question, but are they warm to the touch?
You said they don't fluoresce very well. Some amber just doesn't want to cooperate. This is one of my amber necklaces which is genuine natural Baltic egg yolk amber and has passed the float and other tests, but no blatant enthusiasm on the UV test either:




Here is a site for further testing:
http://ethnicjewelsmagazine.com/the-identification-of-amber-and-its-copies/

 

On specialist discussions it appears that hey are not all varieties of amber which gives positive results with the UV tests as precised on your link, for me it's not the better testing, when I need use amber to make a repair, I always use the test with solvent first when I found the good color, translucent and size, for repairs the use of reconstituted amber when it matches is acceptable ethically(nearly always a lost cabochon).
It's necessary to precise with the heated pin that as for all testings you proceed only on a non visible part, with beads near the hole for example, and to make it with light pressure only.

 

Bead holes are about the only place to pin test, provided the item cannot be celluloid. It catches fire.