Company Update June 2022: Restocking Ruby + New Product: Black CZ

It's been a while since we've had stock, and this was not our intention, but we've taken the time to further refine the main product, in addition to developing new variants, the first of which we will be releasing is: Black Cubic Zirconia (more details at the bottom of this email).

Thank you for your patience. Here are the details of the next restock:

• Date and time: Friday June 10th at 4:20PM Pacific Time
• Products offered: Ruby Sapphire and Black Cubic Zirconia (new)
• Fulfilment times: We have inventory on-hand and will ship out in sequence of when we receive your order. Please allow up to 1.5 weeks for us to ship out to you.

You may be wondering about Blue Sapphire. This limited product isn't retired yet but we need more time to determine how many pieces we can offer after sorting through the latest shipment from the factory.

Product Improvements of Ruby

After many production runs, we are now nearly at the consistency of injection-mold manufacturing, which as you may know is not possible with sapphire. Previously I mentioned that we got slightly thinner than when we launched, but in order to achieve further consistency, we went back in the other direction just a bit. Now, the thickness is at 1.1mm plus a fraction of one tenth of a millimeter with all sets being height-matched within ± two hundredths of a millimeter. You can see for yourself in this image. Note: again, this won’t cause sensor accuracy issues but you may consider increasing the LoD on your mouse. Also note: due to Sapphireskate’s rounded shape, there’s no issue adding additional sapphireskates to an existing setup regardless of which production run your skates come from.

Introducing: Black CZ

CZ stands for Cubic Zirconia. You may have heard of this crystal before as a cheaper diamond-alternative. Similarly, these CZ mouse skates will be cheaper than our standard Sapphireskates. But don’t sleep on CZ just yet. We selected CZ because it has similar properties to sapphire: 8 on the Mohs hardness scale and just a touch higher friction than sapphire.

In addition, we can offer it in unique colors. CZ can be doped with several elements to infuse a wide range of colors into the crystal lattice structure. We went with an incredible black color: it has a very deep color with a mirror-like finish while still being slightly translucent.

Important notices: although extremely scratch-resistant, you will not want to use sandpaper on CZ as most sandpaper essentially has microscopic crushed up bits of Al2O3 (sapphire) in it.

Another important thing to note: Black CZ Mouse Skates will not come with a box. We will still include a protective capsule, in addition to additional adhesive. But our cost to make this is actually close to Ruby and we want to be able to offer them at a lower price point of $39.99.

Moissanite Update

Originally, I released moissanite mouse skates (AKA “Flexskates”) as a reverse April Fool’s since the product was real. We offered up 1 for sale and it sold out immediately. Several more people emailed me about buying them. They’ve been on the site for a while now and are a built-to-order model which can take a while for us to get to you. They nearly sit at the very top of the Moh’s hardness scale at 9.5, often measuring the same hardness as diamond, but the level of friction is a bit higher than sapphire. Despite the high price, they are like works of art with refractive qualities that go far beyond other gemstones.

We are now fulfilling orders for those who ordered Flexskates already. You can find out more about them here but do note: standard wait times of up to 2 months will apply.