Cutting Glass

[strangeranger]

I got a 5' x 5' piece of glass that was originally a tabletop from a friend. How do you cut heavy glass in order to re-size it?

 

[RonMiller]

If the glass is tempered it cannot be recut, it will only break. If not tempered I'd recommend taking to a glass shop, where I presume two cuts wouldn't cost too much and presumbably you'd have less chance of breakage and a better edge.

 

[AlexThePalex]

You can cut tempered glass with an angle grinder with a diamond wheel as if it where stone. Pretty risky though, you need to make precautions or else glass will be flying everywhere. You also need to have special polishing equipment to clean up the cut. Not something your average Joe could do.

 

[jonny round boy]

You can cut tempered glass with an angle grinder with a diamond wheel as if it where stone. Pretty risky though, you need to make precautions or else glass will be flying everywhere. You also need to have special polishing equipment to clean up the cut. Not something your average Joe could do.

No Alex, I'm afraid you can't. Toughened/tempered glass cannot be cut by any method. It will simply shatter.

 

[Ken Nagrod]

I found an article on cutting tempered glass...

Methods of Successfully Cutting Tempered Glass

 

[strangeranger]

Thanks for the help, it looks like I am building a 5' x 5' table.

 

[jonny round boy]

I found an article on cutting tempered glass...

Methods of Successfully Cutting Tempered Glass

Strictly speaking, that isn't an article on how to cut tempered glass. That's an article on how to turn tempered glass back into annealed glass, so that it can then be cut.

Like I said, you can't cut tempered glass...

 

[Ken Nagrod]

Jonny, did ya miss the part about using the laser to cut the tempered glass?

 

[jonny round boy]

Jonny, did ya miss the part about using the laser to cut the tempered glass?

No I didn't, but since the likelyhood of the OP having an industrial laser cutter knocking about is quite slim, I didn't think it was worth commenting on...

 

[AlexThePalex]

You can cut tempered glass with an angle grinder with a diamond wheel as if it where stone. Pretty risky though, you need to make precautions or else glass will be flying everywhere. You also need to have special polishing equipment to clean up the cut. Not something your average Joe could do.

No Alex, I'm afraid you can't. Toughened/tempered glass cannot be cut by any method. It will simply shatter.

I thought I once read somewhere it could be done this way, but I could be mistaken.