Technique

Circle Cutting in Glass:

There are many different tools out there on the market... currently I use the Silberschmidtt Repetitive Circle Cutter. And I use my own custom technique, its a little unconventional - but its fast and simply awesome :)

if I say so myself - ha!

Okay - I 've made a little slideshow - basically the heart of this technique is using a big paint bucket, and smacking the glass after you've made the score - this "smacking" (aka breaking the glass) technique works great with this German scoring tool The Silberschmidtt scores at an angle that enables this - all you have to do after making the score, is shock the glass violently and the circles fall out. No running pliers, no grouzing, no grinding - and even better, if you use a bucket to induce the "violent shock" the mess is minimal, all the scraps end up in the bucket - all you have to do is pick up the circles and clean them off.

Important Safety Note:Of course if anyone is reading this and planning on trying out this technique for themselves, do so at your own risk. I take no responsibility for the foolish unconventional methods I utilize :)

Efficiency makes me happy - the less you handle each piece of glass and the less to clean up - the more I can get done with less cuts and splinters! I cut over 100 circles yesterday, cleaned them and got some of them into the kiln, took about 2 hours of my day. Then I had a class in the evening teaching an introduction to glassworking with Pyrex Glass. Yummy!