Why do we carefully process glass?
There is hardly a person around the world who does not know what glass is. For a long time it was believed that the discoverers of glassmaking were the ancient Egyptians, but several archaeological finds confirmed that he was able to do and more ancient cultures. Working with glass - a painstaking process, because it is quite a fragile material. It can be cut, toned, polished, dyed, made of stained glass and much more. When working with him will need a lot of diligence and patience.
Not so long ago cutting was the last stage of its processing at home, but with the advent of new equipment and technologies, the glass and mirrors began to dull, grind, polish the edges. Processing of the glass edge is made in the case of using glass as doors, shelves, aquarium walls and so on, that is, when the edge is directly in view.
This is done for security reasons, as it is possible to injure sharp edges. This treatment gives the material aesthetic appearance and reduces the likelihood of chips and cracks, besides, untreated glass has no great commercial value. If you want to insert it, for example, into the door, then there is no need to process it.
What do I need to know before starting work?
Cutting and processing of glass passes in three stages: directly itself cutting, grinding and polishing. It is produced on special machines, but also at home with the help of improvised tools you can accomplish this task. The machine for processing the edge of the glass is used for serial production, for example, in the manufacture of furniture, trade showcases, aquariums and so on.
Although, if available, this will simplify and speed up the processing process, the work will be more qualitative, since such machines have a very low degree of error in operation.
Processing the edge of the glass with your own hands will require the presence of such a tool: glass cutter, ruler, electric drill( a Bulgarian is also suitable), a nozzle for grinding wheels, grinding wheels of different grain sizes. For grinding, low speeds are needed in order not to overheat the material, so a drill or a bolt with a regulated speed of rotation is required.
Grinding wheels should be made of waterproof sandpaper. Wetting the edges is necessary to prevent the ingress of glass dust into the pulmonary pathways. It is very harmful and not excreted from the body. The glass processing tool can be purchased at any construction shop, so it will not take much time and effort to search for it.
Stages of home glass processing
Glass processing begins with own hands from cutting. The first thing to do is to mark and fasten the canvas. Further, putting a ruler or a template, we conduct on the marking with a glass cutter, while observing the same force of pressing and speed of movement. You need to spend once. After that, you need to release the cut line a short distance from the surface on which you cut, and knock from below with a special hammer.
After cutting, the edges will be torn, so immediately go to the grinding. For this we put on the drill nozzle, put the grinding wheel, at first more coarse, and start grinding. To prevent the glass from bursting due to overheating, the maximum speed of rotation of the wheel should not exceed 1700 rpm. First get rid of the notches and align the edges, and then give the edge the desired shape.
After processing the edge with a coarse-grained circle, we set the disk to medium-grained, and then the most fine-grained. After grinding, the edge will be matte and rough. We pass to polishing. Polishing is carried out in the same way as grinding, only felt wheels and paste ASI are used. The paste is applied to the felt wheel, and the edge is polished to a shine.
Before processing the glass, it must be remembered that safety is required when working with it. Splinters can injure hands, feet and, especially, the eyes, and glass dust will cause huge damage to your health.