Cutting, Breaking and Shaping Glass

• 1). Put on safety glasses. Line your work table with several pages of newspaper and lay the glass on the newspaper.
  
  
• 2). Hold a ruler or straight edge in the desired place to make one side of a square, oblong, rectangle or octagon. Holding the wheel of a glass cutter perpendicular to the glass and against the ruler, score the glass from one edge to the other edge by pushing the cutter away from your body, using even pressure. Do not press too hard. The scores will be barely visible.
  
  Straight-edged shapes, as well as circles, are to be scored and snapped one side at a time. To make rounded glass or a unique shape, place a template on the glass only slightly larger than the finished product, and trace the template with the marker. Applying the glass cutter in the same method as above, score along the line, but follow one side of the desired shape.
  
  
• 3). Hold the glass with your thumbs on top and placed to either side of the score line, after one side has been scored, and snap the two pieces apart. An optional breaking method is to align the mouth of running pliers to the score, at the center of the length of glass. While holding the glass with your other hand opposite to the running pliers, snap the pieces apart. Breaking pliers are also used to break glass at the score line. These have a concave mouth with a guide mark that is pointed down the length of the score line. Squeeze the handle to snap the glass apart. Grozing pliers are used to nibble away small chips of glass for easy shaping.
  
  Repeat the steps above for all sides until the desired shape is obtained.
  
  
• 4). Fill the reservoir with water, following the manufacturer's instructions for the glass grinder. Smooth the edges of the glass piece by laying it flat on the grinder surface and pressing the sides lightly against the spinning grinder wheel. Use your fingertips to slide the glass piece back and forth against the wheel until a smooth, even side surface is acquired. Be sure to perfect the shape, because a straighter, or rounder, edge is necessary to get a neater beveled edge.
  
  

Making Beveled Edges

• 1). Set the blade of the chop saw to the proper angle for the desired finished bevel. Cut the block of wood to this angle.
  
  
• 2). Place the widest part of the block of wood onto the glass grinder, with the narrowest part facing up and the slope heading downward toward the grinder wheel.
  
  
• 3). Slide the glass object to be beveled down the slope and press the upper edge of the side surface against the wheel. Using your fingertips, slide the piece back and forth against the grinder wheel to ensure a neat, flat-angled bevel. Remove the piece often to monitor the amount of glass being removed. Repeat the grinding steps for all sides of the object.