Glass Questions

Me again - not even got my Wazer and I have so many questions.

So last night I was browsing some of the information about cutting, and it gave the maximum thickness of two types of glass. From memory 18mm for borosilicate glass but only 6mm for soda-lime glass.

I was wondering why this is - I thought boro glass was a much harder glass than ordinary soda-lime (of which there are a lot variations in that as well, float glass and art glass behave differently in the kiln)

So I am curious if there is a reason for this?

Thank you

Dawn

@DawnWazer. Boro glass is chemically harder than the other types of glass. That’s what makes it also more heat resistant.

There are various width setting for The soda lime as I’ve cut from 2mm on up. I’m not on the laptop so I don’t have the exact numbers. But be rest assured that you can cut various thicknesses of glass.

As long as you’re willing to wait, it will saw thru just about anything that the head will clear. You just have to move SLOW, and the bottom of the cut will be a bit wonkey compared to the top.

I’ve stacked 3mm glass to be 6mm, and cut thru it all no big deal. (You do get a bit of skuff in between the sheets, but if you’re fusing glass it doesn’t matter.)

One you login, you can create your own profiles in WAM. For example, the existing 3mm soda lime glass for bullseye glass is really too slow, you can speed it up by 20% no problem, and save time/abrasive.

You just need to test with the material you have to see what provides the finish you require.

Hey @DawnWazer welcome to the forum! Glad to see your excited to get your WAZER and begin cutting!

The WAZER is definitely capable of cutting soda lime glass thicker than 6mm! The materials that appear in the database are the ones that we have performed testing on to determine the cut settings needed.

Soda lime and art glass typically comes in thinner sheets and we have not performed the testing needed to determine settings for thicker sheets. I’m certain that your WAZER could cut the same thicknesses that appear for Boro glass, those settings just haven’t been created yet! In a pinch you can use the Boro setting to cut soda lime glass, the settings are very similar and should give you good results.

There is also a feature on the WAZER that will allow you determine the cut settings needed for a material that does not appear in the database. With these settings you can then create a custom material setting in WAM and expand your materials database. Check out my forum post about it here or the online article on this feature here.

Looking forward to seeing what you cut with your WAZER!

1 Like

Thank you CharB, I figured it must be able to cut thicker soda-lime if it can cut boro.

Dawn

Hi Greg, thank you for replying.

Yes, art glass is usually only 2mm or 3mm, not often 6mm, not until it’s been through the kiln of course.

Good to know that custom materials can be added, I will check out your links, thank you.

I can’t wait now, it will be here this time next week, although I have arts events for the two days following, plus teaching workshops, so I am not going to get much time to experiment straight away!

1 Like

Hi

Thanks for another helpful reply. It is mainly Bullseye that I work with and of course, I am fusing with it, so this is really good to know.