Glass cutting yourself...yes or no?

YUP to Bama & Naze above.

 

Here you go...

 

grind grind grind, I win!

and I noticed you have a heck of a lot of karma for someone with 3 posts..

 

All I can say is thank you! Grinding a hole, what the H3ll is that about!

here is a grinder

here is a DRILL, DRILLING GLASS!


I have drilled tanks from 10 gallons up to 220 and they all cut exactly the same, it just takes longer to cut the bigger ones. I use bits I get from Ebay, they are diamond coated and cost me about 5 or 6 bucks a piece and will drill about 10 to 15 holes before wearing out.

I personally wouldn't use Veggie oil, a constant stream of water or a reservoir made of plumbers putty that gets rinsed out once in a while works great. Veggie oil tends to get messy and provides no better lubrication than water. with water you can keep the cut clean which is the most important thing.

I agree on using a template if you have never done it before. You can make them out of a piece of 1x6 by drilling a hole the same size as the bit your going to use, make it long enough so you can use the end of it as a handle.


If the tank is an All Glass or Aqueon tank and is bigger than a 37 gallon the bottom is tempered. If its a 55 of any brand there is a really good bet that the whole tank is tempered, because the glass that is used in a 55 is actually to thin to be used in a tank of that size unless it is tempered. Although I have heard that some of the newer ones are using thicker glass and are not tempered.

Here is a link to the Aqueon Tank Spec page.

 

Im with bama here.

"It's "drilling a tank". Drill = rotary motor with a cutter head."

i work in optics and i grind glass lenses daily. the machine i use is in no way a drill but contains a rotary motor with a grinding wheel or "cutterhead"

 

drilling, grinding, cutting are all synonymous terms when referring to putting holes in glass with a diamond coated (or sintered) tool.

Drills make holes - doesn't matter how.
Diamonds grind through abrasion - linear cuts, circular, compound, etc doesn't matter.
Cutting is the action of grinding glass with the end being a separation of the core form the main glass. Hence diamond glass drill bits are often referred to as core drills.

 

Making a hole in an aquarium with by means of grinding glass in a circular fashion with a diamond powder coated device..

Can we all agree to this ;D

 

finally a man with reason. why didnt you say this in the 1st place. lol

 

Actually it is grinding when it comes to glass. The diamond particles on the end of the bit grinds away at the glass. A regular drill bit does cut, I agree, but that is considering typical material, like plastic, metal and wood. These specialty bits don't carve and shave away the glass, which is why we are being a PITA and saying it's "grinding." hehe I'm just joking with all this splitting hairs non-sense. It keeps me sane here at work. :bouncylau

 

mmm fire.

So how is cutting different than grinding?

When you use a saw blade or traditional drill bit the sharp edges contact the material and through friction they separate some of the material being cut from the main body generating a particulate matter of the base material, e.g. saw dust. The "blade" in the case of a saw is a tooth and in a drill is the point. Both are sharp, hard, and capable of using shearing force to remove material. Generally speaking they're macroscopic, and you can easily see each cutting surface with the naked eye.

On a diamond tool the cutting action is done by the fractured edge of an industrial diamond. In most cases the actual cutting edge is microscopic, but the action is exactly the same - a sharp edge using a shearing action removes a portion of the base material through friction. This generates particles of glass.


The primary difference is that diamond tools wear out in a much shorter time frame than larger bladed tools because the diamonds are so small and so much heat is generated that the diamonds chip, which has the effect of resharpening them. Still the basic physics are still the same at the molecular level...

so