Drinking Glasses from Wine Bottles

Step 3: Cutting the Bottle (part 2)

Using a candle and some patience, carefully heat the bottle at the scoring mark rotating the bottle as you heat it. Hold the bottle with both hands, one on each end. I will typically heat the bottle for about a minute and then drip cold water on the area. Repeat the process until the bottle suddenly breaks apart. You will actually hear slight cracking of the glass as you do this.

The first time I did it I was very tentative but now it usually takes me only about 5 mins to cut a bottle.

Be carefull, the cut edges are EXTREMELY SHARP!

*Note:  I've also had success by heating the bottle in the oven for about 5 minutes at 225 F and pouring water over the score line.   You'll need to ruin a few bottles to perfect your method.

Comments

[jmendezg]

i can not find the BC Quick Cutter. Please help

[scunningham2]

how do you go about smoothing the edges, so as not to get cut??

[meanmonkey]

cracking off is a technique you can use to cut bottles i use it occasionally. it requires only a turn table of some sort, a small blow torch, and something to scratch the glass.
check out the link its pretty cool.

[Zafner]

Attention everybody reading this instructable: try this. It's awesome. I can't believe I never heard of this.

[didgitalpunk]

true the vid is pretty cool

[server support company nyc]

Wow great video meanmonkey and I agree with asmithwnc. There should be a proper cutter for bottles to avoid any accidents when you use the wrong one.

server support company nyc

[The Dark Ninja]

That is an AWESOME technique! I'm going to try this for sure. I'm going to try it on a wine bottle (of course.) Thanks again for the video!

[Carpenoctem90hrs]

Great link, I think I will give it a shot.

[DarfnageL]

I'm having a hard time getting a clean break, I've tried a few times and I'll either get a crack going down the bottle from the score line, or even a little spider webbing going out from the score mark. What am I doing wrong?

[kikiclint]

your cutter might not be perfect enough.  If your score line is broken at all, it creates places for the glass to run off randomly.  Practice scoring on something, and find out the right pressure, and then make a single continuous line, and try it again.  If it doesn't look like a single line, your cutter probably has a chip or something to break the line.  Just some experience from two years as a glazer.  I haven't tried this yet though.

[ozzbat69]

you are all pretty close, but if you really want to do this the easy and clean way, after heating the bottle/glass for a few moments. The heat slightly causes the glass to expand on either side of the score line evenly. Place an ice cube on the top side of the bottle/glass over top of your score line. This causes the heated glass to rapidly contract from the cold of the ice cube which results in a quick even separation of the glass. It's really quite cool when it separates. PS: you don't need the glass to be melting hot, just a bit of heat, and when you place the ice cube on top you will know when it's enough. Enjoy, haven't seen one of these devices since I was just a kid, good work...

[noahh]

I heard it works better if you put it in the candle, then dunk it in ice cold water. I have not tried it but I read it gives you a fairly smooth cut.

[fstedie]

it doesn't necessarily work better, just possibly faster. you'll still get an extremely sharp edge which you'll have to smooth out. try it, you'll see ;)

[noahh]

You would know better than me. I have never tried one of these.

[Mr.Cire]

how do you find the score line?

[fstedie]

you create the score line with the bottle cutter, which is really all that it does. once you make the score line, it is pretty easy to see. you can actually make it out in one of my pics.