Glass Wine Bottles

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glass wine bottles
When making glassware out of recycled glass wine bottles, how can I melt the edges without cracking it?

I want to smooth the cut edges by melting the glass rather than just sanding. I tried torch firing but the glass cracked. Do I need a kiln for this and, if so, how long at what temperature?

Basically, you can’t. In theory, you would heat the glass in a kiln until it was above the annealing temperature but wouldn’t collapse from its own weight in a brief time – about 1050F for common window glass. Then you could take an compressed-air/propane or oxy/propane and melt the edges, but you would be handling glass at 1050F and your torch would be climbing in temperature while you did it. You can’t use a MAPP air torch because the torch won’t work properly with air at 1050F.
Making items with bottles requires grinding the edge to take off the sharp corners and to shape it then using progressively finer grits and polishes if you won’t accept the ground edge. It is time consuming and labor intensive – thus destroying most of the economics of recycling.

Glass Flowers recycled from wine bottles in ValxArts Backyard

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