Nice to hear from you Mike. There's no easy way that I have of cutting the tubing. I think I sent some thinner tubing along with the 1 inch diameter? The thinner wall thickness is more of a pain, chipping easily with my 12 inch diameter diamond saw. I tried to prevent that by wrapping some tape around the outside and cutting through it that way. You need to go slow and use a very light pressure. Maybe a perfect fitting dowel on the inside would shore up the thin-walled tubing. Maybe mold a blob of plastic/wax to a rough end and then melt it off after the cut. But a cut doesn't have to be perfect if you coceal the rough end in the head and use the neat uncut end for the tail perhaps. Whatever ...Mike Everman wrote: ↑Mon Aug 20, 2018 4:40 pmHey Mark, hope all is well! Getting ready to cut some of that Quartz tube you sent me lo these many years hence.
I wonder if scoring it in the lathe with a glass cutter and break will work? I do need to grind the ends flush to a specific length, too.
As I recall but can't find it was you were a fan of diamond wheel in a dremel?
Be sure to use a fan or vacuum so you don't breathe the dust or cutting oil vapors. Quartz sparks constantly when cutting . Also eye protection of course. Mineral oil or other cutting oils are seriously bad for your lungs.
If you are clever, you might be able to hose clamp a dremel or the extension cable to the bridge of your lathe and ever so gently feed a diamond cutting wheel into the glass tubing. My brother sometime does that on his lathe for cutting metal. But without cooling oil or water maybe the blade will give out prematurely I don't know.
With a lathe you can use some wet aluminum oxide sandpaper and sand down any rough edges on the tubing as it spins. There are lasers that can cut quartz easy as pie.
Also you could try this if you're feeling lucky. With experimentation you will find a way I'm sure. Even those guys who cut tile could cut the thicker quartz tubing with their water cooled saws. Good luck, I'm happy to hear you are wanting to experiment. Inspiration is contageous.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=pQKO1rJC2XI
https://youtube.com/watch?v=8tbm8V9vyMk
https://youtube.com/watch?v=v9kT4v51nAM