Re: ATM Splitting thick mirror blanks

["Bob May" <bobmay@nethere.com>]

Tom, you wrote:
<<As the groove gets deeper, you have a heavy, unsupported 'shelf' of glass,
putting more and more stress on the smaller and smaller section of uncut
glass.  >>
The question that I have is where is the unbalance?  Note that the glass is
turning (it is indeed stting on a rotating platform) and thus, any wear on
the glass will indeed wear the groove evenly around the glass.  Moving the
wire would be useful to get the grit in the cut easier than just letting it
get slowly swept in by the part of the wire coming out of the cut.  I'll
also note that this cutting action isn't fast as it probably takes a fair
number fo minutes to go an inch in so the remaining material will be nicely
centered in the cut.  I'd suspect that with proper working, the cut will go
well below 1/4" diameter before the rest shatters from the stresses.
Bob May
http://nav.to/bobmay
bobmay@nethere.com
NEW! http://bobmay.astronomy.net