The supplies you will need:
*Eye protection (goggles)
*Dust respirator- you never want to breath in glass dust or or aerosol vapor with glass particles, this will harm your lungs!!
*High Speed Drill- I have both a Dremel and Foredom- they each have their own great features
*Shallow tray for water
*Sea Glass _ I would start with Sea Glass that is not perfect and will not matter if you break it. Do not start with your best orange or red piece.
Start with with finding the piece of sea glass I would like to make into jewelry and look to see if it is proper for drilling and hole placement. Meaning not too thin or small for drilling. I have my tray of shallow water, eye protection, drill and dust respiration on ( I can't stress the importance of safety for your health and using water around electricity!). Make sure your diamond bit is secure in the drill shaft and turn the drill on. With the sea glass wet, gently on an angle mark the sea glass with the drill bit and make a small crater to mark were you would like your hole. This will help the drill bit catch the glass and prevent it from "Dancing Across" the glass when you place the drill bit where you would like the hole. Drill the sea glass about half way though and repeat the angle mark on the opposite side so the drilling process can be meant in the middle of the glass and will prevent "blow throughs" on the other side.
While drilling sea glass applying the correct amount of pressure and setting the drill at the lowest speed is crucial to not break the glass or ruin your drill bit with too high friction and heat. Also learning that certain glass is more as I would call temperamental to drill and is more likely to crack from the heat of the drilling process no matter how careful you are. There are also going to be days that you should not attempt to drill sea glass, when you are highly distracted or fatigued, even I have those days and I know to just put the drill down and move on the something else. Drilling sea glass is a self learned skill through lots of practice and takes a long time to perfect the technique so the ratio of successful drills out numbers the number of breakages. Once you have mastered this skill you are on your way to make sea glass jewelry or any craft with your sea glass! Any questions about sea glass, designing or jewelry making please feel free to contact me anytime. You can visit our website for our beautiful sea glass jewelry, sea glass collectors pieces, pre drilled sea glass or our drilling services at http://www.hlseabeachglassjewelry.com
You can also contact us at:
HLSeaGlassJewelry@yahoo.com
(631) 779-2570
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Happy Glassing!
Holly L'Hommedieu
Owner of HL Sea & Beach Glass Jewelry LLC
Looking forward to hearing from you!
