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Tile Cutters
Hand Cutters
For around $10 you can buy a pair of tile
nippers, which look a lot like a pair of
bent nosed pliars with a carbide cutting
edge. They are a great tool for "nipping"
corners or for cutting holes for pipes, etc.,
in ceramic tile. They will break off a small
chunk of tile with surprising ease, but are
poor at cutting a straight line.
Manual Tile Cutters
For cutting straight lines in ceramic tile,
you can use a hand operated cutting machine
that scores the ceramic tile glaze with a
tungsten carbide blade then breaks the tile
along the resultant line of weakness. A pretty
inexpensive tool (relative to a wet saw)
but expect some waste as tiles don't always
break where you want them to.
Wet Saws
The best tool, and if you are
working with
a hard material like porcelain
or marble,
the only tool to use is a wet
saw. A wet
saw is like a radial arm saw
in a small tub.
The piece to be cut is clamped
to a platform
on tracks and slid beneath a
motorized, diamond-edged
cutting wheel with tilt settings.
Water is
circulated from the tub to the
cutting area
to keep the saw blade and material
from overheating.
If you are concerned about water
splashing, try to get the largest tub you
can find because
the blade will throw water. Also,
be sure
to use ear plugs as the cutting
sound can
be very loud. |
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