How to craft a bottleneck slide!
First off, this is Dangerous because your dealing with Glass. I am not promoting this idea. You can severely injure yourself. You can always go the easy route and purchase a bottleneck. That being said, there are several methods to go about crafting your own slide. Always wear eyeprotection, face mask and gloves!!!
The Traditional method
With the traditional method you will need a bottlecutter, a bottle, and a large nail. I like to choose bottles with necks that do not flare. I also like them to be straight with minimal taper. Fine wine bottles work great for slides however, you can use almost any neck you wish.
First you will need to score the bottle with the bottle cutter around the end of the neck. Try to get the score as straight as possible, this takes practice. There are some people who like to add a kerosene method to this as well, but i do not recomend this idea. I believe applying heat to the neck ruins the integrity of the glass and it is very dangerous.
Next the nail comes into play. Tap the bottle from the inside near the scribed area with the nail head until the neck breaks off. Hopefully you will get a good straight break. Again be very careful as the end of the neck and bottle will be razor sharp.
Finally you will need to shape, grind and polish your neck. You can shape and grind your neck with any grinder, or scrape it on a rough conctrete porch or sidewalk. However again this will add heat to the neck so be very careful and slow in the proceess. Heat can cause stress cracks in your neck as well as ruining integrity. You can finish this process with sandpaper.
Voila, a bottleneck slide that sounds better than any manufactured music store tube. You can repeat this process on the other end of the neck to give you a double cut slide, or you can keep it in the authentic style.
Angle grinder method
You can always substitute the glass cutter and use an angle grinder or rotary cutoff tool. I would suggest using wet tools if possible to minimize heat, and to minimize hot glass shards flying at you.
My method
I cut my necks using a wet bandsaw, this gives me a straight clean cut with minimal chipping. Next i use a wet grinder to shape and grind off any excess glass protrusions. Then a wet flat lapidary grinder is used in 3 grit stages to grind and smooth the glass ends. A wet rotary tool is used to grind the inside corner of the bottleneck. Then wet sandpaper is applied in 4 grits. Finally the neck is buffed and polished to finish.
Slide on with your new bottleneck!!!
If you would like to purchase a bottleneck contact me or visit my store.
How to Craft a Bottleneck Slide
