MANUFACTURING PROCESSES
Department of Mechanical Engineering
HITEC University, Taxila Cantt
Glass Working
• Commercially manufactured in an
almost unlimited variety of shapes
• It is one of the three basic types of
ceramics
• For glass working the principal
starting material is silica
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Steps in Glass Manufacturing
Typical glass working process consist of three
steps
1. Preparation of raw materials and melting
2. Shaping
3. Heat treatment
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Types of Glass Melting furnaces
• Glass melting furnaces can be divided into
– Pot furnaces:
• Ceramic pots of limited capacity in which melting occurs by
heating the walls of the pot
– Day tanks:
• Large capacity vessels for batch production in which heating
is done by burning fuel
– Continuous tank furnaces:
• Long tank furnaces in which raw materials are fed in one end
and melted as they move to the other end
– Electric furnaces:
• Use of electricity for melting a wide range of production
rates
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Shaping processes in glass working
• Three categories of shaping
processes
–Discrete processes for piece ware
–Continuous processes for making flat
glass and tubing
–Fiber making processes to produce
glass fiber
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Shaping of Piece Ware
• Spinning
– Similar to centrifugal casting
– Produces funnel shaped
components
– A gob of molten glass is
dropped into a conical mold
– The mold is rotated and the
centrifugal force cause the
glass to flow and spread itself
on the mold surface
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Spinning of Glass
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Shaping of Piece Ware
• Pressing:
– Vastly used for mass production of dishes, bake
ware, headlight lenses, etc.
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Pressing of Glass
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Shaping of Piece Ware
• Blowing (the press and blow)
– as the name indicate a pressing
operation is followed by a blowing
operation
–A split mould is used in the blowing
operation for part removal
–Suited for production of wide mouth
containers
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Press and Blow
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Shaping of Piece Ware
• Blowing(blow and blow)
–Is used to produce smaller
mouthed bottles
–Two blowing operations are used
–Reheating may be required
between two blowing steps
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Blow and Blow
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Blow and Blow
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Glass Bottles (Video-1)
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Glass Bottles (Video-2)
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Shaping of Flat and Tubular Glass
• Rolling of Flat Plate:
– Flat plate glass can be produced by rolling
– Roller separation determines the thickness
of the glass
– Usually glass produced is send for heat
treatment
– Polishing is usually required for
smoothness
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Rolling of Flat Plates
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Shaping of Flat Glass
• Float Process:
–Developed in 1950
–Has the advantage that no further
surface finishing operation is required
–A molten tin bath is used to achieve
uniform thickness , smoothness and
finish
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Float Process
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Float Process
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Glass Sheets (Video-1)
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Glass Sheets (Video-2)
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Drawing of Tubular Glass
• Process know as the Danner process
• Rotating glass flows around a hollow
mandrel
• Air flows inside the mandrel
• Rollers are used to support the formed
tube
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Tubular Glass
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Danner Process
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Formation of Glass Fibers
• Fibers of up to 0.0025mm can be produced
• Strands of molted glass are drawn through
small orifices
• Individual fibers are collected into a strand
over a spool
• The fibers are coated with chemicals to
lubricate and protect them
• Drawing speeds in the excess of 50m/sec are
attainable
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Glass Fibers
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Heat Treatment (Anealing)
• Glass products generally have undesirable
internal stresses
• Annealing is done to release glass of these stress
• It is performed by heating glass to a certain
temperature , maintaining it at that temperature
for some time and then slowly cooling it to room
temperature
• Annealing temperature is around 5000 C
• Annealing time varies with the square of glass
thickness
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