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Float Glass Manufacturing Plant

The float glass process involves floating molten glass on a bed of molten tin, which allows for precise control of the glass thickness and produces sheets with an extremely flat surface. Over 90% of the world's flat glass production now uses this float glass method. The key steps are: (1) raw materials are melted at high temperatures, (2) the molten glass is floated on the tin bath to harden evenly, and (3) the glass is annealed and cooled before cutting. This process has significantly reduced glass production costs and float glass is now commonly used in windows, solar panels, displays, and automotive applications due to its high optical quality and structural flexibility.

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435 views4 pages

Float Glass Manufacturing Plant

The float glass process involves floating molten glass on a bed of molten tin, which allows for precise control of the glass thickness and produces sheets with an extremely flat surface. Over 90% of the world's flat glass production now uses this float glass method. The key steps are: (1) raw materials are melted at high temperatures, (2) the molten glass is floated on the tin bath to harden evenly, and (3) the glass is annealed and cooled before cutting. This process has significantly reduced glass production costs and float glass is now commonly used in windows, solar panels, displays, and automotive applications due to its high optical quality and structural flexibility.

Uploaded by

Ogre Magi
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Guico, Cyrus Christian

Javier, Philippe Fausto


Jocson, Angelo Gabriel
Julian, Harold
Lago, Neil Ian
5ME-D

Float Glass Manufacturing Plant


Abstract:
History of float glass
In the earlier days, window glass was made by blowing glass bottles or large glass
disks. The bottles were cut into pieces, flattened together and then window panes were
cut from the large surface. Most glass for windows up to the early 19th century was
made from rounds, while during the 19th century it was done using the bottle method.
Alastair Pilkington has been identified by many sources as the inventor of the float glass
process, even though it was first patented in 1848 by Henry Bessemer, an English
engineer. Before the development of float glass, larger sheets of plate glass were made
by casting a large puddle of glass on an iron surface, and then grinding and polishing
both sides for smoothness and clarity – a very expensive process.
Float glass
Float glass is sheet glass made by floating molten glass on a bed of molten tin. This
method gives the glass uniform thickness and a very flat surface. Float glass is more
commonly known as window glass. Because it is inexpensive and sometimes free, it is
often used in the glass fusing process. The molten glass spreads onto the surface of the
metal and produces a high quality, consistent level sheet of glass that is later heat
polished. The glass has no wave or distortion and is now the standard method for
glass production; over 90% of the world production of flat glass is float glass. Float glass
is a specialized type of glass with an extremely smooth and uniform structure, with
superb optical properties. For this reason, it is used in a wide variety of different
applications including windows, solar panels, LCD displays, and automotive
windscreens. Float gas is produced via the float glass process, which involves floating
the molten glass on a bed of molten metal and then allowing the glass to set. The
method means large panes can be produced easily, and thickness can also be
controlled. The float glass process has significantly reduced the cost of producing glass
that is flat and smooth. Modern glass is produced from several different materials
including sand, dolomite, limestone, carbonate, sodium sulfate and also scrap glass. All
of these materials are heated to extreme temperatures (2,800 °F) to form molten glass.
This glassy liquid is then poured onto a ‘tin bath’ consisting of molten tin, which acts as
a level template for the glass to distribute over and then harden. As the glass hardens
the tin template ensures the glass has flat top and bottom surfaces. Once it has cooled
and completely solidified the monolithic sheet of glass can be cut into smaller sections.
The molten tin is prone to oxidizing – this is prevented by keeping the tin bath in an
atmosphere of 90% hydrogen and 10% nitrogen. Today, float glass is the most widely
used form of glass in consumer products. Due to both its high quality with no additional
polishing required and its structural flexibility during production, it can easily be shaped
and bent into a variety of forms while in a heated, syrupy state. This makes it ideal for a
variety of applications such as

 Automobile glass (e.g. windshields, windows, mirrors)


 Mirrors
 Furniture (e.g. in tables and shelves)
 Insulated glass
 Windows and doors
Most forms of specialized glass such as toughened glass, frosted glass, laminated
safety glass and soundproof glass consist of standard float glass that has been further
processed.
Float Glass Manufacturing Process

The phrase “to float” means “to be buoyant”. And this is basically the principle on which
the float glass manufacturing process is based. In the float glass process, molten
glass is fed onto a float bath of molten tin. This tin bath is 4-8 meters wide and up to 60
meters long. To prevent the tin surface from oxidizing with the atmospheric oxygen, the
tin bath is placed under a protective gas atmosphere. This atmosphere must be
carefully controlled since its composition is instrumental for the properties of the contact
surface between the glass and the tin which, in turn, influence the thickness of the glass
sheet.
The glass floats like an endless ribbon on the tin. At the entrance where the glass first
makes contact with the tin surface, the temperature of the liquid metal is about 600oC.
Tin is the only metal that remains in a liquid state at 600oC.
Immediately after the exit from the float chamber, special rollers take up the glass and
feed it into the annealing lehr from which it exits at about 200oC. After cooling to room
temperature on an open roller track, it is cut, packed, and stored either for shipment or
for further processing into products such as safety glass, reflective glass, self-cleaning
glass, mirrors or double glazed or multi-glazed units.
Float glass can be made in thickness between 1.5 to 20mm. There are two techniques
to accomplish this. To produce thin float glass, rollers control the width and speed of the
glass ribbon. For thick float glass, the glass floats against graphite barriers, so that the
ribbon flows out thicker. Thus the desired widths and thicknesses can be achieved.
While each glass plant is different from the other, the float glass production process can
be divided into five universal steps:

1. Batching of raw materials:

The main components, namely, soda lime glass, silica sand (73%), calcium oxide (9%),
soda (13%) and magnesium (4%), are weighed and mixed into batches to which
recycled glass (cullet) is added. The use of ‘cullet’ reduces the consumption of natural
gas. The materials are tested and stored for later mixing under computerised control.
2. Melting of raw materials in the furnace:

The batched raw materials pass from a mixing silo to a five-chambered furnace where
they become molten at a temperature of approximately 1500°C.

3. Drawing the molten glass onto the tin bath:

The molten glass is “floated” onto a bath of molten tin at a temperature of about 1000°C.
It forms a ribbon with a working width of 3210mm which is normally between 3 and
25mm thick. The glass which is highly viscous and the tin which is very fluid do not mix
and the contact surface between these two materials is perfectly flat.

4. Cooling of the molten glass in the annealing lehr:

On leaving the bath of molten tin, the glass – now at a temperature of 600°C – has
cooled down sufficiently to pass to an annealing chamber called a lehr. The glass is
now hard enough to pass over rollers and is annealed, which modifies the internal
stresses enabling it to be cut and worked in a predictable way and ensuring flatness of
the glass. As both surfaces are fire finished, they need no grinding or polishing.

5. Quality checks, automatic cutting, and storage:

After cooling, the glass undergoes rigorous quality checks and is washed. It is then cut
into sheets of sizes of up to 6000mm x 3210mm which are in turn stacked, stored and
ready for transport.
Applications

1. Float glass is used for glazing wherever full transparency is required in buildings.
2. It is used as a base material for safety glass, reflective glass and self-cleaning
glass, among others.

It can be used in precision mechanics, especially where extreme surface flatness is


required. E.g., for visual displays.

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