Today’s objectives-glass and clay

products and processing

What are standard glass additives, and how do they effect structure
and properties?
How do specific volume and viscosity vary with temperature?
How are glass sheets and containers prepared?
Why are annealing and tempering important for glass?
What are the steps in processing clays?
What is slip, and what is hydroplasticity?
Describe casting
Describe extruding
Describe drying
Describe firing
Primary glass resource: Corning
Museum of Glass (www.cmog.org)
 History of Glass
The history of the origin of glass can be categorized by
periods according to the methods of the manufacturing
process as follows:
• The First Period: 1700 BC through 100 AD
– Primitive method of making glass using molds.
• The Second Period: 100 AD through 400-500 AD
– Glassblowing technique discovered, and glass manufacture
becomes a more practical process.
• The Third Period: 4-500 AD ~ 1200 AD
– Middle Ages, characterized by Byzantine glass.
• The Fourth Period: 1200 AD ~ 1900 AD
– Venetian glass, foundation for modern glass making is set.
• The Fifth Period: 1900 AD ~ present
– Glass objects used as everyday goods; large scale manufacturing.
 Mesopotamian glass
As early as 3,300 years ago, secret "instructions" for furnace building
and glassmaking in Mesopotamia were written on clay tablets in a
cuneiform script. Typical instructions include:
• When you set up the foundation of a good furnace to make glass,
first search in a favorable month for a day of good omen…
• You regularly perform libation offerings (drink of honey and
liquid butter honoring a deity).
• On the day when you plan to make (glass), you make a sheep
sacrifice.
• Place juniper incense on the incense burner
• Pour out a libation; only then can you make the fire in the hearth
of the furnace and place the glass in the furnace.
• The wood that you burn in the hearth of the furnace should be
thick, peeled poplar wood, which has no knots, bound together
with leather straps, cut in the month of the Abu (Jul. or Aug.).
• If you want to produce zagindurû-colored (blue) glass, you finely
grind separately:
– 10 minas (about one pound) of immanakku-stone (quartz)
– 15 minas of naga-plant ashes
– 1 2/3 minas of 'white plant.'
– Mix these together.
– Place the mixture into a cold furnace that has four openings,
– As soon as the mixture glows yellow, you pour it on a kiln fired brick
and this is called zukû-glass....
 Glasses and glass ceramics
• Now commonly applied for:
– Containers
– Windows
– Decoration
– Lenses
– Fiberglass (insulation)
– Fiberoptics
– Road signs
– Composites

• Chemically, glass is comprised of noncrystalline silica

plus additives:
– CaO
– Na2O
– K2O
– Al2O3
 GLASS STRUCTURE

• Basic Unit: • Glass is amorphous

4- • Amorphous structure
Si0 4 tetrahedron occurs by adding impurities
Si4+ (Na+,Mg2+,Ca2+, Al3+)
O2-
• Impurities:
interfere with formation of
crystalline structure.

• Quartz is crystalline
SiO2:

(soda glass)
Adapted from Fig. 12.11,
Callister, 6e.
 Glass
• Glass composition determines properties
• noncrystalline

glass SiO2 Na2O CaO Al2O3 B2O3 other

Fused silica >99.5%

Pyrex (borosilicate) 81 3.5 2.5 13

Container (soda-lime) 74 16 5 1 4 MgO

fiberglass 55 16 15 10 4 MgO

Thermal expansion coefficient of pyrex is

1/3 that of standard silica glass.
 GLASS PROPERTIES

• Specific volume (1/r) vs Temperature (T):

• Crystalline materials:
--crystallize at melting temp, Tm
--have abrupt change in spec. vol. at
Tm

• Glasses:
--do not crystallize
--spec. vol. varies smoothly with T
--Glass transition temp, Tg

Adapted from Fig. 13.5, Callister, 6e.

 Amorphous materials (glasses)
• For non-crystalline ceramics, deformation occurs by
viscous flow.
– The deformation rate is proportional to the applied stress.

 F A
 
dv dy dv dy
shear stress

velocity change with dis tan ce

• Common units are N*s/m2 = Pa*s (or Poisies=0.1Pa*s)

– Viscosity unit, giving the inverse of how well the material flows.
• Water at 25 °C is 0.001 Pa*s.
• Motor oil (SAE10W…) is 0.132 at 25 °C.
• Glass is 1014 Pa*s = 1015 Poisies (a crystal is infinite).
GLASS VISCOSITY VS T AND IMPURITIES
• Viscosity:
--relates shear stress &
dv

velocity gradient: dy
--has units of (Pa-s)

• Viscosity decreases with T

- (sample flows easier)
• Impurities lower Tdeform

Adapted from Fig. 13.6, Callister, 6e.

Tmelt (Fig. 13.6 is from E.B. Shand, Engineering
Glass, Modern Materials, Vol. 6,
Academic Press, New York, 1968, p. 262.)
 Glass plates
• Originally, glass plates made one at a time using the
Pittsburgh process (vertically draw a continuous sheet of
glass of a consistent width from the tank).
• Pilkington discovered how to make glass continuously.
 Float Glass, Pilkington, 1950.
• Originally able to make only 6mm thick glass, now made as
thin as 0.4mm and as thick as 25mm.
• There are around 260 float plants worldwide with a
combined output of about 800,000 tonnes of glass a week.
• A float plant, which operates non-stop for between 11-15
years, makes around 6000 kilometres of glass a year.

http://www.pilkington.com/pilkington/corporate/english/education/float+process/default.htm
 The Floating part
• Molten glass, at approximately 1000ºC, is poured
continuously from a furnace onto a shallow bath of molten
tin.
• It floats on the tin, spreads out and forms a level surface.
• Thickness is controlled by the speed at which solidifying
glass ribbon is drawn off from the bath.
• After annealing (controlled cooling) the glass emerges as a
'fire' polished product with virtually parallel surfaces.
 HEAT TREATING GLASS
• Annealing:
--removes internal stress caused by uneven cooling.
• Tempering:
Chemical
--puts surface of glass part into compression
tempering is
--suppresses growth of cracks from surface scratches. also possible.
--sequence:
before cooling surface cooling further cooled
cooler compression
hot hot tension
cooler compression
 Fabricating Glass in other shapes

GLASS
FORMING
• Pressing:
Pressing
Gob
operation

Parison
mold

• Blowing:

Adapted from Fig. 13.7, Callister, 6e. (Fig. 13.7 is adapted from C.J. Phillips,
Glass: The Miracle Maker, Pittman Publishing Ltd., London.)
 ‘Crizzling’
• Prolongued exposure to chemical attack
can lead to local microcracks, ‘Crizzling.’
• Eventually leads to failure.
 Ceramic History
• In 221 BC during the Qing Dynasty, Qin Shi Huang was the
Emperor in reign. The Terra Cotta Army was built as a way
of creating an illusion of strength and manpower.
• Discovered in 1974.

Most soldiers standing in

formation, many with their
horses ready for battle.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terracotta_Army
7000 ‘soldiers’ thus far discovered