Glass manufacturing system and method for forming a high quality thin glass sheet

Abstract

A glass manufacturing system (100, 100′, 100″) and method are described herein for forming a high quality thin glass sheet (110). In one embodiment, the glass manufacturing system and method use at least one of a compensated rolling roll (108a), a temperature controlled environment (120) and edge rolls (122, 124) to form a high quality thin glass sheet that has a thickness less than about 2 mm and more preferably less than about 100 μm.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application claims the benefit of priority to European application no. 09 305 168.8 filed on Feb. 23, 2009.TECHNICAL FIELD[0002]The present invention relates in general to the glass manufacturing field and, in particular, to a glass manufacturing system and method for forming a high quality thin glass sheet which has a thickness less than about 2 mm and more preferably less than about 100 μm.BACKGROUND[0003]Today there is an increased need for very high quality glass sheets because of the development of flat display applications such as personal computer (PC) monitors, television (TV) monitors, personal digital assistants (PDAs) and other hand held devices, and perspectives for flat organic light emitting diode (OLED) displays and lighting technologies. In particular, there is an increased need today for very high quality glass sheets which are also flexible and have sufficiently small thicknesses (e.g., roughly below 150 μm thicknes...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present invention provides a glass manufacturing system and method that includes a delivery system, rolling roll pair, and temperature controlled environment. The temperature controlled environment creates a cross temperature gradient where the outer edges of the glass sheet are exposed to a hotter temperature than the central portion, which stretches the glass sheet to have a constant thickness. The method may also utilize compensated rolling roll pair and edge roll pair(s) to help manufacture the glass sheet. The technical effects of this invention include improved glass sheet quality, consistent thickness, and reduced defects.

Problems solved by technology

Some existing glass manufacturing systems and processes which use a fusion draw or a slot draw can produce glass sheets with such low thicknesses but they either have high production costs or do not yield sufficient surface quality.

For instance, existing glass manufacturing systems which incorporate a slot draw produce inferior quality glass sheets with small thicknesses and also have high production costs.

In contrast, the existing glass manufacturing systems which incorporate a fusion draw can produce very good quality glass sheets with small thicknesses but they have high production costs.

In addition, the existing glass manufacturing systems which incorporate the fusion draw and slot draw are limited to the production of glasses that do not devitrify easily.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of glasses that do not meet this viscosity limitation so they can not be used to make thin glass sheets when utilizing the fusion draw process or the slot draw process.

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