Tackling Distortion and Non-Uniformity in Tempered Glass Production

Tempered glass has gained immense popularity across various industries, particularly in the automotive and architectural sectors, owing to its superior stability and safety properties. The glass tempering process involves multiple stages, including cleaning, heating, quenching, and rapid cooling, to create a stronger and safer glass product. However, challenges such as non-uniform cooling and distortion in larger glass pieces during quenching have prompted the need for advanced solutions in the glass industry.

Real-Time Monitoring for Improved Uniformity:

Achieving uniform cooling and minimizing distortion in tempered glass requires precise and continuous monitoring of the glass surface temperature throughout the tempering process. Optris, a leading provider of infrared camera solutions, has introduced the groundbreaking Optris PI640i - Infrared camera, the smallest VGA infrared camera worldwide. With an optical resolution of 640x480 pixels, the camera delivers highly accurate real-time thermography pictures, making it an invaluable tool for temperature monitoring in glass production. The thermal camera provides invaluable data during the heating and cooling stages, ensuring enhanced uniformity and optimal quenching.

The Optris PI640i covers a wide temperature measurement range from -20°C to 600°C, enabling accurate monitoring of the glass surface during the heating and cooling stages. Moreover, the camera's spectral range of 8 – 14 μm ensures precise and reliable temperature data capture. To address challenges in quenching larger glass pieces, the system is equipped with a top-down configuration?and an additional CT G5L Pyrometer from underneath, allowing for automatic emissivity correction on standard and Low-E glasses. The optical pyrometer offers temperature measurement ranges from 100°C to 1200°C with a response time of 120 ms, ensuring precise temperature readings during the quenching process.

Key Features and Benefits:

The Optris glass inspection system boasts several salient features, including automatic hot and cold spot tracking, reducing downtime and maintenance costs, and higher optical resolution. These features enable operators to detect and address temperature variations promptly, ensuring uniform cooling and minimizing distortion, ultimately resulting in higher-quality tempered glass products.

Robust Software Package:

The Optris PIX Connect software, included with the system, enhances the functionality of the infrared camera. It offers a line scan camera function, enabling real-time analysis of temperature data and remote control of the camera. Users can customize measurement areas by setting minimum, maximum, or average temperature values, and even set up individual alarm levels. The thermal camera's separate emissivity settings for measurement areas allow monitoring of various material surfaces with a single camera, improving flexibility and accuracy in the tempering process.

By leveraging Optris' innovative infrared camera solution, glass manufacturers can significantly improve heating and cooling uniformity, minimize distortion, and produce tempered glass that meets stringent customer requirements and industry standards. The Optris glass inspection system offers a comprehensive and reliable solution for the glass industry, ensuring consistent and top-quality tempered glass products.