Robot speeds up glass development

Model by model, the electronics in a car are being moved closer to the engine block. This is why the materials used for the electronics must resist increasing heat – so the glass solder being used as glue must be continually optimised.

For the first time ever, a robot takes on the task of developing new types of glass and examining their characteristics. Researchers will introduce this robot at the ''Productronica'' trade fair to be held in Munich, Germany, from 15 - 18 November .
 
For laymen glas looks like glass – it might be a window, a drinking vessel, a lense for an automotive headlight. But there is much more in and to the transparent material: glass can consist of 50 to 60 different elements. Experts are constantly being asked to create glass with certain characteristics out of these elements, since new applications require new materials quite often.

Let's take the car as an example: the electronic components in a car's engine compartment are being brought ever closer to the engine and so must increasingly be resistant to heat and corrosive gasses. This also applies to the glue, a glass solder.

In the development of fuel cells, the demand for new types of glass is also great: the use of new metals requires that the glass solder also be adapted. In addition, over a period of approximately 100,000 hours, the glass must withstand thermal heat of 900 degrees Celsius without being damaged.
 
In order to develop glass with new characteristics, experts select about ten compounds from potential elements, mix them and then heat the powder. They heat it in a furnace until it is soft, then they pour it into a mould and let it cool slowly and in a controlled fashion, down to room temperature.

During that process small samples from the viscous glass are taken to test it: how viscous is it? How well does it wet metals? How does it crystallize out? To produce the glass samples by hand and to test them requires a lot of time: one employee needs approximately two weeks to process 16 samples.
 
Researchers of the Fraunhofer Institute for Silicate Research ISC in Würzburg have developed a unit that carries out all these steps automatically. "It needs only 24 hours to process 16 samples", says Dr. Martin Kilo, manager of the expert group for glass and high-temperature materials at the ISC.

"For this reason we are able to develop glass elements more cost-effectively than previously, by up to 50 per cent," adds, Kilo.