Method for manufacturing a glass fiber
AssigneeMatsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.
InventorsYasuo Mizuno, Masaki Ikeda, Akihiko Yoshida
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Abstract
A method for manufacturing a glass fiber having a polygonal cross section is provided. According to the method, a glass fiber having an orbicular cross section is manufactured by drawing molten glass supplied into a crucible heated at higher temperatures than a softening point of glass out of a nozzle having an orbicular cross section heated at lower temperatures than the heating temperature of the crucible and at higher temperatures than the softening point of glass. Then, the glass fiber is passed through a slit of a twin roller, having a predetermined shape, whereby glass fibers having a polygonal cross section are successively manufactured. The twin roller is heated at slightly higher temperatures than the softening point of the glass.
Claims9
A method for manufacturing a glass fiber, comprising the steps of:
- (a) pouring molten glass into a crucible having a supply port for molten glass at an upper part thereof, a nozzle having an orbicular cross section being provided at a lower part of the crucible;
- (b) heating the crucible at higher temperatures than the glass melting temperature so that molten glass to be supplied from the supply port is sufficiently mixed with molten glass stored in the crucible, maintaining the higher temperatures, heating the nozzle at lower temperatures than the heating temperature of the crucible and at slightly higher temperatures than the softening point of the molten glass so that the molten glass has a predetermined viscosity, and drawing the molten glass out of the nozzle to mold a glass fiber having an orbicular cross section;
- and
- (c) making the glass fiber drawn out of the nozzle pass through a slit having a predetermined shape specified by a pair of half metal molds which is preheated at lower temperatures than the heating temperature of the nozzle and at slightly higher temperatures than the softening point of the glass, wherein the diameter of the nozzle is ten times or less than the intended thickness of the final glass fiber.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.