Glass Strength Enhancements

The process of thermal tempering involves raising the temperature of glass to its strain point before rapidly cooling it to ambient level in a controlled manner using regulated compressed air. This purposefully creates tension within the glass interior balanced with compression at the exterior, which effectively gives the glass a hardened surface. The resulting glass is 4-5 times stronger than untempered (or annealed) glass and is also more resistant to rapid heating/cooling differentials. Furthermore, if broken, the tempered glass will tend to break into small granular pieces or cubes, rather than larger shards which could cause severe injury, thereby making it a better option in public facing and industrial applications.

For some applications, such as the food processing industry, where it may be undesirable or even illegal to install glass touch sensors, or designs where weight saving is critical, we can produce flexible film touch sensors (ZyFilm®) which customers can apply to the rear surface of suitable polycarbonate or acrylic screens. In such use cases, the customer must consider the benefit of the improved shatter resistance of plastics, versus their tendency to scratch more easily. Another solution is to use a glass touch sensor such as ZyPOS®, mount a thin disposable polycarbonate screen on top, and then replace this if/when it becomes too scratched. Our PCT™ and MPCT™ touch technologies are sensitive enough to detect touches through approximately 3mm of overlaying plastic, depending on the dielectric properties of the material, and how the touch sensor is integrated/set-up.