How are glass cups made?

When you buy a good-looking glass, you may wonder how a glass is made? What are its raw materials? How many steps does it take to make a glass cup? Today, I will answer your questions and briefly introduce the materials and steps required to make a glass.

First of all, the raw materials needed to make glass are mainly quartz sand, soda ash and limestone.

Quartz sand comes from quartz stone, which is a natural mineral. After crushing and washing, it is processed into sand as fine as the beach and then used by glass manufacturers.

This is the limestones, it needs to be polished to the following kinds of silver sand.

Soda ash is used to eliminate air bubbles in the molten glass when melting glass. Soda ash is one of the commonly used fining agents, and its dosage is about 1% of the glass melt.

In addition, there are some trace materials that determine the quality of the glass. The production process of each brand and factory is different, and the trace materials used will also be different.

After all the raw materials are ready, the next step is to start the mechanical operation.

(1) Mixing and feeding

All raw materials are mixed and evenly fed according to the corresponding proportion, and then sent to the kiln through the conveyor belt.

(2) Melt

The raw material is melted at high temperature in a kiln at approximately 2300°F (1260°C).

(3) Cut material

The melted high-temperature glass liquid is transported to the forming machine through the forehearth, and then transported to the mold through the cutting material.

(4) Extrusion molding

The high-temperature glass liquid after cutting is formed into a preliminary shape after the cooperation of the forming machine and the mold, and then it is processed by hot blasting or cold cutting.

(5) Annealing

The extruded glass is passed through a large and long iron box, and the temperature inside is gradually lowered to relieve the stress of the glass. This step is very important because the glass is always at a high temperature during processing. If this treatment is not carried out, the glass is very easy to explode at room temperature or break during use.

(6) Inspection

The finished glass is completed after passing the manual inspection.

(7) Packing

The last step is for workers to pack into boxes.

And just like that, a glass was born. The above are the necessary steps for making ordinary glasses by machine. For some artificial glasses, such as special-shaped glasses or glass products, these cannot be made by machines and can only be made manually. Not the same as the steps above. Generally, an experienced master manually picks the material, then blows out the prototype with the mouth, and then pulls out the glass to be made with the clamps by hand.

And if the glass cups need to be do post-processing, ,like spray colors, ion plating or with decals. The glass cups will be collected first, then arrange to do  the post-processing, then will be pack into box.