ENGEL and Glassomer are to jointly develop new applications for glass injection moulding.
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ENGEL is providing an injection moulding machine to Glassomer for the joint development work and for customer orders.
Founded in 2018 as a start-up, Glassomer GmbH – headquartered in Freiburg, Germany, specialises in the manufacture of injection moulding-capable quartz glass and the production of premium glass parts. Clemens Kastner, Product Manager Technologies at ENGEL said: "The technology offers huge potential, not least for the optical, medical technology, solar, chemical and automotive sectors. Our goal is to tap this potential."
The material, developed and patented by Glassomer, is fed to the injection moulding machine as pellets, just like in conventional injection moulding. It is a plastic-glass blend that can be injection moulded at temperatures of 130 °C and with a cycle time of less than 20 seconds. The plastic is then removed by debinding following injection moulding.
Moulding glass typically requires very high temperatures and toxic chemicals. Injection moulding production is a significantly more energy-efficient, cost effective and sustainable alternative to this. According to Engel, another motivation for processing glass by injection moulding is greater design flexibility. In injection moulding, virtually arbitrary shapes can be produced in a very short time.
The first sample inspections for series production applications are already taking place on Glassomer's new production floors in Freiburg.
Engel claims that to be able to meet the strictest precision requirements, and also those in the field of microtechnology, the company has provided an all-electric e-motion 50 TL injection moulding machine to Glassomer along with an integrated viper linear robot in cleanroom design.
Kastner added: "In optics, the light sources being produced are becoming smaller all the time; this, in turn, means higher and higher energy densities, which necessitate the production of fine lens structures in glass with high chemical and thermal stability," Kastner,