Abstract: There are provided tube-shaped glass monolith fabricating apparatus and method using a sol-gel process. In the tube-shaped glass monolith fabricating method using a tube-shaped glass monolith fabricating apparatus which has an upper mold including cylindrical portions of different sizes, a lower mold including a first lower cylindrical portion inclined toward the center thereof by a predetermined degree and a second lower cylindrical portion having a vacuum releasing hole, a cylindrical central mold for forming a tube-shaped glass, and a rod-shaped rod, the lower mold, the central mold, and the rod are assembled and a sol is poured in the central mold. Then, an unmixable liquid is poured on the sol, and the upper mold is assembled to the central mold. The sol is gelled in the central mold, the upper mold is removed, a cap is opened to release vacuum, and the rod is removed.

Abstract: A device for manufacturing a spiral fluorescent tube is disclosed. The device includes a rod aerially supported in a first predetermined direction; a first clamp supporting a straight fluorescent tube in a second direction which is at right angles to the first predetermined direction; heating device for heating a part of the straight fluorescent tube, which is not facing the rod, to a glass softening temperature; two second clamps disposed in a direction parallel to the rod for clamping ends of the straight fluorescent tube; and device for winding the straight fluorescent tube around the rod by rotating the two second clamps in opposite directions to each other around an axis of the rod while shifting the two second clamps away from each other in a direction parallel to the first predetermined direction.

Abstract: In a device for shaping glass tubes (32), the shaping tools (3, 4), which are designed as shaping rollers, are mounted on a rotary table (2) that encloses the glass tube (32) and that rotates at a speed that is several times higher than the speed of rotation of the glass tube (32). The shaping tools (3,4) are moved in a perpendicular direction to the longitudinal axis (40) of the glass tube (32) in order to shape it. The relatively high speed of rotation of the rotary table (2) allows the advance of the shaping tools per rotation of the rotary table (2) and at the same time the forces that act on the softened part of the glass tube (32) to be kept small.

Abstract: A solid workpiece, e.g. a glass tube, is shaped by a focussed beam of visible light or light in an adjacent portion of the electromagnetic spectrum in a material removal, cutting or drilling operation and is heat-treated or remelted or shaped in a plastic state by heating that second beam which is less focussed or even divergent. The beams derive from a common source, a CO.sub.2 laser, and pass through a splitting deflecting system so that the beams can be directed simultaneously either parallel to one another or with an inclination to one another at the same or different regions of the workpiece which is held in a holder capable of both rotating the workpiece and translating same.

Abstract: A fluorescent tube which is used for bulb-type fluorescent lamps is spirally wound, so that the effective length of the tube is increased. While a fluorescent tube is kept vertical, it is rotated and heated evenly at the part to be wound to a glass softening temperature or above by a heating device. The rotation of the fluorescent tube is stopped, and the part which is not facing a rod are heated. Then, the tube is clamped from a horizontal direction by a pair of clamps, and is wound around the rod at least 2.5 times by rotating the clamp arms in opposite directions while the arms gradually shift away from each other.

Abstract: The present invention provides large, high-purity quartz glass plate with a high degree of smoothness and flatness, its manufacturing method and equipment. The invention is characterized by the procedure in which a quartz glass tube with an opening over a specific width, in the direction of the tube shaft, that is preferably band-shaped, is heated and softened in a band-shaped area over the entire width, in the direction of the tube shaft, progressing sequentially along the direction of tube circumference from a specific position on the glass tube. While softening and heating, the quartz glass tube is pulled in a line approximately tangential to the specific position to flatten the glass tube.

Abstract: The high-purity, opaque quartz glass containing 3.times.10.sup.6 -9.times.10.sup.6 of closed cells having an average size of 20-40 .mu.m per 1 cm.sup.3, a ratio of closed cells having sizes of 100 .mu.m or more to the whole of cells being 1% or less, thereby showing 5% or less of linear transmittance for near infrared rays (.lambda.=900 nm) at a thickness of 1 mm is produced by compacting amorphous silica powder having an average particle size of 0.5-10 .mu.m, in which each of impurities selected from Li, Na, K, Fe, Ti and Al is 1 ppm or less, if any, and sintering the resultant green body at 1730.degree.-1850.degree. C.

Abstract: Ultraviolet (UV) radiation in the UV-C and UV-B bands, which is particularly dangerous, is absorbed and filtered by quartz glass doped with between 0.065% and 3.25%, and preferably between 0.065% and 1.3%, by weight, of cerium metal, or cerium as such. Preferably, the cerium is added to quartz sand and/or rock crystal, in form of a fine-grained powder of up to 20 .mu.m grain size, in form of cerium aluminate (CeAlO.sub.3), present in up to about 5% by weight, and preferably up to about 2%, by weight, and melted together in a single step. The quartz glass so obtained is particularly suitable for a metal halide discharge lamp, e.g. as an outer envelope (1), or as the discharge vessel (27) itself, or for halogen incandescent lamps, to form the quartz-glass light bulb or an envelope therefor. A small quantity of titanium oxide, up to about 0.05%, may be added as a further doping agent to the melt to further improve the UV absorption in the B and C bands.

Abstract: A method for producing an elongated composite glass body by melting at least two starting materials of different material compositions, feeding the starting materials to a drawing die disposed at the bottom of an externally heated melting crucible, and continuously drawing the melts vertically out of the drawing die to form a composite body laminated transverse to the drawing direction. To provide an interface free from impurities between the starting materials in the composite body and to enable the path of the interface to be freely shaped, the starting materials are fed in particle form continuously to a single melting crucible and heaped therein to form a preformed body in which one starting material lies directly next to the other starting material forming an interface line therebetween that extends substantially vertically and parallel to the drawing direction.

Abstract: A method of forming a tapered aperture at the end of a capillary tube bore. A gaseous etchant such as a fluorine-containing compound flows through the bore and emanates from the first end of the tube. That tube end is heated to create a longitudinal temperature gradient. The gaseous etchant reacts with the tube and enlarges that portion of the bore at the first end. The resultant tapered aperture has a surface smoothness and shape that greatly facilitates the insertion of optical fibers during the fabrication of optical energy transfer devices.

Abstract: A softened section of length of a glass tube is expanded in a dimensionally accurate mold until it has assumed the dimensions of the mold, the mold being made of a material of lower thermal expansion than that of the glass, so that, after cooling, the calibrated section of tube can be released from the mold without any problems. A block of a .alpha.-o glass ceramic with a calibrated mold bore is preferably employed as the mold. It is possible for the first time to avoid a material-removing machining step, which causes damage to the glass surface, yet to be able to produce sections of the tube with a calibrated outside diameter of a dimensional accuracy which could previously be attained only by cylindrical grinding.

Abstract: A method for the continuous production of a tube or rod of vitreous fused silica. Silicon dioxide in particle form is heated in a crucible to the softening temperature and is withdrawn contiuously downward from a bottom outlet opening in which a shaping tool is disposed. In the annular space between the shaping tool and the bottom outlet opening the softened silicon dioxide is subjected to an electrical field. In the closed crucible, a hydrogen-containing atmosphere with a hydrogen content of at least 80% is sustained above the silicon dioxide and in the space underneath the crucible that adjoins the shaping region.

Abstract: An outer glass pipe for a solar heat collector pipe includes an outer glass pipe body formed of a straight glass pipe being open at both ends and a lid member provided therein with a small diameter opening. An exhaust pipe of a small diameter is attached to the lid member to form a bottom member. The bottom member is air-tightly fixed to one open end of the outer glass pipe body on its peripheral edge to close one of the open ends.

Abstract: Tubular body of fused quartz and quartz glass with a seamless transition from the fused-quartz zone to the quartz-glass zone. The body is manufactured continuously in a hollow rotating metal cylinder by disposing silica against the rotating mold and adding thereto, such as in an annular zone therein, rock crystal or synthetic silicon dioxide and fusing the rock crystal or synthetic silicon dioxide to the fused silica whereby no seam is formed.

Abstract: The disclosure is of apparatus including two pairs of metal gripping blocks held together by a spring and mounted adjacent to wedge blocks carrying wedges for opening each pair. An operating plate is provided which drives the apparatus to cause the wedge blocks to open the gripping blocks to permit a length of capillary tubing filled with mercury to be inserted between the pairs of gripping blocks. The apparatus is then driven to cause the tubing to pass through a flame positioned to melt the tubing at a desired location and to form two separate seal portions at this location which are gripped by the two gripping blocks; and, on the next cycle, when the gripping blocks are opened, the portion of the tubing which is the desired capsule is released from its pair of gripping blocks and fed to a suitable receiver.

Abstract: Disclosed is a ceramic structural material, which is particularly useful in combination with an assembly or matrix of integrally fused tubes forming a series of longitudinal parallel passageways. Also disclosed is a method for making such ceramic structural material from rods and frit that are thermally crystallizable into a glass-ceramic. One embodiment of the method involves bundling the rods into a desired configuration, with the frit interposed in the interstices between the rods, and heating the combined rod-frit bundle to sinter or fuse the rods and frit together in a heat treatment schedule that also nucleates and thermally crystallizes the fused rod-frit structure to the final ceramic product. A gas turbine regenerator comprising a combination of the ceramic structural material and a matrix is also disclosed along with the method of making same.