Patents Examined by Lisa Herring
  • Patent number: 8769988
    Abstract: Provided is a method for manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible and a manufacturing apparatus for the same, which can reduce the amount of bubbles and impurities of a crucible inner surface and enhance a crystallization yield of silicon single crystal. A method for manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible of the invention includes a silica powder supplying process of supplying silica powder in a rotating mold to form a silica powder layer; an arc fusing process of fusing the silica powder layer by arc discharge generated by carbon electrodes; and a fire polishing process of throwing an arc flame toward a target surface of the silica powder layer for surface removal, wherein, in the fire polishing process, the distances from the tips of the carbon electrodes to the target surface is set to be equal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2011
    Date of Patent: July 8, 2014
    Assignee: Japan Super Quartz Corporation
    Inventors: Toshiaki Sudo, Hiroshi Kishi, Kouta Hasebe
  • Patent number: 8763430
    Abstract: [Object] In manufacturing a GRIN lens by a sol-gel method, an operation for preparing a wet gel is facilitated and cracking in a base material during sintering and foaming during drawing are prevented. [Solution] The object is achieved by obtaining a GRIN lens by producing a wet gel from an alcohol solution containing a silicon alkoxide, a dopant alkoxide, and a boron alkoxide as the main ingredients, leaching the same, drying the same to form a dry gel, and sintering and drawing the same.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 30, 2008
    Date of Patent: July 1, 2014
    Assignee: Toyo Seikan Group Holdings, Ltd.
    Inventors: Tomomi Ichinose, Toru Achiwa
  • Patent number: 8746013
    Abstract: The invention relates to a burner module having a body that is either sintered or photo-cured, and to methods of making such a burner module. The body (110) of the burner (100) is formed from one of a sintered metal, a sintered alloy, a laminated glass ceramic, and a photo-cured polymer. 1 Sintering and photo-curing may be accomplished by irradiating the body with localized heating using a focused energy source, such as a laser. The burner module is resistant to thermal shock and provides a distributed, even stream of a precursor or precursors to be reacted in a flame of the burner module to form soot, which is to deposited on a receptor surface, and may be used for vapor and liquid precursor delivery systems. A soot deposition system having an array of such burner modules and methods of making a fused silica article by depositing soot using the burner modules are also described.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 25, 2008
    Date of Patent: June 10, 2014
    Assignee: Corning Incorporated
    Inventors: Muluwork Geremew, Daniel Warren Hawtof, Richard Curwood Peterson, Amy Lu Rovelstad, Christopher Clark Thompson
  • Patent number: 8726692
    Abstract: The present invention provides a method of manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible by heating and fusing a silica powder layer in a rotating mold by arc discharge generated by carbon electrodes comprising: a preparation process for determining optimal temperatures during heating and fusing the silica powder layer for one or more selected from the group consisting of the silica powder layer, fume generated during arc fusing, and arc flame generated in the arc discharge; a temperature measuring process for measuring actual temperatures during heating and fusing for one or more selected from the group where the optimal temperatures are determined; and a temperature controlling process for controlling the actual temperatures for one or more selected from the group where the actual temperatures are measured so that the actual temperatures match the optimal temperatures.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 27, 2011
    Date of Patent: May 20, 2014
    Assignee: Japan Super Quartz Corporation
    Inventors: Toshiaki Sudo, Eriko Suzuki
  • Patent number: 8726698
    Abstract: The present invention is generally directed to a method of making chalcogenide glasses including holding the melt in a vertical furnace to promote homogenization and mixing; slow cooling the melt at less than 10° C. per minute; and sequentially quenching the melt from the top down in a controlled manner. Additionally, the present invention provides for the materials produced by such method. The present invention is also directed to a process for removing oxygen and hydrogen impurities from chalcogenide glass components using dynamic distillation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 29, 2012
    Date of Patent: May 20, 2014
    Assignee: The United States of America, as represented by the Secretary of the Navy
    Inventors: Vinh Q Nguyen, Jasbinder S Sanghera, Shyam S Bayya, Geoff Chin, Ishwar D Aggarwal
  • Patent number: 8720229
    Abstract: A vacuum degassing apparatus having a throughput of at least 200 tons/day without causing problems such as a stagnation of molten glass flow in the molten glass flow path, an increment of flow rate of the molten glass flow in a local area, an excessive increment of pressure loss of the molten glass flow. A vacuum degassing apparatus comprises a vacuum degassing vessel, and an uprising pipe and a downfalling pipe which are connected with the vacuum degassing vessel, wherein the vacuum degassing vessel includes a wide portion for providing a molten glass flow path, and in the wide portion, the proportion W1/L1 of the breadth of molten glass flow path W1 to the length of molten glass flow path L1 is at least 0.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 1, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 13, 2014
    Assignee: Asahi Glass Company, Limited
    Inventors: Rei Kitamura, Hironobu Yamamichi, Hiroaki Hamamoto, Hajime Itoh, Housaku Yonetsu
  • Patent number: 8713969
    Abstract: The disclosure describes a method by which the Tzc of a silica-titania glass article, for example, a EUVL mirror substrate, can be tuned to within a specification range by means of a selected final anneal that shifts Tzc of the article or substrate to the desired Tzc value. In addition, since different mirrors in a set can be specified at different values of Tzc, this process can be on used glass samples or pieces from a single glass boule to make parts with different Tzc values, thus reducing the number of separate boules required to fill an order.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 26, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 6, 2014
    Assignee: Corning Incorporated
    Inventors: Carlos Duran, Kenneth Edward Hrdina
  • Patent number: 8707738
    Abstract: A glass-melting furnace, which suppresses the effect of exhaust gas on molten glass quality, a process for producing molten glass, and a process and apparatus for producing glass products. The glass-melting furnace containing: a raw glass material particle feed portion disposed downwardly at a furnace wall portion in an upper portion of the glass-melting furnace; a heating unit provided under the feed portion, which forms a gas phase portion for converting raw glass material particles into liquid glass particles; a flue inlet disposed on the upstream side of the gas phase portion in a flow direction of the molten glass liquid; a furnace-bottom portion, which accumulates the liquid glass particles that produce the molten glass liquid; and a discharge portion, which discharges the molten glass liquid.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 15, 2012
    Date of Patent: April 29, 2014
    Assignee: Asahi Glass Company, Limited
    Inventors: Osamu Sakamoto, Chikao Tanaka, Seiji Miyazaki, Satoru Ohkawa
  • Patent number: 8701447
    Abstract: A method of manufacturing an optical fiber base material includes: forming a porous glass base material by depositing glass particles; providing a vessel which employs a composite tube, the composite tube including a portion formed by jacketing a first quartz glass containing aluminum equal to or less than 0.01 ppm with a second quartz glass containing aluminum equal to or more than 15 ppm; introducing dehydration reaction gas and inert gas into the vessel; heating the jacketed portion in the vessel which contains the dehydration reaction gas and the inert gas; and inserting the porous glass base material into the heated vessel to dehydrate and sinter the porous glass base material.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 22, 2008
    Date of Patent: April 22, 2014
    Assignee: Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Dai Inoue, Hiroyuki Koide, Takaaki Nagao
  • Patent number: 8695380
    Abstract: The present invention provides a quartz glass burner that can enhance the heating power of flame working without unnecessarily increasing the flow of combustion gas and improve the deposition efficiency on depositing glass particles onto a porous glass preform. The quartz glass burner has a large diameter outer tube, and a plurality of small diameter inner tubes enclosed in the outer tube, and a tip of the outer tube has a port defining member defining the outer shape of a combustion gas ejecting port that ejects combustion gas, and the port defining member protrudes from the inner circumference of the outer tube towards the center axis so as to block the outermost area including areas between the outer circumferences of a plurality of inner tubes forming the inner tube row and the inner circumference of the outer tube of the combustion gas flow path.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 19, 2011
    Date of Patent: April 15, 2014
    Assignee: Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Makoto Yoshida
  • Patent number: 8689584
    Abstract: The present invention provides a method of manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible including: a silica powder supplying process of supplying a material silica powder into a mold for molding a vitreous silica crucible, to form a silica powder layer, and an arc fusing process of arc fusing the silica powder layer by arc discharge generated by carbon electrodes, wherein the arc fusing process includes processes of measuring temperatures at measuring points provided on different heights of an inner surface of the silica powder layer while rotating the mold, and controlling the arc discharge to enable detection, at each measuring point, of a local maximum point which appears first in the arc fusing process.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 27, 2011
    Date of Patent: April 8, 2014
    Assignee: Japan Super Quartz Corporation
    Inventors: Toshiaki Sudo, Eriko Suzuki
  • Patent number: 8677784
    Abstract: A gravity bending mold for bending glass sheets is disclosed. The gravity bending mold comprises an intermediate mold having an intermediate movable mold section and a final mold having a final movable mold section. Each movable mold section is movable between an operable position and an inoperable position respectively. The intermediate and final movable mold sections are adapted successively to engage a glass sheet during a gravity bending operation. There is a mechanical connection between the intermediate and final movable mold sections, the mechanical connection being selectively disposable in a first configuration, at which the intermediate and final movable mold sections are in the operable and inoperable positions respectively, and in a second configuration, at which the final and intermediate movable mold sections are in the operable position and inoperable positions respectively.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 8, 2008
    Date of Patent: March 25, 2014
    Assignee: Pilkington Group Limited
    Inventors: Ian Nicholas Tetlow, Ian Michael Mackley, Colin Michael Bennett
  • Patent number: 8671716
    Abstract: There is provided a method of manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible having non-bubbles on the inner surface without necessitating new apparatuses for grinding and polishing and without damaging the productivity. According to the present invention, there is provided a method of manufacturing a vitreous silica crucible including the processes of: gathering a vitreous silica layer containing residual bubbles existing in a near-surface region of the transparent layer of the vitreous silica crucible by controlling the number of rotations applied to the vitreous silica crucible in a state that an inner surface side of the vitreous silica crucible is fused by arc heating; and moving a portion of a non-bubble layer in the surface of the transparent layer exposed by movement of the residual bubble-containing layer to cover a region in which bubbles have gathered with the non-bubble layer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2011
    Date of Patent: March 18, 2014
    Assignee: Japan Super Quartz Corporation
    Inventors: Toshiaki Sudo, Takuma Yoshioka
  • Patent number: 8667816
    Abstract: The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing a primary preform for optical fibers, using an internal vapor deposition process, wherein a gas flow of doped undoped glass-forming gases is supplied to the interior of a hollow substrate tube having a supply side and a discharge side via the supply side thereof, wherein deposition of glass layers on the interior of the substrate tube is effected as a result of the presence of a reaction zone.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 1, 2011
    Date of Patent: March 11, 2014
    Assignee: Draka Comteq B.V.
    Inventors: Igor Milicevic, Mattheus Jacobus Nicolaas Van Stralen, Eugen Aldea
  • Patent number: 8661856
    Abstract: In an optical fiber manufacturing method, the cooling device and the coating device are connected in an airtight manner and by preventing a cooling gas, flowing inside the cooling device, from flowing into the coating device by a meniscus of resin inside of the coating device, a flow of the cooling gas inside the cooling device is discharged to an outside of an upper end of the cooling device as an upward stream; helium gas as the cooling gas flows into a lower portion of the cooling device and carbon dioxide gas as the cooling gas which is separated from the helium gas flows into a side lower than a position where the helium gas flows in, during the forcible cooling; and a flow rate of the helium gas and a flow rate of the carbon dioxide gas are individually controlled.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 15, 2011
    Date of Patent: March 4, 2014
    Assignee: Fujikura Ltd.
    Inventor: Kenji Okada
  • Patent number: 8656734
    Abstract: A method for manufacturing a disklike glass material comprising the successive molding of multiple pieces of disklike glass material from glass melt. Being suppressed variation over time in the concentration of infrared radiation-absorbing ions contained in the glass melt being molded into the pieces of disklike glass material so that the variation in the sheet thickness of the multiple pieces of disklike glass material falls within a range of ±15 percent of a reference value. The reference value being the median between the maximum value and the minimum value of the sheet thickness of 1,000 pieces of the glass material. In the course of molding multiple pieces of disklike glass material comprised of glass containing 0.1 to 100 ppm of infrared radiation-absorbing ions, vaiiation over time in the concentration of the infrared radiation-absorbing contained in the glass melt is suppressed to suppress variation in the sheet thickness of the multiple pieces of sheet like glass material.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 8, 2008
    Date of Patent: February 25, 2014
    Assignee: Hoya Corporation
    Inventors: Xuelu Zou, Yoichi Hachitani, Kazuo Tachiwana
  • Patent number: 8656740
    Abstract: The invention provides a manufacturing method of a glass-sealed package, and a glass substrate used for the glass-sealed package, whereby an amount of warp in a glass substrate is reduced to improve processing accuracy in a subsequent step in which the glass substrate is combined (such as by anodic bonding) with another glass substrate provided with a thin film. The front side of the glass substrate includes a region where the cavities used to house electronic devices such as semiconductor IC chips and crystal blanks are not formed. The region devoid of the cavities is provided in the formed of a frame to reduce an amount of warp in the glass substrate.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 19, 2010
    Date of Patent: February 25, 2014
    Assignee: Seiko Instruments Inc.
    Inventor: Yoshihisa Tange
  • Patent number: 8656735
    Abstract: To provide a novel fluorination treatment method whereby the surface of oxide glass can be treated for fluorination at low cost and with excellent adhesiveness. A method for treating the surface of oxide glass, which comprises contacting the surface of oxide glass with a gas of a fluorinating agent or a mixed gas having a fluorinating agent diluted with an inert gas, wherein the fluorinating agent is an elemental fluorine, or a fluorine compound capable of cleaving a bond between an oxygen atom and a metal atom in the framework of the oxide glass and forming a bond between a fluorine atom and the metal atom; and the concentration of hydrogen fluoride at the surface of oxide glass with which the fluorinating agent is in contact, is controlled to be at most 1 mol %.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 17, 2009
    Date of Patent: February 25, 2014
    Assignee: Asahi Glass Company, Limited
    Inventors: Chikaya Tamitsuji, Kunio Watanabe
  • Patent number: 8640497
    Abstract: To provide a magnetic-disk glass substrate manufacturing method that can reduce the inner diameter dimensional error.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 24, 2008
    Date of Patent: February 4, 2014
    Assignees: Hoya Corporation, Hoya Glass Disk (thailand) Ltd.
    Inventors: Ryuuichi Kashima, Hideki Isono, Shinji Eda, Tomotaka Yokoyama, Tadashi Tomonaga, Kraisorn Phandon, Weeraphan Yayod
  • Patent number: 8640502
    Abstract: A method of processing an optical fiber includes introducing fiber that has passed a pulling mechanism to a shredding unit with an introducing unit. The introducing unit includes a movable unit including a notch configured to fit with a capstan roller included in the pulling mechanism, a sliding mechanism that attaches the movable unit slidably with respect to a main body of the introducing unit, and a restoring mechanism configured to restore the movable unit to an initial position when the movable unit has slid. The method includes shredding the fiber introduced by the introducing unit into fiber pieces, and suctioning, carrying, and collecting the fiber pieces. A method of drawing an optical fiber includes drawing the fiber while controlling a drawing speed, adjusting a diameter of the fiber to a diameter passable through a die, and arranging the die around the fiber having the diameter passable through the die.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 7, 2012
    Date of Patent: February 4, 2014
    Assignee: Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yuta Aoki, Katsuhiko Watanabe, Kiyoshi Arima, Hirokazu Sato, Yoshiharu Taga, Takashi Suzuki