Polished glass beads Type S as grinding bead, dispersing ball, filling bead, reflex bead, blasting glass ball
The glass beads made of soda-lime glass in the size range between 0.05 and 5 mm are produced in special thermal forming processes. The production process of glass beads differs from conventional melting processes due to the extremely low energy consumption.
Field of application
Grinding and dispersing beads
Due to their properties, SiLibeads® Type S glass beads are ideally suited as grinding and dispersing beads in horizontal and vertical agitator bead mills for wet grinding of dyes, pigments, ink, agrochemicals, minerals, fillers for chemicals, paper and plastics. Particle sizes of less than 10 microns can be achieved easily. The low wear on the agitator disc and machine lining enables extremely economical use of SiLibeads® glass beads type S.
Filling Beads
SiLibeads® Type S are used as fillers in the chemical, paper and plastics industries. The filling beads increase the physical properties in thermoplastics and thermosets.
Reflex glass beads
Glass beads play a decisive role in road safety. Retroreflection causes the vehicle’s headlight to be reflected back to the driver, causing the road markings to “shine”.
Blasting glass beads
SiLibeads® type S are used for mechanical surface treatment (bead blasting) of various materials such as wood, metal or plastic.
The cost-benefit ratio is unsurpassed.
Polishing agent for optical and intraocular lenses
SiLibeads® type S (Art. 45xx-R8) with improved roundness (≥ 0.980).
An intraocular lens (IOL) is an artificial lens in the eye. It is usually implanted after removal of the natural lens as part of cataract surgery, but can also be implanted in addition to the natural lens.
The IOLs are polished in a drum using glass beads in a specific process.
It is important that the balls are particularly round so as not to scratch the lens.
Quality attributes
- Wide range of sizes in the range d = 0.25 – 6.00 mm
- High proportion of beads in the nominal size range
- High roundness of the beads dMIN / dMAX ≥ 0.95 (also higher on customer request)
- Clean and polished surfaces
- High retroreflectivity
- Low process residues and other impurities
- Wide range of different size fractions (customer-specific special sieving possible)