
"Add slimness".
Are they going to simplificate and add more lightness too?
yeesh. :)
Corning has been showing off a new form of flexible glass that is the thickness of a sheet of paper yet easy to mass-produce. Dubbed Willow glass, the material can be manufactured to just 0.05mm thickness compared to current 0.2mm or 0.5mm screens, and is suitable for touch control systems and with LCD and OLED displays. The …
I'm guessing (and it's a WAG, for sure) that the quote is merely to imply that Corning is NOT employing Glass Fairies with magic wands to make the glass so thin and flexible. At least, not for this particular glass. But I could be very, very wrong about that - it could be pixie dust doing it, for sure.
This post has been deleted by its author
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?
<diversion>
He is not doing the Grammar salute.
That icon is clearly unsuited for the task at hand!
</diversion>
Now I will quietly retreat to a dark corner in order to adequately contemplate my own failure in being properly versed in El Reg's canon of visual aids.
Paris, coz shes haz teh smartz jus liek meh.
BTW the "spilling out of a trough" is basically the Pilkington process where the glass floats on molten tin.
However the equilibrium thickness for this is set by surface tension and density of the glass and the tin to around IIRC 7mm, but surface quality is excellent. The *thinning* process that Corning have developed sounds amazing.
Note You know have a substrate that can take 500c process temperatures without damage which is also transparent.
This *could* open up lots of more speculative ideas (if the price is right) which have been handicapped because some of the other pieces need high temperature process that existing substrates would be destroyed by.
Thumbs up for some clever engineering.
I wonder, if you flatten it bent over does is fracture or crease (like plastic)?
I further wonder what the smallest diameter bend that can be achieved is, and how many flexes before it fractures/creases.
I even further wonder if I should hold onto my iPhone 3G for just one more year to get next years phone with roll out screen?!
It works by filling a trough (or "isopipe" as they call it) which has a triangular cross section tapering to a point at the bottom. When over filled the contents form a sheet dripping down each side. The sheets merge to give the final result.
The key benefit is that the inner and outer faces of the new sheet have *never* been in contact with anything (even Tin) and their smoothness can be very good and the sheet can be stretched further.
Some of their patents suggest the isopipe is machined out of Silcon Nitride or Carbide (which needs to made in a low Oxygen environment) then surface oxidized to form a silica outer layer to reduce contamination even further.
It's not very well explained in the article and I'd never heard of it *ever* before. Apparently it was developed in the late 60s to make car windscreens. Other than not being the Pilkington process I'm not sure what benefits it would have bought to that application.
My bad