US-12617706-B2 - Method for producing glass article and glass-melting furnace

US12617706B2US 12617706 B2US12617706 B2US 12617706B2US-12617706-B2

Abstract

Provided is a method of producing a glass article, including: a melting step of heating molten glass (Gm) in a glass melting furnace ( 2 ) through application of a current with electrode groups ( 13 ) to ( 16 ) including a plurality of electrodes (A) to (H) connected to a common power supply system; and a forming step of forming a glass fiber (Gf) from the molten glass (Gm) heated in the melting step. The melting step includes: a measurement step of measuring ground voltages of the electrodes (A) to (H) included in the electrode groups ( 13 ) to ( 16 ); and a determination step of determining leakage glass (Gx) from the glass melting furnace ( 2 ) based on variations in the ground voltages measured in the measurement step.

Inventors

Daisuke MOMO
Tomohiro Sato

Assignees

NIPPON ELECTRIC GLASS CO., LTD.

Dates

Publication Date: 20260505
Application Date: 20220616
Priority Date: 20210816

Claims (4)

1 . A method of producing a glass article, comprising: a melting step of heating molten glass in a glass melting furnace through application of a current with an electrode group including a plurality of electrodes connected to a common power supply system; and a forming step of forming a glass article from the molten glass heated in the melting step, wherein the melting step comprises: a measurement step of measuring a ground voltage of at least one of the electrodes included in the electrode group; and a determination step of determining leakage of the molten glass from the glass melting furnace based on a variation in the ground voltage measured in the measurement step.
2 . The method of producing a glass article according to claim 1 , wherein a plurality of the electrode groups are arranged.
3 . The method of producing a glass article according to claim 1 , wherein the determination step comprises determining the leakage of the molten glass based on a reduction in the ground voltage.
4 . The method of producing a glass article according to claim 3 , wherein the determination step comprises determining that the leakage of the molten glass occurs around the electrode reduced in the ground voltage out of the electrodes of the electrode group.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a method of producing a glass article and a glass melting furnace. BACKGROUND ART A method of producing a glass article, such as a glass fiber or a glass sheet, includes a melting step of melting a glass raw material to provide molten glass. In the melting step, a glass melting furnace including a plurality of electrodes each extending from a bottom wall portion of the furnace may be utilized. In the glass melting furnace of this kind, the glass raw material is melted in the furnace by supplying electric power to the electrodes to perform heating through application of a current, to thereby provide the molten glass. As compared to heating with a burner using a LPG or a heavy oil as a fuel, such heating through application of a current does not generate an exhaust gas of fuel origin, and can also suppress scattering of the glass raw material. In addition, the heating through application of a current also has advantages of, for example, being excellent in terms of environmental protection, being easily performed at high temperature, and facilitating uniform heating. Meanwhile, in the glass melting furnace, a refractory is broken for some reason and the molten glass leaks out therefrom, which causes a serious trouble. Accordingly, when such leakage of the molten glass occurs, it is significantly important to promptly detect the leakage. In view of the foregoing, for example, in Patent Literature 1, there is a disclosure that a temperature measurement unit is arranged between an electrode and a bottom wall portion (through hole) of a glass melting furnace by which the electrode is held, and it is determined that leakage of molten glass occurs when a temperature measured with the temperature measurement unit is abruptly increased. CITATION LIST Patent Literature 1: JP 2018-193268 A SUMMARY OF INVENTION Technical Problem In a glass melting furnace, the position at which leakage of molten glass occurs is not limited to an electrode arrangement position. That is, even at a position other than the electrode arrangement position, a refractory is broken due to, for example, aging degradation, and the molten glass may leak out therefrom. However, the invention according to Patent Literature 1 has a problem in that when the leakage of the molten glass occurs at a position other than the electrode arrangement position, the leakage cannot be detected. An object of the present invention is to reliably detect occurrence of leakage of molten glass in a glass melting furnace. Solution to Problem (1) According to one embodiment of the present invention, which has been devised in order to achieve the above-mentioned object, there is provided a method of producing a glass article, comprising: a melting step of heating molten glass in a glass melting furnace through application of a current with an electrode group including a plurality of electrodes connected to a common power supply system; and a forming step of forming a glass article from the molten glass heated in the melting step, wherein the melting step comprises: a measurement step of measuring a ground voltage of at least one of the electrodes included in the electrode group; and a determination step of determining leakage of the molten glass from the glass melting furnace based on a variation in the ground voltage measured in the measurement step. Herein, the “determining leakage of the molten glass” in the present invention includes not only the case of determining only the presence or absence of the leakage of the molten glass, but also the case of determining an occurrence position of the leakage of the molten glass. With such configuration, when leakage of the molten glass occurs in the glass melting furnace, the ground voltage of an electrode arranged around the occurrence position of the leakage tends to be reduced. Meanwhile, in the electrode group to which the electrode belongs, the ground voltage of any other electrode arranged at a position spaced apart from the occurrence position of the leakage of the molten glass tends to be increased. That is, when the leakage of the molten glass occurs in the glass melting furnace, as described above, characteristic variations occur in the ground voltages of the electrodes of the electrode group. Accordingly, when the ground voltage of the electrode is measured in the measurement step, the leakage of the molten glass can be reliably determined based on a variation in the ground voltage in the determination step. (2) In the configuration of the above-mentioned item (1), it is preferred that a plurality of the electrode groups be arranged. With such configuration, variations in the ground voltages of the electrodes included in the electrode groups can be elaborately measured. Accordingly, the presence or absence of the leakage of the molten glass can be elaborately determined. In addition, such configuration also has an advantage in that, when the occurrence position of the l