Cutting method for glass sheet and glass sheet cutting apparatus

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9764979-B2
Application number	US-201615176423-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 8, 2016
Priority date	Sep 15, 2011
Publication date	Sep 19, 2017
Grant date	Sep 19, 2017

Abstract

Provided is a cutting method for a glass sheet, comprising radiating a laser beam to a cutting portion (C) of a glass sheet (G) having a thickness of 500 μm or less to fuse the glass sheet (G), wherein a narrowest gap between fused end surfaces (Ga 1 and Gb 1 ) of the glass sheet (G), which face each other in the cutting portion (C), is managed to satisfy a relationship of 0.1≦b/a≦2, where “a” is a thickness of the glass sheet (G) and “b” is the narrowest gap.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A cutting method for a glass sheet, comprising radiating a laser beam to a cutting portion of the glass sheet while jetting an assist gas to the cutting portion, to thereby divide the glass sheet by fusing into a product portion and a non-product portion using the cutting portion as a boundary,
wherein the assist gas comprises:
a center assist gas jetted just below from a position above the cutting portion to the cutting portion in a space above the glass sheet; and
a side assist gas jetted obliquely downward from an upper position on a product portion side to the cutting portion in a space above the glass sheet, and

wherein the side assist gas has a jetting pressure that is higher than a jetting pressure of the center assist gas so that a fused end surface of the product portion comprises a convex curved portion.

2. The cutting method for a glass sheet according to claim 1 , wherein the side assist gas is jetted at an inclination angle of from 25° to 60° with respect to an upper surface of the glass sheet.

3. The cutting method for a glass sheet according to claim 1 , wherein the assist gas further comprises an auxiliary side assist gas jetted obliquely upward from a lower position on the product portion side to the cutting portion in a space below the glass sheet.

4. The cutting method for a glass sheet according to claim 1 , wherein the radiating the laser beam to the glass sheet is carried out in a defocus state.

5. The cutting method for a glass sheet according to claim 1 , wherein a center line of the side assist gas is set to intersect with an upper surface of the glass sheet of the product portion side with respect to the cutting portion.

Assignees

• Nippon Electric Glass Co

Inventors

• Fujii Takahide
• Uchida Setsuo
• INAYAMA Naotoshi
• Noda Takayuki
• ITOH Sho
• Eta Michiharu

Classifications

• B23K2203/54

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic

• B23K26/38 Primary

  by boring or cutting · CPC title

• C03B33/0222 Primary

  Scoring using a focussed radiation beam, e.g. laser · CPC title

• Y02P40/57

  Improving the yield, e-g- reduction of reject rates · CPC title

• B23K26/402

  involving non-metallic material, e.g. isolators · CPC title