Types of Glass

Learn About Specifying Glass Partitions

Since the conception of what we would call ‘glass’ over 5700 years ago, experimentation has been key to the development and understanding of the material’s potential. Records exist of nearly every ancient civilisation taking advantage and even manipulating the properties of glass, going as far as to melt and change the characteristics of the material to suit architectural means. Since then, the method has been trialed, tested and strengthened. Just as the development of glass has allowed for more dynamic uses, such as protection from fire and noise pollution.

Today, one use for glass partitions is to give the impression of open space, with continuous views to either landscapes or a wider area. This same characteristic is why it is widely specified in offices where an open plan environment is required. With development comes regulation and accreditation, bodies such as BREEAM, SKA & WELL have promoted sustainable, environmentally friendly means of construction. It is the objective of each project to reach high standards with each accrediting body. This allows for continued structural development, analysis and progress of partitions and the glass held within.

The ability of glass to allow natural light into a building has been at the heart of its use in construction for centuries. Its use in internal partitions allows natural daylight to flow through rooms located at a building perimeter whilst doing the same for rooms located centrally within a floor plate.

The properties and varieties of glass mean it has can have strong fire, acoustic & structural performance characteristics.

Annealed Glass

Annealed glass is the most common form of glass and the starting point for most of the glasses used in glass partitions.

The most typical raw materials used to manufacture glass are silica sand, soda ash and lime. In simple terms these ingredients are fed into a furnace where they melt to create molten glass, this then floats on a bed of molten tin to create it’s smooth & flat properties, it then goes through a cooling (annealing) process where it solidifies to create annealed glass. Different thicknesses are created by running this process at varying speeds.

Annealed glass is not typically used in in glass partitions in its raw form as it does not have safe breakage characteristics I.e. It creates large shards of glass.

Toughened Glass

Thermally treating annealed glass gives it an impact resistance of up to seven times greater. This is what gives the glass the name ‘toughened glass’. Complying with British Standard 6206 (BS6206), toughened glass breaks safely, shattering into equally sized ‘dice’. Toughened glass is also known as tempered glass due to the tempering process that annealed glass is put through to reach the peak of its physical breaking point. In practice, toughened is the only glass recommended for use where drilling or clamping is required, for example, when used for accommodating door furniture.

Due to its production method of heating and tempering the glass, toughened glass can withstand extreme heat