A glass is an amorphous solid. The term is usually applied to inorganic solids and not to plastics or other organics. Glasses do not have crystalline internal structure. They usually are hard and brittle solids.
Potomac has a wide variety of tools to machine complex features in glass as small as 1 micron.
Applications include hole drilling, cutting and marking. For example, Potomac has extensive experience drilling holes for leak testing of pharmaceutical vials and ampoules. Click here to review our Leak Test Hole Drilling Capabilities.
Lasers can be used for high precision, fine feature laser marking of glass substrates. Marks can be as simple as alignment fiducials or as complex as serial numbers and barcodes. Utilizing high accuracy motion systems, Potomac is capable of holding very tight positional tolerances across very large parts. Line widths can be as narrow as 10 microns depending on the type of glass.
Potomac is capable of machining both flat and 3D configurations.
Typical types of glass that Potomac can micro machine include:
Applications that we have worked on include, microfluidics, sensors, high accuracy marking and many others.