Glass bubble,Hollow glass microspheres , Glass sphere beads, Manufacturer & suppliers

Glass microsphere has the advantages of light weight, low thermal conductivity, non-toxic, incombustible, good chemical stability and high dispersion. These advantages can be reflected in the finished products after molding. The final product is light in weight, easy to install, and especially suitable for manufacturing products requiring buoyancy.

Hollow glass beads can be used in many material fields to improve or improve the water resistance, compressive strength, shrinkage and impact strength of materials. Low density, can make lighter parts; The porosity and specific surface area are low, and the bead absorption resin is less, so the viscosity is not high even if the amount of filling is high; It is chemically stable and inert; Good anti-cracking performance, and the final product is easy to be post-processed, such as drilling, cutting and polishing, which is another advantage that hollow glass beads are easy to be damaged.

Because, like the shock absorber, the compressive strength and impact strength of the product are also improved.

Because the hollow glass bead is destroyed prior to the resin matrix, the impact degree of the product is reduced.

It is an advantage. On the one hand, it can reduce

Application of glass beads in synthetic foam

Glass bead resin composite is usually called synthetic foam. The main feature of this composite material is its low density. It is a multifunctional composite material with wide mechanical properties and a combination of vibration reduction, insulation and fire prevention.

2 Application of glass beads in plastics and rubber

In the plastic industry, glass bead is an inorganic powder filler developed in recent years, with high filling capacity. The plastic filled with it has excellent rheological processing properties, uniform shrinkage, and increased impact resistance. Glass bead is used for filling UHMWPE material, which not only acts as a solid lubricant to improve processing fluidity, but also modifies the comprehensive mechanical properties of UHMWPE material to improve its strength and wear resistance

The tensile strength, impact strength, hardness and other mechanical properties of nylon 6 with glass beads are improved, and the material aging caused by light and heat can be prevented. With the increase of glass bead content, the Martin heat resistance temperature of the material increases.

Application of glass bead in spacer material of liquid crystal display (LCD)

The spacer material of liquid crystal display is the focus of research at home and abroad, which is also one of the more promising applications of glass beads [7]. At present, LCD spacer materials often use various organic particles, and also use ground optical fibers. These materials have different degrees of shortcomings

Application of glass bead in explosives

The introduction of hollow glass beads into emulsion explosives overcomes the above shortcomings, greatly improves the detonation performance of explosives and significantly improves the storage stability

5 Application in cement products

The density of hollow microsphere is low and it is not easy to absorb water. It can reduce the density of grouting cement by adding it alone or together with expansion additives

6 Application in coatings

The glass bead is applied to the coating, and the solar heat reflection and thermal insulation coating prepared has high solar heat reflection and high radiation performance, which improves the thermal insulation performance of the coating, and is used in reflective pavement and decoration and beauty joints

7 Application in medical field

Coupling treatment of hollow glass microspheres and electroless nickel plating on the surface of hollow glass microspheres

After sex, it has a promising prospect in medical immunoassay technology.

Application of modified glass beads in electromagnetic shielding and microwave absorption

Glass beads are widely used in building materials, plastics, rubber, coatings, chemistry, metallurgy, navigation, aerospace and other fields, and have irreplaceable important applications. The modified hollow microspheres have electrical and magnetic properties, which can be used in the fields of microwave absorption or electromagnetic shielding to prepare functional materials and broaden its application range. Due to the high energy consumption of artificial glass beads, the cost of glass beads obtained from fly ash can be greatly reduced, so the bead filler will have a good development prospect. At present, the utilization of fly ash hollow microsphere in China is still at the initial stage, and the utilization rate and utilization level need to be developed. As a new multi-functional material, its application prospect will be better and better.

Glass microsphere plays a very important role in production and life. Glass microsphere not only has the advantages of light weight, low thermal conductivity, high strength and good chemical stability, but also has hydrophilic and hydrophobic properties on the surface, which is easy to disperse in organic material system. What are the main characteristics of glass beads?

Main characteristics of glass bead

1. It can scatter light in the visible spectrum. The glass material is actually colorless and transparent, but because the glass bead has a scattering effect on the light in the full visible spectrum, it looks white. However, when it is added to colored materials, it also scatters the light of material color, so it can be widely used in any material with requirements for appearance color without affecting the original material color.

2. Low density. The density of glass bead is about one tenth of that of traditional filler particles. After filling, the base weight of the product can be greatly reduced. The larger volume makes it replace a large number of other raw materials, reducing the product cost.

3. It is lipophilic. Hollow glass beads are easy to wet and disperse, and can be filled in most thermosetting thermoplastic resins, such as polyester, epoxy resin, polyurethane, etc.

4. High dispersion and good liquidity. Because the glass bead is a tiny ball, it has better fluidity in liquid resin than the filler in sheet, needle or irregular shape, so it has excellent filling performance. More importantly, this kind of small bead is isotropic, so it will not produce the disadvantage of inconsistent shrinkage in different parts due to its orientation, which ensures the dimensional stability of the product and will not warp.

5. Low water absorption. The inside of glass bead is thin gas, so it has the characteristics of sound insulation and heat insulation, and is an excellent filler for various heat insulation and sound insulation products. The thermal insulation characteristics of glass beads can also be used to protect products from thermal shock caused by alternate changes between hot and cold conditions. Its high specific resistance and extremely low water absorption make it widely used for processing and producing cable insulation materials.

6. Low oil absorption. The particle size of the sphere determines that it has the smallest specific surface area and low oil absorption. The amount of resin can be greatly reduced in the use process, and the viscosity will not increase much even under the premise of high addition, which greatly improves the production and operation conditions, and can increase the production efficiency by 10%~20%.

ARTICLE SOURCE: haixumoliao

1: Binder: The application of glass microsphere in the binder can give it the advantages of weight reduction, shrinkage reduction, VOC reduction and increased filling amount.

2: Bowling ball: It can be used to control the density well. Using microspheres with different densities as fillers can better control the density and ensure the stability of the ball.

3: Deep water floating body: reduce the amount of resin used in production, thus reducing the cost; It can reduce weight; Waterproof; Easy to grind (good grinding performance); Easy processing (low viscosity, good flow performance)

4: Polyurethane injection molding: It can reduce cost, easy to polish, easy to process, reduce shrinkage, reduce warpage, and reduce weight.

5: Plugging agent: used as a plugging agent, it can reduce shrinkage and prevent cracking.

6: Artificial stone: It can be easily polished, easily processed, reduce weight, and prevent from thermal cracking (that is, its thermal insulation property has the effect of resisting thermal shock)

7: Cement: adding ceramic tile cement can reduce shrinkage and increase flow.

8: Polyester casting: used for furniture decoration, it can reduce the amount of resin used to reduce costs, easy to polish, easy to process, reduce shrinkage, reduce warpage, reduce weight, and have the effect of heat preservation, making it feel good.

9: Golf ball: (light ball) mainly refers to the effect of weight reduction.

10: Ship putty: used in ship putty can reduce resin consumption, cost, weight, shrinkage and warpage.

11: Clamping board putty: it can reduce cost, weight, shrinkage and warpage.

12: Ceramic material (lightweight): it can reduce the cost, shrink, dielectric constant and heat insulation.

13: Wall putty: It can be easily polished and reduce shrinkage.

14: Synthetic foam: It has the effect of reducing cost and weight.

15: SMC, BMC and other composite materials such as glass fiber reinforced plastic and wood plastic can reduce weight, resin consumption, cost, heat preservation, shrinkage, warpage and easy processing.

16: Application of paint:

(1) Interior and exterior wall coatings of buildings: improve the reflection, heat insulation, durability, waterproof and scrub resistance of coatings; nature

(2) Thermal insulation coating: good thermal insulation effect, increase the building area, energy conservation and environmental protection, and reduce building energy consumption.

17: Glass microspheres are used in oil and gas fields:

(1) Drilling fluid: it can be added to various drilling fluids as a density reducing agent, and its main advantages are: well reducing the density of drilling fluid; It reduces torque and friction, and does no harm to the formation. It works with leak loss reducer to reduce circulating leakage. It is easy to mix and pump. Grout replenishing can be easily mixed on site without special equipment. It has high stability, good compression resistance, and no impact on the performance of drilling and downhole equipment. Microspheric drilling fluid is single-phase and incompressible, so it can be easily used for fluid calculation and measurement while drilling. It has no effect on rheological properties. It can be recycled and reused.

(2) Cementing cement: it is used in cementing cement, and its main advantages are: it can reduce the density very well, and has good rheological property, improve the displacement speed, high and tight cementation strength, reduce leakage, reduce the waiting time, easy to mix, no special equipment, easy to pump, high cementing strength, high compressive strength, no need for multi-stage cementing.

Glass microspheres have a very important role in production and life. The glass micro -balls are not only light quality, low heat conduction, high strength, and good chemical stability, but also have the performance of hydrocariasis on the surface, which is easy to scattered in the organic material system. So what are the main characteristics of glass microspheres?
Main features of glass microspheres
1. There is a scattering effect on visible spectral range light. The glass material is actually colorless and transparent, but because the glass ball has a scattering effect on the full visible spectral range of the spectral range, it looks white. However, when it is added to the color material, it is also scattered with the light of the material color, so it can be widely used in any material required by the appearance and color without affecting the color of the original material.
2. Lear density. The density of glass microspheres is about one -third of the density of traditional filling particles. After filling, it can greatly reduce the base weight of the product, and the large volume makes it replace a large amount of other raw materials and reduce the cost of the product.
3. It has parental oil. Weting and decentralizing hollow glass microspheres can be filled in most thermal thermoplastic resins, such as polyester, epoxy resin, polyurethane, etc.
4. High decentralization and good liquidity. Because the glass micro -ball is a tiny ball, it is more liquid than the fillers of the liquid resin than the chip, needle, or irregular shape, so the model is excellent. What’s more important is that this small micro -ball is different, so it will not produce disadvantages of inconsistent contraction rates caused by different parts of the orientation, ensuring the size of the product stable and not warpage.
5. Low water absorption. The interior of the glass microsphere is thin gas, so it has the characteristics of sound insulation and heat insulation. It is an excellent fillers for various insulation and sound insulation products. The heat insulation characteristics of glass microspheres can also be used to protect the heat shock caused by alternate changes between the products and the conditions of rapid heat and cold. The high ratio resistance, the extremely low water absorption rate allows it to be widely used in processing and production cable insulation materials.
6. Low oil absorption. The particles of the sphere determine that it has the smallest surface area and low oil absorption rate. During the use process, the amount of resin can be greatly reduced. Even if the amount of high addition is added, the viscosity will not increase much, which greatly improves the production operation conditions. Increase production efficiency by 10%to 20%.

Glass microspheres are divided into hollow glass microspheres and solid glass microspheres

1. The main application fields of solid glass microbeads are:
1. Road reflective glass beads:

Road reflective glass beads are divided into internal mixing type and surface scattering type. The internal mixing type is mixed in the paint during the production of road reflective paint, which can ensure the long-term reflection of road markings within the life period.
The surface sprinkler type is used in road marking construction to spread on the surface of the marking line to achieve an instant reflective effect. Road marking glass beads are divided into two specifications: coated and non-coated. Surface-treated coated glass beads are used in road marking construction, which can greatly improve the adhesion between the glass beads and the road marking paint. , Water resistance, enhance the reflectivity of road markings, and have self-cleaning, anti-fouling, moisture-proof and other uses.

2. Shot peening glass beads:

Shot peening glass beads Glass beads used for industrial shot peening and additives can be used on metal surfaces and mold surfaces without damaging the surface of the workpiece and improving the accuracy of the workpiece. It is used for cleaning and polishing of metal metal, plastic, jewelry, precision casting and other objects. It is a high-grade finishing material commonly used at home and abroad.

3. Grinding glass beads:

Grinding glass beads have the advantages of good chemical stability, mechanical strength and hardness, surface finish, good fluidity, low abrasion, easy industrial and mining control, etc. As abrasive materials, they are widely used in chemical materials, coatings, pigments, food, medicine and other fields.

4. Glass beads for decoration:

Glass microbeads, glass sand and colored glass microbeads for handicrafts are ideal materials for garment printing, garment heat transfer, Christmas tree surface decoration, artificial fruit, artificial flower crafts surface decoration, and hourglass quicksand manufacturing.

5. Filling:

Glass beads are also widely used as a new type of material in various fields such as medical equipment and nylon, rubber, engineering plastics, and aviation. Such as additives, enhancers and so on.

2. The main application fields of hollow glass microspheres are:

1. The color is pure white, which can be widely used in any products that have requirements on the appearance color.
2. The specific gravity is light, and the density of hollow glass microspheres is about one tenth of the density of traditional filler particles. After filling, the basis weight of the product can be greatly reduced, more production resins can be replaced and saved, and the product cost can be reduced.
3. Lipophilic, hollow glass microspheres are easy to wet and disperse, and can be filled in most thermosetting thermoplastic resins, such as polyester, epoxy resin, polyurethane, etc.
4. Good fluidity. Since hollow glass microspheres are tiny spheres, they have better fluidity in liquid resins than flake, needle or irregular fillers, so they have excellent mold filling performance. More importantly, the small microbeads are isotropic, so there is no disadvantage of inconsistent shrinkage rates in different parts due to orientation, which ensures the dimensional stability of the product and will not warp.
5. Heat and sound insulation, the hollow glass beads are thin gas inside, so it has the characteristics of sound insulation and heat insulation, and it is an excellent filler for various thermal insulation and sound insulation products. The insulating properties of hollow glass microspheres can also be used to protect products from thermal shock caused by alternating between rapid heating and rapid cooling conditions. High specific resistance and extremely low water absorption make it widely used in the production of cable insulation materials.
6. The oil absorption rate is low. The particles of the sphere determine that it has the smallest specific surface area and low oil absorption rate. During use, the amount of resin can be greatly reduced. Even under the premise of high addition amount, the viscosity will not increase a lot, which is greatly improved. The production operating conditions can be improved, and the production efficiency can be increased by 10% to 20%.

Article Source：HS glass beads

Hollow glass polymeric or ceramic microspheres are used in coatings or composites and exhibit unusual mechanical and heat-insulation properties.In many countries, heat insulation by means of coatings is achieved by adding hollow or solid microspheres in acrylic-based coatings. Many coatings are developed with high absorbtivity in the visible regime and very low emissivity in the IR regime for architectural as well as industrial coatings.

Issues like stringent environmental regulations, customer requirements and competitive markets can be tackled with innovative raw material usage and developing new processes. There are many raw materials available that can be called ‘answers awaiting questions’; a good example being microspheres.

These specialty materials are used for many purposes in many diverse industries. Microspheres are innovative raw materials in the coatings industry, and are diverse because both solid and hollow formats are readily available. Solid spheres are most commonly used in reflective traffic paints where the microspheres are used as light reflectors. Hollow microspheres are small, spherical particles ranging in size from 12-300 microns in diameter, and wall thickness up to 0.1 micron. As these microspheres are hollow, the true density is very low, ranging from 0.60 g/cc to as low as 0.025 g/cc. Organic hollow microspheres are mostly composed of polystyrene, polyacrylonitrile or phenolic materials, while inorganic microspheres are glass, ceramic or made from fly ash from thermal power plants.

Glass Microspheres
Glass microspheres give high heat and chemical resistance with density ranges of 0.125 – 0.60 g/cc. The collapse strength depends directly on the wall thickness and density, thus the higher the density, the higher the strength.

Solid or hollow glass microspheres are used in various applications in the coatings industry. They are commonly used to improve the performance of epoxy primers, powder coatings, floor applications, aircraft paints and industrial coatings. Hollow spheres are used in thermal insulating coatings for construction and transportation applications, and also for acoustic insulation coatings.(4) Hollow glass microspheres with a density of 0.6 g/cc with a fine particle size distribution can be used in flat wall paint.

Plastic Microspheres
Thermoplastic microspheres are compressible hollow particles with thin shell walls having densities as low as 0.025 g/cc. As resilient plastic materials, these microspheres can deform under stress (during high shear mixing or pumping), and there is very low to no breakage. The compressible nature of plastic can absorb impact, reducing damage caused by stone chips, foot traffic or freeze-thaw cycles.

Use in Coatings
Uniform spherical-shaped microspheres have lower surface area then irregular fillers and extender pigments, which means a lower resin demand. Another benefit to the spherical shape is the ability to roll past one another, hence there is minimal impact on viscosity when they are added to a liquid. As coatings are manufactured on weight basis and sold on volume basis, microspheres are used to increase the solid content of a coating, maintaining application and flow properties. Higher-volume solids reduce VOCs, shrinkage and drying time.

Since hollow spheres lower the density of materials, they are added to coatings. If added in coatings, it will atomize better while spraying and it will give less spatter while rolling also sag less once applied. [4]

One of the most important applications microspheres have been developed for is the Space Shuttle program. When the space shuttle re-enters the earth’s atmosphere, incredible heat is generated due to increasing air friction. In order to prevent the space shuttle from burning up during re-entry, NASA scientists developed a superior insulating material using Ceramic technology. This technology can now be applied to roofs and sidewalls of buildings, piping, ducts, tanks, various storage devices, refrigerated containers, cold rooms, etc. in order to insulate them from the radiant heat of the sun and the atmosphere by using hollow ceramic spheres.

Stagnant air is a bad conductor of heat because heat is transferred by convection currents. Stagnant air inside hollow spheres acts as an insulator for heat and hence can be used as heat insulating material in coatings. This characteristic of hollow microspheres allows improved thermal and acoustic insulation properties of coatings or composites. Currently, markets taking advantage of this property include fire retardant materials, sensitive acoustic equipment, and roof coatings.

Applications of Hollow Microspheres
All Types of Roofs – Flat or Slopping, made of Concrete, Metal or Asbestos Cement,
Side Walls of Residential and Commercial Buildings, Hotels and Hospitals, Construction Office,
Roofs and Sidewalls at Process Control Rooms, Surveillance Towers, Manufacturing Plants and similar constructions and structures
Piping in Air Conditioning Systems, Steam Pipes, Thermo Fluid Pipes, Boilers
Exterior of Storage Tanks for Crude Oil, Chemicals, Solvents, Natural and Petroleum Gas, Storage Devices at Petroleum and Petrochemical Industries,
Grain Silos, Fishing Trawlers, Cold Storage, Refrigerated Trucks and Containers
Exterior Roofs of Public Transport Vehicles, Railway Passenger Coaches

Limitations
Large particle sizes of microspheres can result in surface texture, meaning gloss reduction. Today, however, fine size hollow glass microspheres are available for coatings requiring higher gloss and thin layer deposition . Microspheres have low density, which means the particles have the tendency to become airborne while being added to the batch. Also for the same reasons, floating or phase separation can occur in the finished mix.

Conclusion
Hollow micro spheres (especially glass microspheres) offer improved scrub and burnish properties, gloss, stain resistance, viscosity control, thermal insulation and sound-dampening characteristics. No other conventional additive can match the multiple performance benefits of hollow micro spheres. Their hollow structure, low density and small particle size make them ideal for use as extenders for paint formulations. With particle sizes considerably finer than previously available, hollow micro spheres can be used in thin-film coatings to improve integrity. In the case of glass microspheres, they do not absorb resin, allowing more resin to be available in film forming; the result being a tighter and more uniform film with improved durability . Opaque hollow-sphere polymeric pigments can be added to improve dry hide of coatings, which allows the paint manufacturer to reduce the level of TiO2 in coatings at no loss of performance.

China glass microsphere, has been around for ten years or so, but it really is industrial production and the use of only a short five or six years or so, but on their current market situation, the global situation at large, there the substantial needs, including with the insulation materials, coatings and various other high-end military and civilian products.

Cenospheres products are divided into three categories: white hollow glass beads; one is floating beads; there is a class resin beads. Each category is divided into a variety of specifications of products, used in different fields. In terms of market applications cenospheres product point of view, now more mature customer base should be foreign, domestic large enterprises started relatively late, the vast majority have not come into contact with such products.But also the most important point, foreign companies and Porter company 3M hollow glass beads, due to price and delivery time, most domestic customers which can only wait and see situation, some of this is already in use users of the product are also trying to find 3M and Potter’s beads alternatives.Domestic producers of beads confined to limit the production technology and equipment, has been unable to provide a high-performance alternative to the market vacuum, some companies began to fish in a very poor product and low market price to disrupt the market. Judging hollow glass beads application situation continues to forge ahead, in fact, exactly the opposite, due to defects in each of their own technology, making cenospheres product quality is uneven, with greatly reduced the quality of their products, but affected the hollow glass microspheres Pearl market expansion.

Reflective glass microspheres is a tiny glass sphere glass sand particles as raw material formed by high-temperature melting. Reflective glass microsphere for road marking as the reflective material to improve road marking paint Retroreflective performance, improve traffic safety at night, has to be determined for national transport sector.When driving at night, the lights shining on the road signs with glassmicrosphere, can lights and parallel light is reflected back, never make drivers see the way forward to improve traffic safety at night. Now, reflective glass microspheres have become a road safety products reflective material can not be replaced.
This article comes from DOC88

Bioactive glass is a promising osteoconductive silica-based biomaterial for guidance of new bone growth. On the basis of several in vitro studies, the material appears able to promote osteoblast functions. In our in vivo study, the osteopromotive effect of bioactive glass microspheres seemed to surpass the osteoinductive action of direct adenovirus-mediated human bone morphogenetic protein 2 (BMP-2) gene transfer in a noncritical size bone defect model. The current study was initiated to elucidate the molecular mechanism behind bioactive glass action with or without adjunct BMP-2 gene transfer. A standardized bone defect of the rat tibia was filled with bioactive glass microspheres and injected with adenovirus carrying the human BMP-2 gene (RAdBMP-2). Control defects were left empty or filled with bioactive glass microspheres with injection of adenovirus carrying the lacZ reporter gene or saline. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction confirmed the expression of the transferred human BMP-2 gene at the defect area at 4 days, but not in intact reference tissues. Bone matrix components (collagens I, II, and III, osteocalcin, osteonectin, and osteopontin) and resorption markers (cathepsin K and MMP-9), determined by Northern analysis, showed a completely different pattern of gene expression in defects filled with bioactive glass compared with control defects left to heal without filling. Bioactive glass induced a long-lasting production of bone matrix with concurrent upregulation of osteoclastic markers, a sign of high bone turnover. Combining RAdBMP-2 gene transfer with bioactive glass decelerated the high turnover, but did not influence the balance of synthesis and resorption. This molecular analysis confirmed not only the highly osteopromotive effect of bioactive glass microspheres, but also the accelerated rate of new bone resorption on its surface. At least in noncritical size defects this impact of bioactive glass seems to saturate new bone formation on its surface and thereby overshadow the effect of BMP-2 gene transfer.

From: researchgate

The product, made of borosilicate, is hollow sphere which grain size is 10-250micron, wall-thickness 1-2 micron. It has much merit, such as light, low heat conductivity, higher mechanical strength and excellent chemical stability. Its surface was treated by the special way and the products are dispersed very easily in organic materials such as resin.Hollow glass microsphere are widely used in composite materials such as FRP, man made marble and man made agate. It can decrease the weight of the composite materials and the composite materials have excellent performance of sound insulation and heat preservation, and it can improve the mechanical performance of the composite materials such as strengthened rigidity, enhanced anti-impact property, excellent anti-breaking property and re-processing function.Hollow glass beads are applied in a wide range of fields such as aviation, space flight, new bullet train, luxurious yacht, adiabatic dope, bowing balls, in which they play a distinctive role.Hollow glass micro sphere is the excellent sensitized of emulsion explosive. It can improve the detonation property of emulsion explosive and prolong the shelf period of emulsion explosive. When used in the resin putty, hollow glass microsphere can increase the volume of resin putty, improve its polishing function.