Effect of enameling on the strength and dynamic fatigue of soda-lime-silica float glass

The effect of a glass enamel coating on the strength and fatigue behavior of float glass was investigated. Commercially available enamel that was comprised of Cu ₂Cr ₂O ₄ pigment particles in a bismuth-zinc borosilicate glass matrix was applied to a soda-lime-silica float glass via screen printing, followed by fusion at elevated temperature. Strengths of the enameled specimens were evaluated in biaxial flexure using a ring-on-ring (ROR) test geometry, and the data were analyzed using a conventional two-parameter Weibull distribution. Enameling was found to significantly degrade the strength of the float glass. There was no statistical difference in the characteristic strengths of samples enameled on the air side (66 MPa) compared with samples enameled on the tin side (61 MPa) of the float glass. Fractographic analysis revealed that the failures in the enameled float glass samples initiated at pores and pigment aggregates in the enamel, whereas failures in float glass samples initiated solely from surface flaws. Dynamic fatigue tests were performed on enameled float glass and indented float glass samples to determine the effect of the enamel on the stress corrosion behavior of the enameled components. There was no statistically significant difference between the stress corrosion exponents for the float glass and enameled float glass specimens.