Fabrication of Energy Efficient Vacuum Glazing using a Novel Edge Sealing Material

This poster aims at presenting an experimental investigations for the fabrication of vacuum glazing using a novel low-temperature edge sealing material, melts at around 200 C, as shown in figure 1. To date two materials indium and solder glass have been used for sealing the edges of the glass sheets in a vacuum glazing. Indium is a low temperature sealing material, melts at 157 C, but is very expensive. Solder glass is a high temperature sealing material, melts at around 450C, but has limitation of using low-e coatings and a tempered glass. One of the main hindrance to the manufacture of vacuum glazing at the industrial level is the cost. In this poster presentation, a vacuum glazing system for production at a laboratory scale using a modified evacuation pump-out sealing technique is presented. A number of samples have been fabricated using a novel cost effective edge sealing material that achieves an evacuation pressure less than 0.046 Pa in the cavity of the vacuum glazing samples. An experimental performance verification of samples using new cost effective sealing materials will be executed in a hot box calorimeter to measure thermal transmittance performance of the samples. Issues associated with degradation of the vacuum pressure inside the cavity can be addressed by introducing non-evaporable getters.