Float glass is a sheet of glass made by floating molten glass on a bed of molten tin. The term “float” glass derives from Sir Alastair Pilkington, the man who developed the process between 1953 and 1957, together with Kenneth Bickerstaff of the U.K.’s Pilkington Brother. It was the first successful commercial application for forming a continuous ribbon of glass using a molten tin bath on which the molten glass flows laterally, unhindered to the limit of its free flow under the influence of gravity and surface tension. About 90% of the world’s flat glass is currently formed via the float method, which produces glass with extremely flat, parallel surfaces.
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