How many uses does quartz sand have? Finally someone said it!

Glass industry

The glass industry is a large user of quartz raw materials, quartz raw materials give silicate glass and its products many excellent properties, such as transparency, mechanical strength, chemical stability, etc. SiO2 content in raw materials will have an important impact on the performance of silicate glass products, in the composition of ordinary silicate glass, SiO2 generally accounts for about 65% ~ 75%. Modern float glass generally requires quartz raw material SiO2 content above 96%, Al2O3 content below 2%, Fe2O3 between 0.01% and 0.1%, particle size of about 0.4mm, particle size above 0.5mm and below 0.1mm shall not exceed 5%.

High-grade glass, such as special glass, high-quality flat glass and precision optical glass, quartz raw material chemical composition has more strict requirements, the content of SiO2 should be more than 99%, the content of Fe2O3 should be less than 0.05% ~ 0.1%, the content of Al2O3 and TiO2 respectively in 0.5 ~ 2.0% and 0.05% below.

Mechanical casting industry

In the mechanical casting industry, quartz raw materials are widely used as molding sand, casting mold core and casting mold, etc., because quartz sand has the characteristics of high melting point in addition to the smelting process also has the role of warming, desulfurization, deoxidation and so on. The amount of quartz sand in the casting industry is relatively large, generally the production of 1 ton of casting requires 1 ton of sand and clay. With the improvement of the degree of precision of castings, there are higher requirements for the purity of quartz raw materials. For example, the content of SiO2 in quartz sand required by the more advanced resin sand process in casting is higher than 97%, and the particle size should be between 40 and 320 mesh. Quartz sand used in the foundry industry accounts for about 33 percent of the world's total production.

Ceramic industry

As a kind of barren raw material, quartz raw material can adjust the plasticity and bonding of ceramic billet body, which can offset the contraction of the billet body and react with alumina to form the structural skeleton of ceramic material in the process of firing, improve the mechanical strength of ceramic products, but also increase its transmittance and whiteness.

Quartz is the main form of vitreous ceramic glaze, giving ceramic glaze a series of good physical and chemical properties (such as strength, gloss, wear resistance, hardness and chemical erosion resistance, etc.), in addition to increasing the content of SiO2 glaze can also improve the melting temperature and viscosity of glaze.

Fused quartz ceramics, fused quartz or quartz glass as raw material, the raw material is crushed, and then through raw material classification, ball grinding pulping, grouting or injection type, and finally made of sintering process of sintered body. Fused quartz ceramics have a small coefficient of thermal expansion, good thermal shock stability, good electrical insulation, acid and alkali corrosion resistance and many other excellent properties, since its appearance, has been rapidly promoted and applied in the world.

Refractory industry

The main use of quartz in the refractory industry is in the production of siliceous refractory bricks, including silicon bricks, lightweight silicon bricks and fused quartz products. In order to ensure that the refractoriness of silica refractory is higher than 1650 ~ 1700℃, the load softening temperature is higher than 1650℃, and it has the characteristics of good thermal stability, good chemical stability, small thermal expansion coefficient and high mechanical properties, it is necessary to strictly control the content of SiO2 in quartz raw materials and the gradation of quartz particles, otherwise it will seriously affect the performance of refractory materials. Generally, the content of SiO2 in quartz raw materials is more than 93%. For quartz raw materials with poor crystal state, the coarse particles should be limited to less than 2mm.

Chemical industry

The application of quartz sand in the chemical industry is commonly seen in sodium silicate, silica gel and paucine and other products. As an example, according to its different uses can be divided into solid and liquid Pauline, as washing supplies and carton adhesive liquid Pauline requirements SiO2 content is higher than 98%, Fe2O3 content is lower than 0.2%, particle size requirements between 0.2~2mm, and as a catalyst for petroleum refining solid Pauline is stricter, The content of SiO2 is higher than 99%, and the content of Fe2O3 is lower than 0.03%.

Water purification material

Quartz sand is a kind of water purification material widely used in all kinds of water supply treatment, sewage treatment and environmental governance. But because of the quartz sand filter material surface pores, specific surface area and isoelectric point is low, under normal conditions with negative electricity, making it on the water toxic substances (heavy metal ions, etc.), bacteria, viruses and organic matter removal effect is not ideal. In recent years, researchers have put forward the idea of modifying ordinary quartz sand filter media. By attaching different functional substances on the surface of quartz sand, the properties of the filter media surface can be improved to make modified filter media with excellent adsorption performance and certain mechanical strength. In view of the current economic level of our country, this technology will be widely used in water treatment.

Photovoltaic ultra white glass

As a new material, super white glass has a wide application prospect in solar photovoltaic industry, high-end cars, high-end buildings, high-end horticultural buildings and high-end furniture with its high light transmittance and crystal clear characteristics. During the "14th Five-Year Plan", according to the national "carbon peak, carbon neutral" strategic planning, the photovoltaic industry will attract explosive development, its basic material photovoltaic ultra-white glass used for low iron quartz sand demand is expected to grow at a rapid rate of more than 30% per year.

Artificial quartz stone plate

Artificial quartz stone is made of 93% ~ 95% quartz and about 7% of unsaturated polyester resin adhesive, color, curing initiator and other auxiliary reagents, a kind of composite material produced by curing molding, it is hard, dense structure, rich color, wear resistance, pressure resistance, high temperature resistance, corrosion resistance, penetration resistance, widely used in the market, It is the fastest growing variety of artificial stone.

The production process of artificial quartz stone is generally: raw materials from the automatic batching system into the mixing system, the quartz sand, quartz powder, resin and other additives mixed into the mold frame cloth, and then under vacuum conditions for vibration compaction, and then the pressed good mixture into the curing furnace heating and curing, curing good material into the blank plate, and then after polishing. A series of tests are carried out on the polished sheet to remove defects.

Quartz crucible

Quartz crucible belongs to the quartz glass products in the subdivision products, has clean, homogenous, high temperature resistance and other properties. At present, it is widely used in the production process of refining crystalline silicon in solar energy and semiconductor fields, and it is a consumable in the production process of crystalline silicon. The demand for high purity quartz sand and quartz sand crucible is expected to grow rapidly due to the accelerated expansion of silicon wafer capacity and increased permeability of N-type silicon wafer.

The production of quartz crucible is to load the high purity quartz sand into the rotating forming die which can be tilted at any Angle, use the action of centrifugal force and the forming rod to shape by hand, move the crucible shaped rotating device to the electrode rod, then send electricity to start the arc and insert the electrode into the formed powder cavity, at the same time start the vacuum system, so that it can quickly melt into the molten quartz in the shape of the crucible, and take it out after cooling. That is to complete the blank production of a quartz crucible.

Optical fiber

Optical fiber, short for optical fiber, is a cylindrical optical waveguide used for long-distance transmission of light energy or light signal, its structure is made of various optical materials made of fiber. At present, the mainstream of communication fiber is quartz fiber. As the "source" of optical fiber and cable production, optical fiber prefabricated rod has always been considered as the core competitive point of the optical fiber and cable industry chain. Among them, the quartz sleeve accounts for more than 90% of the quartz material of the optical fiber, which is used as the outsourcing layer material and the large size doping mandrel is matched into the optical fiber prefabricated rod to reduce the production cost of the optical fiber prefabricated rod.

By using natural quartz sand as raw material and plasma solid deposition method (PSOD), domestic researchers have prepared large-size quartz sleeve for single-mode fiber prefabrication rod. The product has the characteristics of single-mode forming, low hydroxy-content, less impurity content, large size (compared with multi-mode sleeve) and good glass transition process, which can meet the requirements for the preparation of single-mode fiber prefabrication rod.

Electronic glass

TFT-LCD glass substrate, as the core component of liquid crystal display panel, is the key strategic material of electronic information display industry. Its production control precision is comparable to that of semiconductor industry, representing the highest level in the modern glass large-scale manufacturing field in the world. SiO2 is an important structural element of TFT-LCD glass substrate. SiO2 forms an irregular continuous network with the structure of silico-oxygen tetrahedron [SiO4] and becomes the skeleton of glass, accounting for 58% ~ 63% of the glass composition. It can reduce the coefficient of thermal expansion of glass. Improve the thermal stability, chemical stability, softening temperature, strain point, heat resistance, hardness, mechanical strength, viscosity and UV light transmittance of glass.

Vaccine glass bottle

Vaccine vials, made of the highest grade of "water resistant" borosilicate glass. Although the main component of borosilicate glass is ordinary quartz sand (silica), but the preparation process is not ordinary. The boron content of borosilicate glass is more than 10%, and the alumina content is close to 7%, which leads to the problems of high viscosity and high melting temperature in the melting process. At the same time, the bubble content, chemical uniformity and temperature uniformity of medium borosilicate glass are much higher than that of ordinary glass.

Glass fibre

Glass fiber is a kind of inorganic nonmetallic material with excellent performance. It has a wide variety of advantages, such as good insulation, strong heat resistance, good corrosion resistance and high mechanical strength. Glass fiber is quartz sand, phyllachite, kaolin, limestone and other ores as raw materials by high temperature melting, wire drawing, drying, winding and other processes, the diameter of the monofilm is a few microns to 20 microns, equivalent to a hair 1/20-1/5, each bunch of fiber fibers are composed of hundreds or even thousands of monofilms. Glass fiber is usually used as reinforcement materials in composite materials, electrical insulation materials and thermal insulation materials, electric roadbed board and other fields of the national economy, is the national focus to encourage the development of new materials industry.

Quartz fibre

Quartz fiber is a kind of high performance inorganic fiber, the preparation of raw materials for high purity silica or natural quartz crystal. It retains some properties and characteristics of solid quartz, is a good high temperature resistant material, and can be used as a reinforcement of advanced composite materials. The purity of quartz fiber is very high (≥99.9%), which makes it have some good characteristics, such as strong ablative resistance, good temperature resistance, low thermal conductivity, and its high chemical stability, dielectric properties are also better.

Oil fracturing proppant

Fracturing is an important technical means to stabilize and increase oil and gas production, especially for the development of low permeability and ultra-deep oil and gas reservoirs. Among them, fracturing proppant is the core technical product of oil and gas fracturing. It is a key material used to support artificial fracture in oil and gas reservoir reconstruction and is the key to improve the success rate of fracturing and reconstruction effect.

Proppant is a natural sand or artificial high strength ceramic solid particles with a certain size and strength, a certain sphericity and grading. Proppant development has taken place over the decades since the world's first successful hydraulic fracturing technique was developed. At present, the main proppant used in industry is natural quartz sand, artificial ceramic, coated proppant 3 kinds.

Calcium silicate plate

Calcium silicate board is an inorganic building board with high strength and stable performance, which is made of siliceous materials, calcium materials and reinforced fiber as the main raw materials by slurry molding, slab compaction and autoclaved curing. With fire (reach A1 level standards), heat preservation and insulation, anticorrosion and moth-proof, waterproof and moisture proof, sound insulation, light, high strength, green harmless superior characteristics, than the traditional plate more energy saving, environmental protection, seismic, impact resistance, can be widely used in building interior and exterior insulation decoration, ceiling and cabin partition, billboard and other fields, and design and installation plasticity, time and labor saving.

Quartz sand is one of the most important raw materials in calcium silicate products, accounting for 40% of the raw material quality of calcium silicate board. The purity of SiO2 in quartz sand has a great impact on the generation of tobermolite crystals in the hydration reaction process. Quartz powder not involved in chemical reactions is also used as the aggregate in cement cements. However, the wet abrasion energy of quartz sand is very large. In order to reduce the wet grinding energy consumption of quartz sand and make more use of industrial wastes, quartz sand with SiO2 content higher than 90% is preferred in the production of calcium silicate board, and a certain amount of fly ash can be added appropriately to reduce the production cost.

Colored sand floor

Colored quartz sand is the main raw material of colored sand floor coating. Colored sand floor coating is a kind of floor material made of colored quartz sand as aggregate and modified epoxy resin as adhesive. The construction thickness is generally 3 ~ 30mm, which is suitable for hotels, office buildings, exhibition halls, shopping malls, hospitals and other places. In recent years, epoxy colored flat decoration floor is very popular in developed countries, known as "color sand seamless hard carpet" in European and American countries.

Color quartz sand not only gives the floor beautiful decorative performance, but also can guarantee the floor of high compressive resistance and high wear resistance. The colored quartz sand in the epoxy floor should be spherical particles, and have appropriate gradation. The colored sand particles can be packed as closely as possible, so that the epoxy colored sand layer is fully dense. This can ensure the strength of the product, save the amount of resin coating, reduce the cost. The colored quartz sand in the colored sand floor is mainly artificially prepared.

Industrial packing

Quartz sand as an industrial filler is another important application field, has been widely paid attention to. Mainly used in organic polymer materials, such as plastics and their plastic films, rubber, coatings, paints and binders, to improve their physical and chemical properties or improve one aspect of the property, such as quartz sand can improve the compressive and tensile strength of plastics. Generally, the quality of quartz sand is relatively high, the content of SiO2 reaches more than 99%, the content of Fe2O3 should be below 0.05%. Sometimes the quality requirements of quartz sand can reach the requirements of high purity quartz.