Splitting of glass and SiC ceramic sheets using controlled fracture technique with elliptic microwave spot

This paper presents an alternative splitting method of both thick glass (transparent material) and Sic ceramic (non-transparent) sheets without causing removal of material based on controlled fracture technique with elliptic microwave spot. This method is called as MISM (Microwave Induced Split Method) for short. First, the fact of that 2.45 GHz microwave could volumetrically heat 10-mm thickness NaCa glass and Sic ceramic sheets is theoretically proved. Then MISM physical model and corresponding apparatus is developed. Simulating of distribution of power loss density of microwave spot in the physical model is performed. Simulating results shows that an elliptic volumetrically heating microwave spot is obtained, which is testified by measured temperature distribution on the input and output surface of sheet. NaCa glass sheets with max thickness of 4 mm and Sic sheets with max thickness of 3 mm are both split without causing removal of material. The split line is straight. The split procedure is as same as the procedure of controlled fracture technique with laser spot. The sub-processes of split were related with the movement of three parts of elliptic microwave spot.