strength in materials Technical Product Guide www.agy.com Table of Contents Corporate Overview AGY provides the best quality, highest performance, and broadest range of glass fiber yarns, rovings and chop products to Corporate Overview .............................1 a wide variety of markets and end uses. Although founded as an independent entity Glass Fiber Manufacturing ...................2 in 1998, AGY has a 50+ year history of serving the composites industry. Nomenclature ......................................3 Globally, AGY has over 600 employees Conversion Tables ...............................6 involved in production, sales, distribution and development of our products. Our AGY Glass Yarns .................................8 world headquarters, technology center and manufacturing facility are located in Aiken, AGY Glass Rovings ...........................14 SC U.S.A. AGY Chopped Glass ..........................16 We also have commercial and administrative offices in Lyon, France, and AGY Packaging Specificaions ............18 a commercial office in Shanghai, China. AGY Sizing Systems ..........................20 Typical Fiber Properties .....................26 Glossary of Terms ..............................28 strength in materials 1 Glass Fiber Manufacturing Glass Fiber Nomenclature AGY glass fibers are made from molten glass. The viscous liquid is General drawn through tiny holes at the base of the furnace to form hair-like Glass fiber yarns are typically identified by either an inch-pound based system (U.S. customary system) or a TEX/metric system (based on the SI*/metric system). filaments. A protective sizing, applied as the filament cools and This section gives a brief description of glass fiber yarn nomenclature, including hardens, helps prevent abrasion during additional processing and comparisons of the two systems (see table on page 4). A more comprehensive makes the glass compatible with various resin systems. description can be found in ASTM D578 – standard specification for glass fiber strands. For yarn products, after sizing is applied, filaments are gathered AGY’s products use standardized nomenclature designations that include both alphabetical and numerical elements. They identify glass composition, filament type, into strands and wound into intermediate (forming) packages for strand count and yarn construction. These designations match either an inch-pound processing. These strands become the basic components for a version or a TEX/metric version. Both systems are industry-recognized identifications. variety of textile and roving products. Roving Nomenclature Textile yarns are produced by twisting and sometimes plying several Glass fiber roving nomenclature is defined by ASTM D578. The nomenclature uses strands of fiber. Once twisted, the yarns can be further processed alpha-numeric designations signifying binder, sizing, yield in yards and method of by beaming or rewinding onto different packages. manufacture/construction of a roving. The following is an explanation of the standard alpha-numerical form: XXXX-YY-ZZZZ. • “XXXX” is a number/character combination signifying a binder (sizing). Textile yarns can also be texturized for decorative and industrial Typically it is a three-digit number with or without a letter designation afterwards. applications and coated with a variety of resinous or elastomeric • “YY” is a two-character alpha (letter) designation used internally by AGY to materials. For some processes, the gathered strands are not identify the method of manufacture or construction of a roving, for example it wound onto packages but are further processed into chopped may be an assemblage of multiple ends of a G75 yarn to produce a given yield. The letters would change as the method of production changed. Note that each strands for a variety of applications. company producing glass fiber rovings use their own letter designations so they would not be comparable for similar products from different manufacturers. Because of this, roving nomenclature is often shortened to indicate only the sizing and the yield as in 449-750, dropping the two-letter middle designator. • “ZZZZ” at the end of the form is the yield in yards/lb for U.S. customary system (or TEX for the SI/metric system), typically rounded to the nearest conventional yield (e.g., AGY’s 449-AA-750 yield rovings are actually 735 yds./lb. nominal). Raw Material Storage Twisting Designations such as 250, 750 and 1250 have been in existence for years, and it has become convention to use them instead of actual nominals. Please refer to Beams Bushing Various Yarn the appropriate product technical specification for actual yields of a given product. bobbins Furnace Texturizing Air Jet Chop Nomenclature Binder Application Glass fiber chop nomenclature is defined by ASTM D578. The chop nomenclature is Chop Forming Package modelled after the yarn nomenclature, and has the basic form: Assembled roving SG37 544 5/32 INCH 2204 LB BULK BAG Where S = Glass type, and can be E, S, L etc Single End Roving G = Filament filameter (See Table 1) Oven 37 = chop bundle size, in this case it was chopped from a 3700 yd / lb input 544 = Binder system 5/32 inch = chop length 2204 lb bulk bag = packaging 2 *Le Système International d’ Unités (SI) 3 Yarn Nomenclaure Typical Yarn Nomenclature Identified Typical Yarn Nomenclature Identified Twist in U.S. Customary System In TEX/Metric System The fifth segment in the nomenclature is the number of basic strands* twisted (based on inch-pound) (based on SI/metric) together intp a single yarn. Following this number is the number of turns per unit length and either the letter “S” or “Z” which indicates the direction of the twist. The Glass Composition: Glass Composition: S or Z direction of the yarn is determined by the slope of the yarn when it is held in E=Electrical E=Electrical L=Low Dieletric L=Low Dieletric a vertical position. E S=High Strength E S=High Strength A twist is mechanically applied to yarns because, in addition to helping keep all of Type of Filament: Type of Filament: C=Continuous C=Continuous the filaments together, it provides the yarn higher abrasion resistance, improved S=Staple S=Staple processing and better tensile strength. C T=Texturized C T=Texturized Filament Diameter: Filament Diameter: (see Table 1) (see Table 1) G 9 Yield Designation: Yield Designation: (see Table 2) (see Table 2) 75 Z twist: ascending left to 68 right configuration as in center of letter Z Number of single strands Number of single strands twisted into continuous filament twisted into continuous filament 1/2 ends/Number of twisted 1x2 ends x Number of twisted strands plied together strands plied together U.S. Customary Yield Number of turns per inch in Direction of twist The approximate length of the fabricated yarn required to make one pound mass The twist of the final yarn S = S direction can be computed when the yield designation number is multiplied by 100 and 2.8 Z = Z direction divided by the total number of strands. The result of this computation must always S (see next page) be considered approximate. The yards per pound are reduced slightly in the Direction of twist Number of turns per meter in twisting and plying operations, and by the addition of sizes or binders. S = S direction the twist of the final yarn Z = Z direction 112 S (see next page) The example above then identifies the The example above then identifies the Following yarn: ECG75 1/2 2.8S Following yarn: EC9 68 1x2 S112 E = electrical glass E = electrical glass C = continuous filament C = continuous filament G = average filament diameter 9 = 9 micrometers (see table 1) 68 = 68 grams per 1,000 meters of yarn 75 = 7,500 yards/lb. nominal bare 1x2 = one ply of 2-strand construction glass in basic strand (total 2 basic strands) 1/2 = one ply of 2-strand construction S = the direction of the twist (total 2 basic strands) 112 = the number of turns per meter 2.8 = the number of turns per inch (TPI) (TPM) in the twist of the final yarn in the twist of the final yarn S = the direction of the twist *A “basic” strand is one produced from a single bushing. 4 5 Yarn Nomenclaure (continued) Table 1 - Designations for Glass Strand Filament Diameters Table 3 - Yarn Reference and Conversion Formulas Filament Designations Range for Filament Diameter Average Conversion - Measurements US Units SI Units Microns Inches To Convert To convert (letter) (microns) US SI US Units to SI SI Units to US Units Units BC 4 3.60 to 4.40 0.00014 to 0.000173 Multipy by: Multiply by: C 4.5 4.06 to 4.82 0.00014 to 0.000189 Length mile km 1.6093 0.6214 D 5 4.83 to 5.83 0.00014 to 0.000229 DE 6 5.84 to 6.85 0.00014 to 0.000269 inch mm 25.4000 0.0394 E 7 6.35 to 7.61 0.00014 to 0.000299 inch cm 2.5400 0.3937 F 8 7.62 to 8.88 0.00014 to 0.000345 foot mm 0.3048 3.2808 G 9 8.89 to 10.15 0.00014 to 0.000399 yard mm 0.9144 1.0936 H 11 10.16 to 11.42 0.00014 to 0.000449 2 2 J 12 11.43 to 12.69 0.00014 to 0.000499 Area yard m 0.8361 1.1960 K 13 12.70 to 13.96 0.00014 to 0.000549 inch2 cm2 6.4516 0.1550 L 14 13.97 to 15.23 0.00014 to 0.000599 feet2 m2 0.0929 10.7639 M 16 15.24 to 16.50 0.00014 to 0.000649 Textile oz/yd g/m 31.0039 0.0323 N 17 16.51 to 17.77 0.00014 to 0.000699 oz/yd2 g/m2 33.9063 0.0295 P 18 17.78 to 19.04 0.00014 to 0.000749 Q 20 10.95 to 20.31 0.00014 to 0.000799 turns/in [tpi] turns/m [tpm] 40.000 0 0.0250 R 21 20.32 to 21.58 0.00014 to 0.000849 yd/lb m/kg 2.01659 0.4961 S 22 21.59 to 22.85 0.00014 to 0.000899 T 23 22.86 to 24.12 0.00014 to 0.000949 U 24 24.13 to 25.40 0.00014 to 0.000999 Table 4 - Strand Twist Cross Reference The low values stated for each micron range are exact equivalents to inches, rounded to the nearest houndredth micron.