Method for producing fibers from heat-softening materials

Claim 1

A method for producing fibers from a glass material, which comprises: heating the glass material in a melting crucible to form a viscous melt, and continuously causing the melt to flow from said crucible through at least one nozzle provided thereon; and jetting out at least three substantially straight-line high speed gas streams disposed at intervals around the melt in its peripheral direction, each of said streams having a component in the tangential direction along the cross-section of the melt and a component which gradually approaches the central axial line of the melt toward the flowing direction of the melt and then gradually departs from the central axial line, toward the melt which has flown out, whereby the melt is rotated about its central axial line and is formed into a substantially conical shape in a first zone which ranges from the flow-initiating part of the melt to the part at which the gas stream most closely approaches the central axial line of the melt, and in a second zone subsequent to the first zone, the melt being allowed to fly in fibrous form from the tip of the conical shape in a vortex form in the flowing direction and outwardly in the radial direction and wherein said straight-line high speed gas streams are inclined at an angle of 20 to 70° to the central axial line of the melt, the distance between the outlet of the melt-flowing nozzle and the focal point at which the high speed gas stream most closely approaches the central axial line of the melt being 0.2 to 10 times the effective hole diameter of the melt-flowing nozzle, and said straight-line high speed gas streams being arranged symmetrically with respect to the central axial line of the melt as a rotating symmmetrical axis, and at least two of the angles formed between the central axial lines of the adjoining gas streams being 95 to 135°.

Claim 2

A method for producing fibers from a glass material, which comprises: heating the glass material in a melting crucible to form a viscous melt, and continuously causing the melt to flow from said crucible through at least one nozzle provided thereon; and jetting out at least three substantially straight-line high speed gas streams disposed at intervals around the melt in its peripheral direction, each of said streams having a component in the tangential direction along the cross-section of the melt and a component which gradually approaches the central axial line of the melt toward the flowing direction of the melt and then gradually departs from the central axial line, toward the melt which has flown out, whereby the melt is rotated about its central axial line and is formed into a substantially conical shape in a first zone which ranges from the flow-initiating part of the melt to the part at which the gas stream most closely approaches the central axial line of the melt, and in a second zone subsequent to the first zone, the melt being allowed to fly in fibrous form from the tip of the conical shape in a vortex form in the flowing direction and outwardly in the radial direction and wherein said straight-line high speed gas streams are inclined at an angle of 20 to 70° to the central axial line of the melt, the distance between the outlet of the melt-flowing nozzle and the focal point at which the high speed gas stream most closely approaches the central axial line of the melt being 0.2 to 10 times the effective hole diameter of the melt-flowing nozzle, and said straight-line high speed gas streams being arranged symmetrically with respect to the central axial line of the melt as a rotating symmmetrical axis, and at least two of the angles formed between the central axial lines of the adjoining gas streams being 95 to 135°.