Application of the Christiansen-Shelyubskii method to determine homogeneity and refractive index of industrial glasses

Abstract

The Christiansen-Shelyubskii method has been applied to determine the homogeneity of both colorless and colored technical glasses. It could be confirmed that this method is sufficiently sensitive to changes by the melting process of flat, container and special glasses. The homogeneity factor, which essentially is the standard deviation of the refractive index, can be obtained with a precision of about ±5 %. The measurement simultaneously delivers the mean refractive index with high accuracy. This property possibly could be used to substitute density measurements to control the constancy of glass composition. The Christiansen-Shelyubskii method can be standardized and highly automated. About 15 samples can be measured per day. Thus it shows all features of a method to be used for industrial quality control.