Glass specific weight: weight of 1 m² by thickness

Archaeological studies prove that people learned to make glass more than 5 thousand years ago. Ancient Egypt was the birthplace of the first glass ornaments. Glass was used to decorate palace walls and to line the inner surfaces of pyramids. Much has changed since then. Modern technologies make it possible to produce many different types of glass.

Composition and properties of different material types

Glass is an amorphous inorganic material. There are many modifications of it, with different physical and chemical properties and different composition.

Glass is produced by melting glass-forming substances:

• Oxides. For example: quartz glass, germanate glass or ordinary window, silicate, glass.
• Fluorides.

Depending on the requirements for using glass in a particular area, different components are added to give the required characteristics. These include:

• hardness, measured on the Mohs scale and averaging about 6 units; it depends on additional impurities, with quartz glass being the hardest and lead glass the softest;
• thermal conductivity, 0.7 W/mK - 13.4 W/mK;
• resistance to high temperatures;
• electrical conductivity;
• density, or specific weight, which depends on the type: quartz glass has the lowest density, 2200 kg/m3; silicate glass is 2500-2600 kg/m3; lead oxide glass reaches up to 7500 kg/m3;
• transparency;
• impact toughness, for window glass 1.5-2 kN/m; it increases depending on the amount of bromine in the material;
• reflectivity and other characteristics.

When choosing a material, first of all you should be guided by the required physical characteristics of the glass and know exactly which properties matter.

Glass weight

The most common type in everyday life is ordinary silicate or window glass. Its weight is important and must be considered when:

• installing mirror surfaces on walls and ceilings, glass partitions, shower cabins, windows and similar structures;
• selecting fittings and fasteners and calculating loads on structures;
• transporting glass.

The mass of an item M, kg, can be calculated with the formula: M(kg)=S(m2)*t(mm)*2.5, where S is the surface area measured in m2, t is the material thickness in mm, and the coefficient 2.5 means the average weight of 1 m2 of silicate glass 1 mm thick.

The weight of 1 m2 of window glass depends on its thickness. For convenient calculations, the weight values for glass of different thicknesses are shown in the table.

As an example, let us calculate the weight of a standard single-chamber double-glazed unit for one half of a two-sash window.

With a size of 650 mm * 1400 mm, its area is 0.91 m2. If the weight of 4 mm glass is 10 kg/m2, then one pane weighs 9.1 kg and two panes weigh 18.2 kg.

In a double-chamber glazing unit of a balcony block sized 800 mm x 1450 mm, one 6 mm pane and two 4 mm panes are used. Its area is 1.16 m2. The weight of 6 mm glass of this area is 17.4 kg, plus 18.2 kg for the other two panes.

Sheet glass 8 mm thick is used for shower cabin partitions. With a standard cabin size of 90 * 90 cm and a partition height of 2 m, the glass surface area is 3.6 m2. The weight of 8 mm glass is 20 kg/m2, and the mass of the entire partition is 72 kg.

A large aquarium is assembled from glass more than 10 mm thick, so its mass will be considerable. For dimensions of 1300 mm * 600 mm * 600 mm, 2.28 m2 of 10 mm glass and 0.78 m2 of 15 mm glass are required. In this case, the weight of 10 mm glass is 57 kg, and the 15 mm bottom weighs 29 kg.