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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Apple's new sapphire glass manufacturing partner, GT Advanced, owns some very advanced technology to manufacture extremely thin sheets of sapphire much more cheaply than current methods.

TechCrunch has done some digging and discovered a company called Twin Creeks that GT Advanced acquired late last year. Twin Creeks developed a hydrogen particle accelerator (pictured below) as a cheaper alternative to saws when attempting to slice larger chunks of sapphire for use on electronics.

particleaccelerator.jpg
Twin Creeks' hydrogen ion particle accelerator (basically an ion cannon) allowed them to place wafers around the edges of the device and smash them with hydrogen ions. Here's a description of the process from Extreme Tech:

"A particle accelerator bombards these wafers with hydrogen ions, and with exacting control of the voltage of the accelerator, the hydrogen ions accumulate precisely 20 micrometers from the surface of each wafer. A robotic arm then transports the wafers to a furnace where the ions expand into hydrogen gas, which cause the 20-micrometer-thick layer to shear off."

The process, when applied to solar, is then followed up by backing the sheets with flexible metal. The result is a huge reduction in thickness of sheets without the use of saws. This results in a big reduction in costs.
According to the press release GT Advanced released last week, GT expects to see its gross margins to drop significantly as sapphire glass production rises -- as costs go down -- but the overall volume will more than make up for it.

TechCrunch goes on to note a patent that Apple got last year that creates a layered touchscreen with a "hyper-thin sheet of sapphire" combined with much cheaper glass sheets. The sapphire glass could be on the outside of the phone, protecting the screen from scratches, while enjoying the cost-savings of cheaper forms of glass on the rest of the display assembly.
By doing this, Apple could stretch out the production and cost factors of sapphire enough to support manufacturing full-size display cover sheets, not just small wearable panels, buttons or protective camera covers. This, in turn, could mean sapphire cover sheets that are harder and tougher than standard glass materials on your iPhone years sooner than most analysts have predicted.
The new Apple/GT Advanced facility is expected to open in Mesa, Arizona sometime next year.

Article Link: Apple's New Manufacturing Partner, GT Advanced, Uses Particle Accelerator to Cut Sapphire Glass Production Costs
 

jyen

macrumors regular
Oct 29, 2012
105
126
Wow, I had no idea you could do stuff like that with a particle accelerator.
 

Reason077

macrumors 68040
Aug 14, 2007
3,586
3,531
Pretty impressive looking particle accelerator.

But I'd be more impressed if it were portable (say, backpack sized) and fired a stream of protons which could trap ectoplasmic entities.
 

Woogaloo

macrumors newbie
Jul 18, 2008
24
1
I'd love to see the cost of the saws if a hydrogen particle accelerator is the "cheaper" alternative...

Either way very cool that they can do this.
 

petsounds

macrumors 65816
Jun 30, 2007
1,493
519
Seems like the forums got caught in a particle accelerator accident as well.

Strange that it's such a small device -- the particle accelerators I've seen pictures of are several miles in length and accelerate the particles using pulsed electromagnets. I'm surprised they can accelerate the particles in such a small enclosure and get enough velocity to cut through sapphire!
 

jtmarine73

macrumors regular
Nov 9, 2011
103
70
I'd love to see the cost of the saws if a hydrogen particle accelerator is the "cheaper" alternative...

Either way very cool that they can do this.

I would bet the cost is more, but there are no saws to replace. Hydrogen is in pretty good supply. :) Pretty amazing innovation for a company that can't innovate anymore. Would love to see how much stronger sapphire is then gorilla glass.
 

klaxamazoo

macrumors 6502
Sep 8, 2006
438
0
I'd love to see the cost of the saws if a hydrogen particle accelerator is the "cheaper" alternative...

Either way very cool that they can do this.

It's not the cost of the saws that makes the Hydrogen Particle Accelerator cheaper. It is the fact that you don't waste a saw blade's width of material, don't waste material polishing, etc. It takes 17 days to make one ingot of sapphire and using the particle accelerators probably get 5x as many wafers out of a single ingot using this process.
 

neutrino23

macrumors 68000
Feb 14, 2003
1,881
391
SF Bay area
I'd love to see the cost of the saws if a hydrogen particle accelerator is the "cheaper" alternative...

Either way very cool that they can do this.

The problem is that the saw blade is relatively thick so that you wind up losing most of the sapphire to the saw cut. Using the proton method there is virtually no wasted material.

Accelerating protons into sapphire is a clever idea. Charged particles in solids lose energy as 1/E. This means that the slower they move the faster they they slow down. This is why they all wind up at roughly the same depth. The protons acquire an electron from the matrix becoming hydrogen. When the boule is heated the gas expands and a thin slice cleaves off the boule.

Interesting that they will layer 20 microns of sapphire over glass. Sapphire is extremely hard but it might not be tough. Perhaps the combination is both scratch resistant and fracture resistant.
 

DTphonehome

macrumors 68000
Apr 4, 2003
1,914
3,377
NYC
Seems like the forums got caught in a particle accelerator accident as well.

Strange that it's such a small device -- the particle accelerators I've seen pictures of are several miles in length and accelerate the particles using pulsed electromagnets. I'm surprised they can accelerate the particles in such a small enclosure and get enough velocity to cut through sapphire!

If my understanding of the technology is correct, the particles don't actually cut the material. The hydrogen particles accumulate on the surface of the sapphire, and then, when heated, they expand and shear off a fragment of the sapphire substrate.
 

TMay

macrumors 68000
Dec 24, 2001
1,520
1
Carson City, NV
Would Apple also be pushing Silicon on sapphire?

I seem to recall that this is one of the processes available for RF devices; might Apple be delving into this as well?
 

rei101

macrumors 6502a
Dec 24, 2011
976
1
All that 21st century technology just to receive a phone call from someone to tell you your girlfriend is cheating on you.
 
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