DEEP SEA, DOWNHOLE & MARINE MOLDED GLASS DOME & MOLDED GLASS SPHERE - FLANGED

Full Spherical Transparent Ultra-high Pressure Submersible Hull
Full Spherical Transparent Ultra-high Pressure Submersible Hull

ROV With Ultra-High Pressure Camera Dome
ROV With Ultra-High Pressure Camera Dome

GLASS, STRONGER THAN STEEL FOR AUV & ROV ENVIRONMENTS:

Glass, as is used in a Rayotek Flanged Mounted Molded Glass Dome, is by definition amorphous. What this means is good quality glass is naturally homogeneous and mechanically symmetric down to the atomic level. There are uniaxially stronger crystalline materials such as sapphire, but under the isostatic pressure conditions that AUV's and ROV's operate, crystalline materials are weaker for dome and sphere shapes. This is because crystalline asymmetric structures allow for premature buckling in the weaker axis. For metals and ceramics, grain boundaries must be considered because grains and grain boundaries are susceptible to uncontrollable creep and slippage. Therefore glass, specifically high quality, homogeneous glass like the glass used for Rayotek borosilicate glass domes is by far the superior material for high-pressure environments.

Add to that over 25 years of research, engineering, and exhaustive testing, to develop flanged dome mounting systems that truly support the dome; allowing the flanged glass dome to achieve its optimum strength.


ROV with Glass Pilot Camera Dome
ROV with Glass Pilot Camera Dome

Undersea Platform as viewed from ROV
Undersea Platform as viewed from ROV

RAYOTEK'S SUGGESTIONS FOR A ROBUST HIGH PRESSURE MOLDED GLASS DOME SYSTEM:

  1. Build the glass molded dome as dimensionally symmetric as possible. The more deviation from circularity and sphericity, the weaker the glass dome.
  2. Choose good quality glass, such as borosilicate glass, so the material homogeneity is good. Inhomogeneous glass compresses non-uniformly.
  3. Mount the dome to a flange properly. The ideal mounted dome behaves as if the glass dome is floating independently from the flange to which it is mounted
  4. Choose a company that can co-engineer and properly test your flange mounted glass domes to insure they can handle the environmental conditions to which they will be subjected. Proper testing, including life testing, is critical to the safety of life, equipment, and your reputation.

Rayotek has decades of experience designing flanged mounted molded optical domes for the most extreme, hostile environments. Rayotek is the sole supplier for many military and commercial applications that use our optical domes and windows.


RAYOTEK FLANGED DOMES CAPABILITIES LINKS


* A glass sphere is simply two hemispheric glass domes sealed together. A common practice in deep sea applications is to create semi-autonomous camera and electronic glass spheres with two Rayotek hemispheric domes with feed-through holes for electronics. Properly designed feed-through holes do not compromise the strength of the dome.