Glassman Latin America 2024: Spearheading the Future of Glass Efficiency

The Glassman Latin America conference, set to be held in Mexico City this May, will shine a spotlight on enhancing production processes and achieving efficiency improvements within the glass manufacturing sector.

Featuring 22 industry-focused presentations, this event promises to be a pivotal gathering for professionals seeking to advance in the glass industry.

The Glassman Latin America conference takes place in Mexico City in May and has 22 presentations focused on the glass industry.

Kicking off with a keynote speech by Arglass CEO Jose de Diego Arozamena, the two-day event will focus on topics such as decarbonisation, glass technology innovation and manufacturing efficiency.

One of the areas under the spotlight will be Refractories, where two companies will provide presentations.

SEFPRO

Sefpro’s Services Director, Victor Mathieu, (pictured below) will discuss ‘Glass Furnace Refractory material behaviour control with enhanced sensor technology and digital platform’.

The abstract for his presentation is as follows:

“In the challenge of glass manufacturing decarbonisation and consecutive glass melting technology evolutions, glass tank refractory material will be subjected to higher corrosion stresses, especially with electrical boosting or full electrical melting.

"Controlling the lifespan of new furnace designs will be a key element given the operating and maintenance conditions of the furnaces which are relatively unknown.

To support glassmakers on this objective, SEFPRO has developed a soldier block temperature monitoring solution on dedicated digital platform called SEFPROGUARD.

Thanks to this new technology, SEFPROGUARD secures and provides reliable temperature data to detect unexpected short-term events and analyze a long-term temperature evolution related to soldier block corrosion.

This digital solution, in correlation with furnace data platform, will become a key element to manage furnace lifetime and to analyze the impact of operating parameters on soldier block corrosion rate.”

RATH

RATH’s Head of Sales Glass, Robert Nusszer, (pictured below) will discuss the ‘Installation of feeder expendables from a refractory perspective, avoidance of machine downtimes caused by typical installation errors, and, in general, how to maximise the service life of feeder expendables.’

His abstract is as follows:

Due to high productivity, minimising machine downtimes has the highest priority in the container glass industry.

It is well known that in all areas of the glass making industry, high-quality refractories are the basis for superior glass conditioning.

Their use in forehearth and feeder mechanisms plays a crucial role in the formation and conditioning of glass prior to being formed into finished products.

All RATH refractories are formulated from the highest quality raw materials and designed to achieve predictable density and resistance to erosion and corrosion.

However, to achieve good refractory performance, we must always bear in mind that feeder expendables are sensitive, high-purity and fragile products, and must be installed according to the refractory manufacturer’s guidelines to avoid installation errors that lead to machine downtime.

This presentation focuses on typical mistakes made when installing feeder expendables, provides recommendations on how to avoid these mistakes, and introduces the latest developments from RATH.

The Glassman Latin America trade show and conference is free to attend and takes place May 15 and 16 in Santa Fe, Mexico City.