is glass really a liquid?

Answer 1

Yes it is and it flows even in solid form just very very slowly. Windows taken from old buildings are thicker at the bottom than the top.

Answer 2

Okay, so if glass 'flows' as is being suggested, Roman and earlier glass would not exist - they would just be 'blobs' - after all, the earliest glass comes from around 2500BC - and may be even earlier! It was used as a glaze for pottery - and if it were to 'flow', we would not know that as it would 'flow' off the clay!

However, there are some who may not believe this - so went to the old favourite, Wiki and came up with these points:

Glass as a liquid
One common misconception is that glass is a super-cooled liquid of practically infinite viscosity at room temperature and as such flows, though very slowly, similar to pitch. Glass is generally treated as an amorphous solid rather than a liquid, though different views can be justified since characterizing glass as either 'solid' or 'liquid' is not an entirely straightforward matter. However, the notion that glass flows to an appreciable extent over extended periods of time is not supported by empirical evidence or theoretical analysis

Behaviour of antique glass
The observation that old windows are often thicker at the bottom than at the top is often offered as supporting evidence for the view that glass flows over a matter of centuries. It is then assumed that the glass was once uniform, but has flowed to its new shape.

The likely source of this belief is that when panes of glass were commonly made by glassblowers, the technique used was to spin molten glass so as to create a round, mostly flat and even plate (the Crown glass process, described above). This plate was then cut to fit a window. The pieces were not, however, absolutely flat; the edges of the disk would be thicker because of centrifugal forces. When actually installed in a window frame, the glass would be placed thicker side down for the sake of stability and visual sparkle. Occasionally such glass has been found thinner side down, as would be caused by carelessness at the time of installation.

Mass production of glass window panes in the early twentieth century caused a similar effect. In glass factories, molten glass was poured onto a large cooling table and allowed to spread. The resulting glass is thicker at the location of the pour, located at the center of the large sheet. These sheets were cut into smaller window panes with nonuniform thickness.

Oh, and I have also checked where they got their information from!

So, in summary, glass is a SOLID!

Answer 3

no, that one is based on a misunderstanding. glass is a liquid in a thermodynamic sense, because to make it you have to cool down the molten ingredients so fast that they cannot chrystalise. in thermodynamics it nis therefore called a frozen, supercooled liquid, but in every other sense it is an amorphous solid. the story of the old windows that are thicker at the bottom than at the top is an urban myth (perpetuated by bill bryson in a short history of nearly everything, which is something i'm very disapppointed about). glass is, however, subject to deformation under stress, but so are a lot of other solids.

Answer 4

There is no clear answer to the question "Is glass solid or liquid?". In terms of molecular dynamics and thermodynamics it is possible to justify various different views that it is a highly viscous liquid, an amorphous solid, or simply that glass is another state of matter which is neither liquid nor solid...

Answer 5

It's a solid in our time frame.
But given a long enough period of time, it displays the properties of a liquid.

If you look at some really old windows in churches or houses over 100 years old, you will noticethat the glass bulges at teh bottom and is thin at the top.
This is because the glass is very slowly flowing downwards like a liquid.

If you left ot for long enough (say a few thousand years) it would pour itself right out of the windowframe altogether.

Answer 6

Yes,take a look at glass 1 or 2 centuries old it's wider at the base than the top.

Answer 7

At room temperature, glass is a solid, it needs to be heated for it to become a liquid. By the way, the only metal to be liquid at room temperature is murcury.

Answer 8

When it's really hot, yes. When it's at the normal temperature, it's a solid with moderately viscous qualities (that is, it gradually flows downward with gravity).

Answer 9

Glass is a solid that, with enough heat, can become a liquid.
Metals, too, are solids that, with heat, will become liquid.
Lava is rock that has become so hot that it has become liquid
There are gases that, when put under pressure, become liquified.

Check it out!

Answer 10

:/ erm if heated to a certain temprature it can be a solid liquid or even a gas WOW gas glass!! :p