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High Purity Silica Rods

High purity silica rods
Heraeus has long produced fused silica materials with optimized optical properties for a broad range of specialty fiber applications. Heraeus has mastered the manufacturing of fused silica base materials for UV, VIS, and NIR spectroscopy applications. In addition, we have successfully developed fused silica materials optimized for demanding applications from radiation resistance to high power transmission characteristics.
These fused silica rods are the basis for many types of specialty fiber preforms and applications, such as:
  • Starting materials for plastic clad silica fiber preforms (PCS)
  • Starting materials for photonic crystal fiber preforms (PCF)
Drawing of plastic clad silica fibers

Heraeus manufactures the base material needed for your fiber applications

Heraeus possesses a comprehensive knowledge and portfolio of base materials with optimized optical properties for preform production and related fiber draw applications. Therefore, we can help our customers determine the best fused silica materials for their applications and ultimately provide the material to meet these required specifications. Due to our long history of experience in this area, our base material products have been developed with consistent and tightly controlled optical properties. We also have been successful in producing base materials for large volumes while controlling costs for price-sensitive applications.

Available F300 grades – ES and HQ

F300 rods are offered in two grades: ES and HQ. The process for making ES grade materials has been developed for cost-optimized fused silica core rods for large volume applications. ES material is suited for those applications where the quality and higher costs of the HQ grade are not required to meet the customer’s application needs. In contrast, the HQ grade material is manufactured by a complex process which produces rods free of bubbles with correspondingly tight geometric tolerances. The HQ grade material is available in small batches and is designed for the most demanding optical performance applications.

Rod geometries

Heraeus offers silica rods in a broad range of diameters. Standard rod diameters range from 7 mm to 33 mm. Since rod diameters can be precisely adjusted to meet customer’s requirements, custom diameters are available upon request.

Low OH Rods – Optical Properties and Applications Reference Table

F300ES F300HQ F500HQ F320-08HQ
OH [ppm]
specified
typical
≤5
0.2
≤1
0.2
≤0.1
0.02
≤1
0.2
Cl [ppm] specified ≤2,500 ≤2,500 ≤2,500 ≤200
F [ppm] - - - 3,000 ... 4,000
Trace impurities below detection limit of ICP-MS
Refractive index * +3.5 ... +5 x 10-4 +3.5 ... +5 x 10-4 +3.5 ... +5 x 10-4 -6 ... -12 x 10-4
Features Excellent transmission properties in VIS – NIR

Absorption bands
at λ< 400 nm

Well suited for laser transmission at 1,064 nm

Cost optimized quality for large volume price sensitive applications 		Excellent transmission properties in VIS – NIR

Absorption bands
at λ< 400 nm

Well suited for laser transmission at 1,064 nm

Customized quality available in small quantities

Bubble free material

Tight geometrical tolerances

No surface scratches are allowed 		Optimized water-free material

Material properties
similar to F300HQ,
but lower OH-content 		Fluorine doped material

Ideal for broad range spectroscopy from
350 – 2,200 nm

High radiation resistance
to gamma irradiation
at VIS and 1,310 nm
* Difference to un-doped silica (Heraeus standard)

High OH UV Rods - Optical Properties and Application Reference Table

F100 F110 Spectrosil
OH [ppm] typical 700 400 1000
Cl [ppm] typical 200 ... 300 ppm 200 ... 300 ppm < 0.15
Trace impurities below detection limit of ICP-MS
Refractive Index* -1 ... -1.6 x 10 -4 -1 ... 0 x 10 -4 -1.6 ... -2.5 x 10 -4
Features Excellent transmission in UV (190 - 400 nm)

Good transmission near the OH absorption band minima around 670, 800 and 1,030 nm

High resistance to gamma irradiation at 800 nm

Low UV solarization 		Excellent transmission in UV (260 - 400 nm)

Good transmission near the OH absorption band minima around 670, 800 and 1,030 nm

Low UV solarization at 308 nm 		Chlorine free material

For price sensitive applications
*Difference to un-doped silica (Heraeus standard)

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