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Seven industries that cannot afford a lining failure.
Our solutions are trusted across the chemical, pharmaceutical, petrochemical, oil and gas, fertilizer, food processing and water treatment industries — wherever the process is aggressive enough that steel alone will not do.
Applications
Why glass lining, and where.
Glass lining is chosen for three reasons: it resists chemistry that eats alloy, it does not contaminate what it holds, and its surface stays smooth enough to clean properly. Different industries buy it for different combinations of those three.
Chemical
Reaction, distillation, scrubbing and storage.
The core market for glass lined equipment. Batch reactors handling organic and inorganic acids, oxidising and reducing service, solvent chemistry and melted salts — at temperatures and concentrations where stainless and alloy steels have a short and expensive life.
Complete trains are common here: reactor, overhead condenser, receiver, scrubber column and the piping between them, all lined and all from one works.
- Reactors, type AE / CE63–40,000 L
- Distillation / scrubber columns250–1,200 mm
- Condensers2–10 m²
- Receivers & storage160–40,000 L
- Typical glass gradeSG-C / SG-CT
- cGMP reactors63–40,000 L
- ANF / ANFD630–5,000 L
- Receivers160–40,000 L
- GMP stainless equipmentIntegrated
- Typical glass gradeSG-P
Pharmaceutical
Where the lining must add nothing to the batch.
Pharmaceutical production is bought on cleanliness as much as on corrosion resistance. STAHL GLAS SG-P is formulated for it: completely free from heavy metal contamination, with non-stick surface properties that give cleaner processing and more cost-effective production.
cGMP reactors and ANFDs are supplied with GMP-compliant stainless equipment, pipelines and accessories integrated into a single ready-to-operate system — so the validation package covers one supplier, not six.
Petrochemical
Intermediates that consume alloy vessels.
Petrochemical intermediates frequently combine acid attack with temperature and, sometimes, abrasive solids — the combination that shortens alloy life fastest. Glass lining resists acids across the concentration range and, unlike a metallurgical solution, cannot be undermined by a change in the grade of feedstock.
Where abrasion is present alongside acid, that combination needs designing for — see the note on abrasion and acid corrosion.
- Reactors & vesselsUp to 40,000 L
- Heat exchangers2–10 m²
- Jacketed piping80–500 NB
- ASME process equipmentTo standard
- Typical glass gradeSG-C / SG-CT
- ASME pressure vesselsTo standard
- Glass lined storage1,000–40,000 L
- Process piping25–500 NB
- Structures & skidsCustom
- DocumentationFull traceability
Oil & Gas
Corrosive streams, documented to ASME practice.
Oil and gas work is as much about documentation as about metal. Equipment is fabricated to ASME standards with material traceability per heat, radiography, hydrostatic testing and third-party inspection where the client or the authority calls for it.
Where the stream is corrosive enough to justify it, glass lined vessels and piping go in alongside the ASME scope — supplied and documented as one package.
Fertilizers
Phosphoric and nitric acid duty.
Fertilizer production is one of the clearest cases for glass lining on cost alone. But phosphoric acid is also the one acid that becomes more aggressive as it concentrates: at 85 % concentration the maximum useable temperature is 95 °C.
Technical-grade phosphoric acid and its salts are also frequently fluoride-contaminated — and fluoride at even 20 ppm attacks glass. Analysing feedstock for fluoride is not optional in this industry. See corrosion resistance.
- Reactors & agitated vesselsUp to 40,000 L
- Storage tanksUp to 40,000 L
- Piping & fittingsUp to 600 NB
- H₃PO₄ at 85 %Max 95 °C
- Fluoride checkMandatory
- Process vessels160–40,000 L
- Storage & receiversJacketed
- Agitation systemsTo 40,000 L
- Typical glass gradeSG-R / SG-P
- SurfaceNon-stick
Food processing
A surface that cleans properly and stays clean.
The fired glass surface is exceptionally smooth, which makes it easy to clean while giving excellent wear resistance and gas impermeability, and prevents sticking and micro-flora growth. It is also biologically sterilisable with base.
Where product fouling costs yield, STAHL GLAS SG-R’s non-stick surface minimises residue build-up for cleaner processing and higher production efficiency. Note the alkali limit when specifying hot caustic cleaning cycles.
Water treatment
High-purity water is more aggressive than people expect.
Water can cause severe corrosion, and the risk rises with purity. Condensed water droplets on the colder glass surface in a vapour phase environment leach alkali ions out of the glass network — which is why vessel contents are best kept slightly acidic and un-jacketed top dishes are best insulated.
Storage, dosing and treatment-chemistry equipment is supplied with that behaviour designed in rather than discovered later.
- Storage & dosing vessels160–40,000 L
- Piping & fittings25–600 NB
- Vapour-phase protectionCERA 9011
- Top dishInsulate
Your industry is not on this list
That is common, and it is not a problem. What matters is the duty, not the sector: the medium and its concentration, pH, operating and cleaning temperatures, pressure, cycle pattern and any cleanliness requirement. Send us those and we will tell you whether glass lining is the right answer — including when it is not. Start there.
Application support
Bring us the process, not just the part number.
The equipment that causes trouble is usually the equipment that was specified without anyone asking about the cleaning cycle, the cold charge or the fluoride in the feedstock. We ask.