Fiberglass is a type of fiber-reinforced plastic that uses glass fibers as reinforcement. It’s a strong, lightweight, versatile material used across many applications — insulation, boat hulls, car parts, and circuit boards among them. Fiberglass is made by heating glass until molten, then forcing it through tiny holes to create thin filaments. Those filaments can be woven into a fabric or mixed with a resin to form a composite.
Fiberglass has real advantages over other materials — non-magnetic, non-conductive, transparent to electromagnetic radiation, and chemically inert under many conditions. It does have some downsides too, though — less stiff and strong than carbon fiber, and brittle, prone to cracking under stress.
A Few More Facts
Fiberglass was accidentally discovered in 1932 by a researcher at Owens-Illinois who directed a jet of compressed air at a stream of molten glass.
Fiberglass is widely used across the composites industry and comes in many variations, such as glass-reinforced plastic (GRP), glass-fiber-reinforced plastic (GFRP), and glass-fiber-reinforced epoxy (GFRE).
Fiberglass can be recycled by melting it down and reforming it into new products, or by grinding it into a powder for use as a filler or reinforcement in other materials.