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Would diamond make a good window?
If you made a window out of synthetic diamond would it work very well? Would it be possible? If a whole window wasn’t possible what about like a window that is made of smaller pieces? (Like staind glass windows are). How strong would that window be? Would it be more fragile than glass? Would the light transparency be any good?
5 Answers
- ?Lv 71 year ago
Yes, yes, yes. Diamond is a cubic crystal so it is like wood. It has a grain in one direction and it can split along the grain fairly easily. That's called cleaving. The other direction it is incredibly strong. Much more durable than glass, transparency would be excellent. And yes, it has been done. The problem: synthetic diamond can be pretty cheap depending on the form of it. Diamond abrasives are pretty cheap. The problem with a window would be cutting it into a window shape and polishing it. That might take weeks if not months. And there is nothing over the size of a quarter or maybe a silver dollar or so. So the question arises, "Why do you need a $100,000 window?" If there's a good reason then fine. So your cat can sit on the sill looking at the birds on the front lawn, probably not.
- StarryskyLv 71 year ago
Yes. About 41 years ago a probe to land on Venus had a window that had to endure tremendous pressure and high temperatures. A large diamond was shaped to make that window.
