Like all other glass manufacturing processes, structured glass substrates are subject to defects during production.

Bubbles in the glass panel, for example, induce a mechanical stress in the material that can lead to glass breakage during tempering or other processing steps. In some cases, the glass may even break at a later stage, when already delivered to the customer. Especially critical are those defects that occur at the edges of the glass sheets - an area usually not covered by standard vision systems. Micro-cracks and chips of the solar glass panels are a major cause of glass breakage and their detection is important for assuring highest quality standards.

The surface structure as used for glass substrates of silicon solar modules inclines to create similar or even stronger optical signals then the actual inspected defect and is considered as the main challenge of automated optical inspection of structured glass. Where other vision systems can only deliver limited results, Dr. Schenk has developed and manufactured GlassInspect, a system specialized to precisely distinguish between glass structure and defects covering 100 percent of the material surface including the edges.