Patent ID: 8511461

Claim:
A method for conveying a glass sheet comprising: (a) providing a moving conveyor configured to contact an edge of the sheet and move the sheet at a conveyance speed; (b) providing a non-contact bearing configured to eject gas against a portion of a major surface of the sheet so as to hold the major surface of the sheet in an orientation wherein it is disposed at an angle from 0 to 15° from vertical; and (c) contacting the edge of the sheet with the moving conveyor and moving the sheet at the conveyance speed while ejecting gas from the non-contact bearing against the portion of the major surface of the sheet; wherein: (i) the non-contact bearing includes a plurality of orifices which eject the gas against the portion of the major surface of the sheet, (ii) the gas is provided to the orifices from a plenum which operates at a pressure P plenum , (iii) the plurality of orifices has a centermost orifice, and (iv) the calculated static pressure P midpoint at the midpoints between the centermost orifice and each of its nearest neighbors in a horizontal direction satisfies the relationship: P midpoint /P plenum ≧0.05.