Patent ID: 7628038

Claim:
A method for producing a glass product, said method comprising the steps of: forming and/or processing molten glass within at least one of a melting, a fining, a delivery, and a forming vessel; providing a capsule to enclose at least one of the vessels; and providing an atmosphere between interior walls of the capsule and around a non-glass contact surface of said at least one vessel, wherein said step of providing an atmosphere further includes: controlling a level of hydrogen within a mixture of gases in the atmosphere so that a partial pressure around the non-glass contact surface of said at least one vessel is maintained at or greater than a level defined by an equilibrium relationship: pH 2 ⁢ ⁢ ( ppm ) = 78000 × ⅇ - 58900 + 13.1 ⁢ ⁢ T 1.987 ⁢ ⁢ T ( 2 ) to suppress the formation of undesirable gaseous inclusions within the molten glass, where T is a temperature in Kelvin of the non-glass contact surface of said at least one vessel.