Glass Badges  - Their creation and production


During the 1950's, Isaak Kitaygorodsky, a scientist from the USSR, created a unique material. It was a glass-crystalline material that they named "Sitall".It was very hard with a low density, with similar properties to Quartz(6.5-7 according to Mohs hardness scale) and had very good heat resistance .The material had many applications and was used in the production of optical products, and in the Military where it was used in the production rocket fairings.








The First Glass Badges 

The first Sitall badge was "Ilyich"
After V. Bakhtiyarova was appointed to the position of technologist at Angstrem, and developed new production techniques, by which time the badges were ready for mass production. They began to be made by the method of vacuum deposition on a Sitall substrate. The first innovative badge was "Ilyich", it's dimensions where 9mm x 9mm, the production methods were then adapted to produce the "Component" style of badge.
The volumes produced of Sitall pins were growing rapidly

As for the "Component", about twenty four series of new different badges were launched every month. During the year, the circulation reached 4,000,000 copies. It should be noted that for the production of this type of product in the Soviet Union for the period from 1970 to 1980, this plant was the most prolific.

The plant was especially proud of the Cosmos collections.
Why other countries did not produce Sitall badges

The production of Sitall badges was expensive, so other countries did not try to develop them for commercial use.
Although patents for the use of the technology were obtained by Japan, Italy, France, and the United States, they never went into production outside of the Soviet Union but were available in Romania, Poland, East Germany, Cuba, Hungary as well as in Russia itself.