What is safety glass?
There are two types of safety glass used in passenger vehicles. Laminated glass is used in the windshield. It is made up of two layers of glass laminated to a sheet of vinyl in the middle. This holds the glass in place in case of breakage. Tempered glass is used for the other glass in your vehicle. This glass has been heated almost to the point of melting and then is quenched with air at a specific rate to cause the tempering effect. This process also strengthens the glass. When tempered glass breaks, it brakes into tiny pieces.
Safety Glass is a generic term for the following products: Heat-Treated Glass In order to provide greater resistance to thermal and mechanical stresses and achieve specific break patterns for safety glazing applications, annealed float glass products may be subjected to a heat-treating process. The most commonly used process for heat-treating architectural products calls for glass to be cut to the desired size, transported through a furnace and uniformly heated to approximately 1150 F (621 C). Upon exiting the furnace, the glass is rapidly cooled (quenched) by blowing air uniformly onto both surfaces simultaneously. The cooling process locks the surfaces of the glass in a state of high compression and the central core in compensating tension. Heat-treated glass has two compression layers or zones, one starting at each surface, plus an interior tension zone centered in the middle of the glass. Each of the two compression zones is approximately 20% of the glass thickness. The middle 60%
Safety glass is a type of glass which is designed to resist breaking, and to break in a way which minimizes the risk of injuries in the event that the glass cannot withstand the forces which are exerted on it. Car windows are classically made from safety glass to promote safety in collisions, and this type of glass can also be used in regular house windows, eyeglasses, laboratory glassware, and a wide variety of other products. As its name would seem to imply, safety glass is meant to be safer than ordinary glass. There are two ways in which safety glass can work: tempering or laminating. Tempered glass is made by treating the glass very carefully as it is heated and cooled to increase its tensile strength, making it hard to break. If tempered glass does break, it snaps apart into rounded chunks, rather than breaking up into jagged pieces which could potentially be very dangerous. People who have seen a broken side window in a car have probably seen an example of tempered safety glass.
Safety glass can come in several different forms. Tempered glass is designed to shatter into tiny pieces rather than large shards of glass, lessening the chance of serious injury. Laminated glass is safety glass as well. It is made up of two individual panes of glass bonded together by PVB resin. This resin will prevent the glass from falling apart when broken. This glass is also used for security purposes. The resin makes this glass nearly impossible to break through.
