When car windshields / windows break, why do they break in little cubes?
This is a particular item is known as ‘tempered’ glass. It is usually found in side and rear glass applications. The reason it is used is because tempered glass is very, very strong and much lighter than windshields, which are standard sheets of glass with an acrylic layer sandwiched between them. If we used laminate glass in doors they would crack almost every time we slammed the door. The tempered glass is designed to shatter into very small particles when broken to help prevent deadly lacerations in a vehicle crash (imagine long, thin slivers of glass coming at your face during a collision … brrrrrr..). Tempered glass is NOT used in windshields because we wouldn’t want 45 pounds of glass cubes in our laps every time a stone chipped it whereas a laminate unit will usually receive a small ‘chip’ or star break.
