Agp America S.a.

Mario Arturo Mannheim Astete

Charles Stephen Voeltzel

Andres Fernando Sarmiento Santos

Juan Pablo Suarez

Laura Granados Caro

Gonzalo Rafael Vizcarra Mendoza

Ivan Arturo Cornejo

Vincenzo Mannino

José Nuñez-Regueiro

Alexey Krasnov

Jean-Marie Le Ny

Massimo Michetti

Philip Denton Gordon

Elena K Mendoza Carranza

Juan Pablo Suárez

Jorge Ramos

Raghu K Pendyala

Jose Roman Carrillo Rojas

Iván Arturo Cornejo

Ian Jarm Riofrio Véliz

Eduardo D Temoche

Allan De Oliveira

Andrés Moscoso

Guillaume Géranton

Osmar Curi Grados

Pierre Mezeix

Natalia Andrea Rueda Guerrero

Jean Marie Le Ny

Merlyn Rojas Valle

Joel Benavides

Diego Alonso Vargas Duharte

Charles S Voetzel

Jairton Pozzebon

Edward Enrique Custodio Sheen

Zhaoyu Wang

Camilo Ignacio Cuervo Figueredo

Jimmy Alexander Quijano Reyes

Juliana Schottborgh RODRÍGUEZ

Manuel Leonardo Serrano Rey

Andrés Fernando Sarmiento Santos

Iván Cornejo

José NUÑEZ-Regueiro

Automotive glazing, with electrically controlled light transmittance, has been available for a number of years. Growth has been steady as the public recognizes the added utility provided. While a number of means of implementation are in use, all require a set of electrodes spanning opposite faces of the switchable portion of the glazing. As automotive electronic content has proliferated and the glazed area of the vehicle has increased, it is becoming more and more of a problem finding a suitable location for the controls, for the switchable glazing as well as for other functions. By structuring the electrodes, touch sensitive regions can be formed on the laminate and utilized for control.

Switchable laminate with touch control

The laminated glazing proposed in this invention has an outer glass layer () with holes () and a thin inner facing glass layer () with shorter length dimension whereas the bottom edge () does not have holes on it and which does not overlap with the holes () in the outer glass layer (). One or more retention layers (), comprising reinforcement and adhesive layers, serve to connect the glazing mounting means () to both of the glass layers () providing a thin laminated glazing with holes () that in the event of failure is retained by the mounting means ().

Hybrid asymmetric automotive laminate

Due to the increased glazed area of modern vehicles, especially the large panoramic glass roofs, we have seen a substantial growth in the use of anti-reflective coatings. Unfortunately, these types of coatings accentuate fingerprints and smudges. The invention provides an automotive glazing which is substantially resistant to fingerprints, and a method of manufacture thereof through the application of an anti-fingerprint coating based on low surface energy silanes.

Automotive glazing with anti-fingerprint coating

Black enamel frit obscurations are commonly printed on laminated and tempered automotive safety glazing where they serve to hide the adhesive used to bind the glazing to the automotive body and to protect the adhesive from ultraviolet radiation. However, frit has a number of drawbacks. Frit weakens the surface of the glass. It can create distortion in the glass due to thermal gradients. Printed frit obscurations are incompatible and cannot be used with many types of coatings. Standard frit blocks ion exchange and cannot be used with the chemical tempering process. In addition, while many types of frits are available for printing on soda-lime glass, there are very few, if any, for non-soda lime glass. As the market moves towards thinner and lighter glazing, non-soda lime glass types are finding increasing application in automotive glazing. These limitations are overcome by replacing the printed black obscuration with an obscuration formed from a thin sheet of plastic, which is integrated into the laminate. This results in a laminate having superior optical quality, higher strength and a lower probability of breakage as compared to a laminate with a black enamel frit obscuration.

Glass laminate with thin insert obscuration having superior strength and optical quality

The demand for automotive glazings, on which the intensity of the light transmitted can be controlled by the user, has been increasing as the public becomes more aware of the technology. The most common methods employed to make such glazings utilize Suspended Particle Devices (SPD) and Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystal (PDLC) films. With both, the light transmission of the glazing changes in response to an alternating current electrical field. A problem with this technology is that the voltage required is far higher than that of the typical automotive electrical system. The disclosure provides a touch potential safe, small, lightweight and inexpensive means for controlling the light transmission of multiple glazing circuits by combining a single flyback voltage converter with multiple variable amplitude sinewave generators all coordinated by a micro-controller.

Multiple circuit variable light transmission glazing system

The use of camera-based safety systems is growing at a rapid rate in automobiles where they are used to provide lane departure warning, collision avoidance, adaptive cruise control and other functions. As the industry moves towards full autonomous capability, the number of cameras and the resolution are increasing. For proper operation, the cameras require a clear undistorted field of view. Keeping the camera area free of snow and ice has been a problem. A resistive heating circuit is typically used to keep the area clear. For rapid clearing the circuit needs to operate at a high-power level. Due to the temperature dependent index of refraction of the plastic interlayer, severe distortion can result from the non-isothermal heating resulting from the spacing of the circuit elements. The laminate of the invention reduces distortion by removing the interlayer in the camera field of view and replacing with a plastic having a more temperature stable index of refraction.

Automotive laminate camera heating system with low distortion

The present invention discloses a vehicle glazing having a sharply curved portion and the method for bending such glazing. The sharply curved portion of the glass may extend along the surface of the glass. The sharply curved portion is obtained by locally heating by means of a laser source, heating the portion of the glass to a temperature sufficiently high enough to allow said portion of glass to bend. In preferred embodiments, the sharply curved portion comprises a first bent portion described by a first radius and a second bent portion described by a second radius, wherein the point where the radiuses of the first and second bent portions change their orientation generate an inflection point. The radius of curvature of the first and second bent portions is of less than 150 mm.

Vehicle glazing having a sharply curved portion and the method for bending

A vehicle glazing with improved stiffness having a modified structure which comprises at least one stiffening portion, wherein each portion is a recessed portion and/or a raised portion, and wherein each portion has at least a portion of its contour being sharply curved.

Vehicle glazing with improved stiffness

Vehicle glazing, which once served just to provide for vision and protect from the elements, has been taking on new functions as the complexity and functionality of modern automobiles has evolved. Performance films and interlayers are often used to add to and enhance the functionality of laminates. These functions include solar control, sound dampening, head up display and variable light transmittance. Recent advances have made it possible to produce electronic circuits on thin transparent substrates that are essentially invisible under normal lighting conditions. While these circuits can be inserted into the laminate and successfully laminated, the edges of the circuit insert are prone to objectionable aesthetics due to mismatch between the substrate and the interlayer index of refraction, thickness and color. The present invention compensates the edge of the solid insert by providing a sheet of a compatible compensation material that the substrate of the insert and which extends to at least the black band or the edge of glass of the laminate making the insert edge essentially invisible.

Invisible edge solid substrate compensation layer for automotive glazing

The use of camera based safety systems is growing at a rapid rate in modern automobiles. As the industry moves towards vehicles with full autonomous capability, the number of cameras required and the resolution of the cameras are both increasing. At the same time, windshields, where many of the cameras are mounted, are becoming larger and more complex in shape. This presents problems in the area of camera optics. Variations in the thickness of the glass and the plastic layer, surface mismatch, surface texture and the design curvature of the glass in conjunction with the often low installation angle, can reduce the optical clarity of the camera optics. These optical aberrations are further exacerbated during the lamination process when the layers are bonded together under pressure. The laminate of the invention utilizes a cutout in the plastic bonding layer in side of the laminate, preferable in the camera field of view. A laminating resin is used to fill the gap left by the cutout between the two glass layers.

Automotive laminate with improved optics

A switchable laminated glazing comprising two stacks of components with different lamination parameters, a first stack of components which provides the mechanical protection of the glazing, and a second stack of components with variable light transmission.

Laminated glazing with a switchable liquid crystal layer

Glass laminates, comprising more than one glass composition, are becoming increasingly common as the industry moves towards lighter and stronger glazing. Bending dissimilar glass compositions can present problems. A mismatch in the glass viscosity curves, especially in the viscoelastic region of the compositions can result in one layer becoming softer than one of the other layers during the thermal bending process. As a result, economical processes, such as gravity or press bending in which multiple glass layers are simultaneously bent, may not be practical to use forcing the use of more expensive single glass layer bending processes. By thermal treatment processes the fictive temperature of at least one of the glass compositions prior to bending can be shifted to better match the other compositions allowing the glass layers to be simultaneously bent.

Method of bending dissimilar glass compositions

Strengthened glass substrates with glass fits and methods for forming the same are disclosed. According to one embodiment, the present invention provides a glass frit with a coefficient of thermal expansion less than or equal to the coefficient of thermal expansion of the glass substrate where it is going to be painted. The glass frit of the present invention has similar ion exchange properties to the glass substrate that is going to be used to paint with the glass frit allowing the glass substrate to be ion-exchanged. The glass frit of the present invention is mixed with an organic carrier.

Glass frits for ion-exchangeable glasses

The use of camera-based safety systems is growing at a rapid rate in modern automobiles. At the same time, windshields, where many of the cameras are mounted, are becoming larger and more complex in shape. As the industry moves towards vehicles with full autonomous capability, the number of cameras required and the resolution of the cameras are both increasing. However, the optical quality of the windshield is less than optimal. One of the problems is caused by the typical black enamel frit that is printed on the glass, prior to heating and bending, to hide or obscure the camera hardware. The abrupt thermal gradients during bending, caused by the heat absorbing black frit, result in a high level of distortion in the camera field of view. The object of this invention is to provide laminated automotive glazing having an obscuration area produced by creating an obscuration after heating and bending the glass by removing a portion of the plastic interlayer glass in or near the camera field of view (camera obscuration) or/and in the edges of the windshield (black band) and replacing it with an inlay made of a substantially opaque plastic or other suitable material in or near the camera field of view (camera obscuration) or/and in the edges of the windshield (black band) rather than printing and firing an enamel frit on the glass. This results in a laminate having superior optical quality, higher strength and a lower probability of breakage as compared to a laminate with a black enamel frit obscuration.

Glass laminate with inlay obscuration having superior strength and optical quality

The trend towards increasing the glazed area in automobiles has reduced the potential locations for mounting cabin lighting. This is especially true for vehicles having large panoramic glazing. Attempts to utilize integrated light sources within the glazing have had mixed results. Embedded LEDs in the laminate tend to be too bright for night driving. Edge feed illumination with light dispersing elements on the glass to date have only been able to provide low intensity levels. Both approaches tend to reduce visibility and aesthetics in the off state. The current invention provides a means and a method to produce a laminate which provides bright cabin lighting without compromising the function of the glazing to serve as a window, by creating a light dispersing layer that is substantially invisible when in the off state and very bright in the on state.

Growing community of inventors

Lima, Peru

Mario Arturo Mannheim Astete