Innovation, safety, and sustainability are the main drivers towards an outstanding performance in various applications of glass. Hence, special glasses, such as borosilicate glasses, are steadily replacing commonly used soda lime glass. Especially in the transportation sector borosilicate glasses are indispensable, due to their light weight, advantageous mechanical and thermal properties, as well as durability. Soda-lime glass has been used for a long time but being exposed to a variety of exterior influences during its service life, the utility value may be affected in a negative way.
One example of an environmental impact are abrasive effects of particulate impacts, which can lead to signs of use being macroscopic scale. Even smaller traces of smaller particles may initially cause damage, which is difficult to perceive with the naked eye, but can lead to scattered light when there is strong backlight or certain incident angles of the sun. For a comprehensive understanding of the corresponding mechanism, the damage pattern and chipping behaviour was systematically investigated via various experiments. Another example of an exterior influence are sudden and extreme changes in temperature, such as the outbreak of fire. Glasses with a low resistance to thermal shock and temperature gradients will fail here. Therefore, an improved mechanical and thermal resistance is desired being solved by the utilization of borosilicate glasses.
The structure-property relationship of glass will be discussed comparing conventional soda lime glass with technical borosilicated glasses. Various applications of glass in transportation are then presented, such as automotive and train glazing.
