'We can offer 11-14% weight reduction through lightweighting techniques in glass': Rahul Nikhanj

When it comes to lightweighting technology for vehicles, glass is usually not the first thing that comes to mind. However, more than 30% of the vehicular space is usually taken up by glass.

When it comes to weight part of glass, conventional vehicles add 50 kg, but with increased use of glass with features such as solar roofs, the glass weight has increased to 70 kg, Rahul Nikhanj Head, Projects and Production Technology, Asahi India Glass added.

Talking on day two of Autocar Professional's lightweighting conference, he said, "We can offer 11-14% weight reduction through lightweighting techniques in glass, he added. The thickness of the glass is reducing from a conventional 3.2 temper light, to 2.8, and now we see that the trend is moving towards adopting even 2.5 and 2.6 mm of glass, Rahul noted, which will give 11% weight reduction without compromising on strengths.  There are also developments where the inner layer of glass is being produced at 1mm of thickness. 

Technologies to reduce NVH (noise, vibration, harshness) are to either add thinner laminates for doorlights and replace tempered sunroofs with laminated sunroofs and adding acoustics in laminates. "There is a possibility of reducing close to 40% of sound transmission loss into the vehicle," he noted.