Automotive Antireflective Coatings to Reduce Veiling Glare

Veiling glare, or the reflection of the interior from the windscreen back to the observer, can limit a driver's visual acuity. Additionally, the recent popularity of high installation angle windscreen designs exacerbates the veiling glare problem. Optical antireflection (AR) coatings applied to the windscreen can reduce the reflectivity of the windscreen thereby reducing veiling glare. An economical method for producing AR coated windscreens during the glass manufacturing process will be described. Since these films are deposited during the glass making process, they are bendable and can be formed into windscreens by conventional bending and laminating processes. A novel three layer AR structure produced by this method drops the inboard reflectance of a laminated windscreen at a 60 degree installation angle from 13.6% to 9.7% when compared to uncoated glass. If the AR films are applied to both inboard and outboard surfaces of the windscreen laminate, the reflectivity of the structure drops to 7.3%. In addition to the reflection reductions, the reflected color of the AR windscreens are more neutral than traditional AR designs yielding an aesthetically pleasing final product.