Automotive applications of chromogenic materials

Conference · Mon Dec 31 04:00:00 EST 1990

OSTI ID:86073

Lynam, N R; Agrawal, A ^[1]

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1. Donnelly Corp., Holland, MI (United States)

Automobiles present both opportunities and challenges for large-area chromogenics. Opportunities include optical and thermal control of vehicle glazing along with optical control of rearview mirrors and privacy glass. Challenges include cost-effectively meeting automotive safety, performance, and reliability standards. Of the roughly 33 million cars produced annually, approximately 8% are luxury models which are candidates for features such as automatically dimming rearview mirrors or variable opacity sunroofs. Thus copious commercial opportunities await whatever chromogenic technologies qualify for use in automobiles. This review will describe the performance, safety, and reliability/durability required for automotive use. Commercial opportunities and challenges will be discussed including cost factors and specifications. Chromogenic technologies such as electrochromism, liquid crystals and thermochromism will be reviewed in terms of how publicly announced technical developments match automotive needs and expectations. Construction and performance of existing or imminent chromogenic devices will be described. Finally, how opportunities and challenges of the automotive environment translate to other applications for chromogenic materials such as architectural or information display devices will be discussed. The objective is to generally review the applications, the technologies appropriate to these applications, and the automotive chromogenic devices available at the time of writing to match these applications. 81 refs., 26 figs., 9 tabs.

• OSTI ID: 86073
• Report Number(s): CONF-8809123--; ISBN 0-8194-0069-6
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
AUTOMOBILES
COOLING LOAD
DISPLAY DEVICES
ELECTROCHROMISM
ENERGY CONSERVATION
GLAZING MATERIALS
LIQUID CRYSTALS
MIRRORS
SOLAR CONTROL FILMS
TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT
USES
WINDOWS