Corning puts Gorilla Glass in Automobiles

If you have a mobile device, chances are very good that it uses Corning’s Gorilla Glass to protect its touch screen. Gorilla Glass has been used in more than 4.5 billion mobile devices. Corning has just announced that Gorilla Glass is making its debut in the ultimate mobile device: the automobile.

Gorilla Glass featured in center consoles

You might think that break-resistant glass is an obvious choice for a car, but you won’t find Gorilla Glass in windshields anytime soon. Gorilla Glass will be incorporated into a full glass center console developed by Faurecia and on display at the Paris Motor Show this month.

According to Faurecia, the Gorilla Glass will be used in a cold-formed touchscreen cover for the company’s “Smart Pebbles” configurable console application. The console contains the vehicle’s entire instrument display cluster, as well as an airflow management system. The console application supports autonomous driving, as well as conventional driving, and is fully touch controllable.

When a vehicle is in autonomous driving mode, the system activates a second screen and produces a tabletop which the occupants can use for storage, work, eating or leisure activities.

The glass cover is 3-dimensional, and can be formed in any shape. The touchscreens use AMOLED lighting, and can interface with other mobile devices. The Smart Pebbles system also includes seating controls and amenities designed to improve the comfort of the cabin.

Corning and Faurecia believe that consumers want their vehicle displays to function similarly to current smart phones, and have designed the Smart Pebbles applications to duplicate the smart phone experience. Cold-formed glass is less expensive to manufacture, a consideration that will be attractive to automotive manufacturers. The improved visibility of the AMOLED displays under the Gorilla Glass also means that the displays can be flush mounted; they will not require additional dimensional shading to maintain visibility, even in direct sunlight.

Glassprimer™ glass paint is a specialized glass coating that bonds permanently to glass surfaces. GlassPrimer also makes a glass surface molecular activator that is designed to work with UV-inkjet glass printing processes. For more information about Glassprimer™ glass paint, please visit the rest of our site. If you’d like to purchase Glassprimer™ glass paint, please visit our online store

Photo Credit: Faurecia