Glass Walls & Roofs

Smart Glass High Performance Glass

                With the introduction of our new glass offering, C-Thru now offers a new high performance single pane product and a new “SmartGlass” family of double pane high performance glass products that outperform all competitive products in their class.  Why are we doing this?  For two reasons …. (1) To give you, our Dealers, an even greater competitive edge,  and (2) because more than any other component in a sunroom or patio room, the type of glass used will determine the comfort and usability of the finished sunroom. Let’s take a brief look at why the performance of glass is so important.  What it all boils down to is this … the two biggest problems with sunrooms and patio rooms has to do with excess heat gain, which makes the rooms uncomfortably hot; and Ultraviolet radiation which fades and damages fabrics and furnishings.  Here’s why these are major issues for your clients

Solar Heat Gain:                     We’ve all had the experience of parking our car at the mall on a nice sunny day, then returning to the car an hour or so later to find that it’s an oven inside.  Just like an automobile, sunrooms and patio rooms are glass-intensive structures which make them susceptible to overheating.  Up to 90% of the surface area of a sunroom  or patio room may be glass, so the performance of the glass has a direct and significant affect on the comfort and usability of the room.  What sense does it make for your clients to invest in sunrooms or patio rooms that overheat so quickly that they can only be used comfortably on mild days in the Spring or Fall? 

Ultraviolet Radiation:               It is widely know that UV radiation is harmful and damaging, to people as well as to fabrics and furnishings.  Glass products that transmit a high percentage of UV radiation will result in faster fading and damage to fabrics and furnishings that are used in that room.  More importantly, homeowners who regularly spend time in these rooms may receive unsafe exposure to harmful UV radiation                

SmartGlass^tm 30

The first product in our line of high-performance glass products is a single pane glass, which goes by the name SmartGlass 30.  This new product has 30% lower solar transmission than ordinary clear single pane glass (and 30% less UV transmission).  What this means is that a competitor’s room equipped with clear single pane glass will heat up 30% faster than a C-Thru room.  SmartGlass 30 has the same high optical clarity and same visual appearance as regular single pane glass; it’s only on a very, very close inspection that one might notice a very, very subtle green hue.   SmartGlass 30 is so effective that it even outperforms single pane bronze glass by 8%, and without the “dirty” look of ordinary bronze tinted glass.  Clear single pane glass will still be our low cost standard, but SmartGlass 30 will be available for a modest upcharge.
 

SmartGlass^tm 40

The next product in our line of high-performance glass offerings is a double pane product, which goes by the name SmartGlass 40.  This product consists of an outer pane of 1/8” green glass over an inner pane of 1/8” clear.  This new product has 20% lower solar transmission than ordinary double pane clear glass (and 26% less UV transmission).  What this means is that a competitor’s room equipped with clear single pane glass will heat up 20% faster than a C-Thru room equipped with SmartGlass 40.  SmartGlass 40 has the same high optical clarity and same visual appearance as ordinary double pane glass; it’s only on a very, very close inspection that one might notice a very subtle green hue.   SmartGlass 40 is so effective that it even outperforms double pane bronze glass by 5%, and without the “dirty” look of ordinary bronze tinted glass.  Other’s bronze double pane glass products also block 23% more visible light than C-Thru’s SmartGlass 40.  While not the highest performing SmartGlass offering, SmartGlass 40 is a smart choice when trying to balance performance with affordability.

            The last two high-performance glass products represent a significant improvement over our old Smart Glass, and are called SmartGlass 60 and SmartGlass 90EZ. Both of these are double pane glass products that incorporate a unique multi-layered low-e coating applied to the inside of the outboard pane of glass.  This incredible coating blocks far higher levels of the sun’s invisible solar heat and harmful UV radiation. 

SmartGlass^tm 60

SmartGlass 60  is an optional high performance double pane glass (replacing our old Smart Glass) for use in vertical glazing areas, such as windows, doors, kickpanels and transoms.  It provides your clients with 60% less solar heat gain per s.f./hr than clear double pane glass, and 28% lower transmission of damaging and harmful UV radiation than our former high performance “Smart Glass”.  The solar shading performance of this glass is so remarkable that your clients can actually pull a chair up next to a south-facing window, and sit down and read a book without experiencing that “radiator effect” that one normally feels sitting next to a sunlit window. 
 

SmartGlass^tm 90EZ

            SmartGlass 90EZ will be used only in sloped, overhead applications such as glass-roofed sunrooms.   Traditionally, in glass-roofed rooms, most of the excess heat gain that enters the sunroom comes through the overhead glass because the sun tends to be higher in the sky in summer.  To combat this problem, and also to reduce the potential for glare in a glass-intensive room, SmartGlass 90EZ will reduce the solar and UV transmission to less than half that of our old Smart Glass.  To enhance the performance of SmartGlass 90EZ,  the inboard pane of this product is the same high performance green glass used in SmartGlass 30.  By utilizing two layers of high performance glass in the same unit, SmartGlass 90EZ achieves solar shading performance unmatched by any other manufacturer, blocking up to 83% of the sun’s harmful and damaging UV radiation and 84% of unwanted solar heat transmission. 
           So in Summer, when the sun is higher in the sky, this unique new roof glass will keep the room cooler and more usable, and in winter, when the sun is lower in the sky, our vertical SmartGlass 60 will enable you to benefit from low levels of passive solar gain to help heat the room. SmartGlass 90EZ has 50% less visible light transmission to help reduce glare associated with overhead glass in summer, and to block an astounding 85% of total solar energy transmission.  SmartGlass 90EZ is more than twice as effective as most of our competitor’s extra-cost low-e double pane offerings, significantly extending the number of hours that your clients can comfortably use their rooms during the heat of summer months. 
           And since it will be used only in a sloped overhead application, SmartGlass 90EZ incorporates a special “EZ Clean” coating on the #1 (exterior) surface of the glass.  The application of this unique silicone dioxide coating makes the glass surface smoother, which causes water to sheet-out rather than forming water drops on the surface.  The unique EZ Clean coating allows water to evaporate quickly meaning less water spots on the surface when it dries.   The EZ Clean coating can be “activated” immediately after installation simply by spraying the surface of the glass with a solution of vinegar and water.

 SMART GLASS PERFORMANCE SUMMARY

SmartGlass^tm 30

   ·         30% less heat gain vs. Clear single pane    ·         30% less UV transmission vs. Clear single pane  
   ·         8% less heat gain vs. Bronze single pane   ·         No tinted, dirty appearance like Bronze single pane glass 

SmartGlass^tm 40

   ·         20% less heat gain vs. Clear double pane    ·         26% less UV transmission vs. Clear double pane 
   ·         5%   less heat gain vs. Bronze double pane   ·         23% less blockage of light vs. Bronze double pane 
    ·     No tinted, dirty appearance like Bronze double pane 

SmartGlass^tm 60

   ·         60% less heat gain vs. Clear double pane   ·         38% less heat gain vs. Bronze double pane (or Low-e double pane)
   ·         50% less UV transmission vs. Clear double pane    ·         33% less UV transmission vs. Bronze double pane (or Low-e double pane) 

SmartGlass^tm 90EZ

    ·         Five times less heat gain vs. Clear double pane    ·         Blocks 83% of harmful UV radiation    ·         EZ-Clean standard with SmartGlass 90
    ·         Less than one-half the glare of clear double pane roof glass    ·         40% less glare than bronze double pane roof glass