How a simple yet sophisticated bottom profile makes the windshield of a passenger vehicles cheaper and lighter.

India is the fourth largest automotive market in the world and produces more than 3 million passenger vehicles each year. Marked as one of the fastest growing economies in the world, Indian automotive industry is expected to grow much more in the coming years with a plethora of new features and several regulations planned.

Despite being one of the fastest growing automotive markets, the Indian consumer is pretty cost sensitive. Though aspirational for new technologies and features in their cars, Indian consumer is always looking for maximum value for the money. While lots of feature loaded and well styled cars dominate Indian streets, keeping the cost factor well under check is one of the essential factors to be successful in this market. Hence, car makers in India are always on the lookout for attractive and innovative new technologies that can give them an advantage over their competition and lower the cost of their vehicles.

Elkamet Kunststofftechnik GmbH is a Germany based world- leader providing patented bottom profiles for the windshield. These windshields offer a range of benefits, while reducing the overall cost of the windshield assembly. The benefits offered by these bottom profiles include light weighting, enhanced aesthetics and aerodynamics, better pedestrian safety rating, reduction in labor requirement etc.

Here are key advantages of switching to Elkamet bottom profiles for windshields:

Compact assembly: A conventional system used by most Indian carmakers in India have the cowl overlapped on the Windshield surface. An overlap of up to 25mm can be eliminated by the introduction & integration of an Elkamet Profile. For more information on this, read our First blog on How the Elkamet technology provides better light weighting. This improves vehicle efficiency and performance.

Enhanced quality and durability: In the conventional system, the overlapped cowl is fixed using several retainers, foams and supports. Over time, dirt and dust gets embedded in the overlap, causing squeaks, vibration of the windshield at the bottom leading to cracks and chips. This reduces the life of the windshield. By eliminating the cowl overlap, Elkamet assembly eliminates all the above-mentioned problems with the conventional assembly and reduces the overall cost by eliminating the need for foam, retainers, supports etc.

Reduced costs: A conventional system requires the OEM to acquire the windshield, and then fit the cowl with the supports and other components on it manually which is time-consuming and requires a lot of effort. In the Elkamet system, the profile, is directly fitted at the bottom of the windshield by the glassmaker before shipping the assembly to the carmaker. Since Elkamet already supplies to over 80 car makers globally, all glassmakers are well accustomed to this Elkamet technology. The carmaker can just easily snap in the cowl to the windshield on his assembly line. The operator also gets haptic feedback while assembling the cowl to the windshield.

The conventional windshield assembly uses an expensive two-mold water management cowl system that combines different material grades and is rather bulky. The usage of an Elkamet profile allows the use of a smaller cowl, which uses only a small positive lock-in solution and eliminates the Expensive two-mold cowl. Thus, the overall cost is reduced, while also making the assembly simpler.

The Elkamet technology is currently integrated in a few models in India. This assembly has enabled an OEM to successfully reduce the price of their SUV windshield while uplifting the aesthetics and user experience. If you would like to explore this technology for your range of vehicles, please contact prashant@quanzen.com