Please Note! This is our archived old board, it is “read only.”
To visit our current active discussion board click below.
https://www.replacement-windows.com/windowbb/
| Author: | dumbhomeowner |
| Subject: | low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-02 03:35:23 |
can someone provide me with a brief overview of the pros and cons of hard vs soft coat low e?
thank you
| Author: | Oberon |
| In Reply To: | low e coat (posted by dumbhomeowner) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-02 12:21:04 |
Sure...
Hardcoat LowE, also called Pyrolitic, is essentially tin-oxide applied to the upper surface of the glass while still in the "float" process.
Hardcoat can have excellent U values, but it has very poor SHGC values.
What that means is that while hardcoat will block UV radiation, it does not perform nearly as well against infrared, so that you can "feel" the heat from the sun when standing near the window.
Is that bad?
Not necessarily. In northern climates that may actually be something of an advantage in that the hardcoat will tend to keep your home's "heat" inside and will allow the suns "heat" to penetrate as well so that you can take advantage of the additional "free" energy.
Softcoat LowE, or "sputter coat" is applied in a very specailly designed vacuum chamber where layers of various metals are "sputtered" on to the surface of the glass. This coating is very thin, actually measured in angstroms which is essentially "how many atoms per layer thickness".
Softcoats tend to have slightly better U values than hardcoats and also are commonly "spectrally selective" which means that they also can be "programmed" to stop the suns heat energy from passing thru the coating.
In a hot climate, an obvious advantage.
To add a bit of confusion, Pilkington, a British glass manufacturer, is currently advertising a spectrally selective hardcoat which they claim works as well as a softcoat in blocking the sun's heat in hot climates. I have yet to see any of this product in actual service, so I have no comments on the performance.
And on the flip side, all of the softcoat manufacturers have product that is not spectrally selective so that it works very well in cold climates allowing the sun's heat-energy to pass thru, just as well as the hard coats. In fact, a couple of the "cold-climate" soft coats have numbers that are virtually identical with the hardcoats.
About 85% of all residential applications of LowE coatings in the US are softcoat.
In Canada, however, hardcoat is more commonly used in homes.
Cardinal "owns" about 70% of the entire residential LowE market. They are a sofcoat manufacturer. Guardian and PPG are also big in the soft coat market, accounting for most of the remaining 15%.
Of the 15% of the residential market that is hardcoat, Pilkington and PPG enjoy the largest share of the market.
There is still much that can be mentioned about LowE performance, but this is probably too long already.
I hope I have answered your question, but if you have more specific thoughts I would be happy to respond to them as well.
| Author: | Oberon |
| In Reply To: | low e coat (posted by dumbhomeowner) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-02 16:55:29 |
And I think "wantstolearnhomeowner" is a much better "name" for your post.
| Author: | A soon purchaser of windows |
| In Reply To: | RE: low e coat (posted by Oberon) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-02 20:32:44 |
I am in Kentucky, and not really a hot or cold dlimate. All of my windows do face east and west though. I have seen several things on low e2. Is this benificial.
Also, I have been told by a couple of sales reps that argon was not important as it settled in a couple of years and was not helpful after that. How true is that statement.
Thanks for any help.
dnt
| Author: | dumbhomeowner |
| In Reply To: | RE: low e coat (posted by Oberon) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-02 23:33:00 |
thank you Oberon
| Author: | es |
| In Reply To: | RE: low e coat (posted by A soon purchaser of windows) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-03 03:21:10 |
Don't believe it. Simply follow the recomendations of Energy Star for your area and you will be able to buy the energy efficient windows best for your climate and area. Good luck
| Author: | Oberon |
| In Reply To: | RE: low e coat (posted by A soon purchaser of windows) |
| Subject: | RE: low e coat |
| Posted At: | 2004-09-03 18:08:16 |
Argon settling? Is that anything like fiberglass settling?
Seriously, purchaser, there are several good reasons for an argon infill. Argon does not "settle". It will dissipate out of the IG over time, but with current technologies that time could easily be 50 years or more (potentially much more).
Some people will tell you that the argon (or whatever gas infill) will be gone in less than 10 years (and that is possible in some cases), even in that amount of time, there are still valid reasons to use it initially.