Cover Glass Design & Integration Service

 

Value Added Options

Take your cover glass integration one step further by adding a touch sensor to your design. If your LCD does not already have touch screen capability, AGDisplays offers virtually limitless touch sensor options for integration with your cover glass. Quickly upgrade your LCD monitor to an up-to-date touch screen that is fast, intuitive and productive. Learn more about touchscreen integration here. 

In the future, when your coverglass has been worn from normal wear & tear, you will only need a simple change of the top film for a clean and polished finish. With a restoration of the coverglass and top film coating, your coverglass will be restored to new. Read more about our film enhancements here. 

 

 Cover Glass Benefits

Why would someone need to add a cover glass to the front of their LCD? Stock coverglass material does not hold up well against scratches or damages, leaving your LCD with large vulnerabilities. To protect your LCD display, you will need to install a superior cover glass or other strengthened polycarbonate material to the LCD for protection.

Display assemblies including (or integrating) a strengthened cover glass substrate has become a popular solution in years past, as the trend for reducing the thickness of mobile and LCD devices has been on the rise. Utilizing a glass substrate has the superior advantage of increased hardness and scratch resistance as well as having a higher design value. Pairing glass with various strengthening methods increases the robustness even more. There are many ways to increase glass strength. A popular approach is chemical strengthening. where a compressive surface layer is formed via a high-temperature ion-exchange process when sodium ions are replaced by larger volume ions such as potassium.1 This process may differ from manufacturer to manufacturer. AGDisplays offers a variety of cover glass substrate options to add durability and protection to an LCD. From our wide selection of glass, each material substrate provides unique benefits.

AGDisplays employs an integration method commonly known as LCD bonding. LCD bonding uses one of various adhesive options available on the market for a wide range of benefits. In this case, integrating a cover glass to the LCD requires a h2 adhesive bond to fuse two LCD components together to form one unit. Typically, the cover glass is bonded straight to the LCD unit itself. AGDisplays offers three different bond integration methods: optical bond, OCA bond, and tape bond. Each of these services contributes unique benefits to an LCD design; however, every design specification and requirements are different. Selecting the wrong bonding method for your design may have adverse effects on design quality. That’s why your design is in the hands of an AGDisplays expert, we know the unique aspects of bonding, and are able to select and integrate services to designs that will benefit your overall specifications.

Benefits:

• Cover glass is enhanced and treated for strength
• Cover glass is used in LCD and touch screen applications from industrial to commercial
• Add an optical coating onto the cover glass for more optical features. Quality cover glass coatings influences and controls transmittance, resistance, absorbance and reflectance
• Customizable screen printing for a polished and professional look to your LCD
• Three bonding methods available: optical bond, tape bond, OCA bond
• Bond a touch sensor with your cover glass

State of the Art Equipment:

• Class 1000+ Clean Rooms
• CNC Machines
• OCA Bonding Capabilities
• PCB Design Software
• Programmable Automated Test Equipment

Cover Glass Features*:

• Chemically-Strengthened
• Scratch and Crack Resistant
• Improved Surface Quality
• Enhanced Response
• Thin and Light without Fragility
• Promote Sunlight Readability
• Ruggedized
• Protection From EMI Interference

 

 

 

 

 

Cover Glass Options

Chemically-strengthened soda lime is used for thin, rugged displays. It can be strengthened from 8 to 16 hours, depending on application. Chemical strengthening is ideal for soda lime sheets under 3 mm. If ruptured, soda lime will simply crack rather than shatter. AGDisplays offers a variety of different soda lime options: clear & tinted; low iron; anti-glare; heat absorbing float glass and more.

Clear and tinted: this option offers a high light transmission with the option to add AR coating for extra transmission; this material is eligible for chemical strengthening and features good flatness with no green tint.

Moh’s Scale Hardness	5 to 6
Refractive Index (sodium D line) 1 µm 2 µm	1.5231.5111.499
Thickness Availability	0.55 mm to 25.4 mm (0.02” to 1”)

Grey glass: this glass is tined and is used for restricting or reducing light transmission. Benefits include increased privacy; reduce glare and has a reduced opacity.

Transmission Ranges	62% (lightest grey) 57% 31% 14% 9% 8% (darkest grey, nearly black)
Thickness Availability	3 mm to 6 mm (.125” to .234375”)

Low iron soda-lime: this option offers a high light transmission with the option to add AR coating for extra transmission; this material is eligible for chemical strengthening and features good flatness with no green tint.

Moh’s Scale Hardness	5 to 6
Refractive Index (sodium D line) 1 µm 2 µm	1.523 1.511 1.499

Anti-glare reducing etched soda-lime: this glass offers glare reduction with a high resolution, superior durability and anti-Newton ring.

Gloss	60-130 (US Gloss, measured at 60° by a BYK Gardner Glossmeter model 4501)
Thickness Availability	60-130 (US Gloss, measured at 60° by a BYK Gardner Glossmeter model 4501) 0.7 mm to 4.75 mm

Low Emissivity (low E): this glass provides a higher window U-Value, increased insulation performance, energy savings, and decreases color fade by blocking UV light.

Visible Light Transmission	76%
Thickness Availability	3.2 mm, 5.0 mm

Heat absorbing float glass: this glass features IR absorption.

Refractive Index at sodium D Line (ND)	1.5184
Thickness Availability	3.175 mm & 6.35 mm (.125” & .25”)

AGC Dragontrail™ is a chemically strengthened and tempered float-glass material that is 6x more durable than soda lime glass. With this strength, the glass can be produced in thinner material. This material does not contain harmful materials like arsenic, lead or antimony.

Vicker’s Hardness Unstrengthened Strengthened	596 kg f/mm² 673 kg f/mm²
Refractive Index at sodium D Line (ND)Thickness Availability Standard Special Request (MOQ req.)	0.8 to 1.1 mm 0.5 to 5.0 mm
Refractive Index	1.51 Nd
Damage and Scratch Resistant	>600 MPa strength 35 < depth of layer (DOL) < 45 µm

Corning® Gorilla® Glass is a thin sheet glass with a high degree of chemical strengthening. Benefits of Gorilla® Glass include high scratch resistance, high retained strength after use, and pristine surface quality.

Vicker’s Hardness Unstrengthened Strengthened	534 kg f/mm² 649 kg f/mm²
Thickness Availability	0.4 mm to 2.0 mm
Improved Damage Resistance	≥ 950 MPa @ 40 µm DOL, compressive strength
Refractive Index Core Glass Compression Layer Photo-Elastic Constant	≥590 nm 1.5 1.51 31.9 nm/cm/MPa

 

 

 

Optical Coatings

One issue that may arise from the normal or enhanced front of screen structure is reflection, caused by the multiple layers in an LCD stack. To properly optimize cover glass and other enhanced elements in an LCD design, AGDisplays incorporates (optional) optical coatings to the LCD, such as anti-glare, anti-reflective, and/or other surface treatments. Light reflections cause a distracting flare for the LCD and contributes to overall image quality. These treatments are placed on the front surface of the display, creating different reflection patterns to reduce the negative readability reduction and to enhance optical properties. Mostly, these coatings are thin-film layers that cause a disruption in light wave patterns. These coatings are applied to glass and other substrates. These can be added by vacuum evaporation methods or low-cost wet-coating processes. Features below are dependent on solution selection.