Guardian Industries’ flush-mount sliding rear window for pickup trucks captured the Most Innovative Use of Plastics award in the Performance and Customization category at last night’s Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) Automotive Division Innovation Awards event.  The window’s innovative design keys on the performance and design freedom afforded by DuPont™ Rynite® PET thermoplastic polyester and DuPont™ Delrin® acetal. 

“The sleek flush-mount design of our HPS G-1.0 window represents a major styling and functional advance over other sliding truck windows,” said Phil Taylor, Guardian’s product marketing manager for the new unit.  Other designs, which use metal rails, have an overlap of the center panel and fixed rear panels when in the closed position.

The new window has upper and lower guide rails molded from Rynite® PET.  Their design is crucial to the window’s innovative flush-mount feature with guide channels that have an angled change of direction near each side of the window opening.  The angled channel guides the sliding center window assembly into alignment with the fixed window as it closes.

The slider’s glass pane is framed in a one-piece carrier molded from Rynite®.  A separate elastomer part attached around the perimeter of the carrier’s outside surface provides a seal against the inside surface of the fixed glass panel.  The elastomer seal is a bulb design that prevents the passage of high-pressure water past the seal, according to Guardian.  The stiffness and strength of the rails molded from Rynite® are crucial to the application of force for tight, reliable seals.

The slider assembly is held in the rail by guide components mounted at the top and bottom of the carrier.  Molded from Delrin® 100AL, formulated for especially low friction properties, the guides travel smoothly in channels in the upper and lower rails made of Rynite®.  The upper guides are spring-loaded to maintain their position in the upper rail’s channel.  Delrin® 100AL also provides the good strength, stiffness and dimensional stability required for the guide components.

“Rynite® gives us an ideal combination of properties for the rails and center carrier,” said Darrin Neitzke, Guardian’s program manager for development and manufacturing of the flush-mount sliding rear window.  “Its coefficient of linear thermal expansion (CLTE) is nearly the same as glass’s, which is crucial for effective sealing and operation over a wide temperature range.  Rynite® also provides the excellent surface appearance, dimensional stability, strength and stiffness required.”  The grade used, a black-colored version of Rynite® 530, passes SAE’s J1885 interior UV weatherability standard. 

DuPont specialists provided crucial assistance during development, according to Neitzke.  “They recommended materials and grades for our evaluation and provided design input and computer-aided mold flow and warp analysis that helped us meet quality and productivity goals,” he said.  DuPont also assisted Guardian by conducting molding trials at its Automotive Technical Center in Troy, Mich. 

Guardian’s HPS G-1.0 flush-mount window consists of the slider and a one-piece, full-width rear window with a cutout.  It can replace either a fixed glass backlite or an OEM sliding window system in selected existing vehicles. It is available from distributors of Guardian Automotive Products and from a select group of installers.  For more information, please contact Guardian at 1-800-331-8401.
For more information about DuPont™ Rynite® PET and Delrin® acetal, please visit plastics.dupont.com on the web or call DuPont at 800-441-0575.

DuPont is a science-based products and services company.  Founded in 1802, DuPont puts science to work by creating sustainable solutions essential to a better, safer, healthier life for people everywhere.  Operating in more than 70 countries, DuPont offers a wide range of innovative products and services for markets including agriculture and food; building and construction; communications; and transportation.

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11/14/06

Click here for high resolution image of truck with window.

Click here for high resolution image of the window.

Captions:
Innovative flush-mount sliding window uses rails and center pane carrier molded from DuPont™ Rynite®, PET, guides made of low-friction DuPont™ Delrin®.