New Viracon VUE-50 Insulating Glass Balances Light, Comfort, Solar Performance and Sustainability

Date: 19 November 2008

Meeting simultaneous design criteria in one product can be a challenge. However, a new glazing solution from Viracon, the country’s leading single-source glass fabricator, is offering designers, architects and developers an unprecedented “package” of benefits.

The new Viracon VUE-50 insulating glass provides the perfect balance of light, comfort, solar performance and sustainability.

“We asked designers what they wanted in high-performance glass, and we listened,” says Rick Voelker, vice president technical services at Viracon. “That’s how Viracon VUE-50 was developed. We focused on a coating that would provide the right amount of visible light transmittance by providing natural daylight and reducing potential glare.

Viracon’s VUE-50 offers a Visible Light Transmittance (VLT) of 49 percent on clear glass and more than 50 percent on low-iron substrates. It also provides low interior and exterior reflectance and low U-V light transmittance.

A real benefit of Viracon VUE-50 is the coating’s solar performance. With a Solar Heat Gain Coefficient of .26 and a Light to Solar Gain ratio of 1.88, VUE-50 is a clear improvement over the dark-tinted Low-E coatings of the 1980’s and early 1990’s, and VUE-50 exceeds the standard for sustainable design based on ASHREA 90.1 requirements.

“From an aesthetic perspective, Viracon VUE-50 not only has a subtle blue-gray hue, it also offers a pleasing flat appearance,” says Voelker. “The coating is applied after heat treating, which augments flatness compared to high performance coatings that are heat treated after the coating application.”

The VUE-50 coating can be specified on your preferred glass substrate and can be applied to the same surface as silk-screen patterns for added solar performance or enhanced aesthetics.

For additional information, visit www.viracon.com or call 800-533-2080.

About Viracon

Viracon, based in Owatonna, Minn., has additional plants in Statesboro, Georgia and St. George, Utah. The company is an international company of Apogee Enterprises, Inc. Viracon produces high-performance glass products, including tempered, laminated, insulating, silk-screened and high-performance coatings. Apogee Enterprises, Inc. is a leading fabricator, distributor and installer of value-added glass products and systems. Headquartered in Minneapolis, the company’s stock is traded on NASDAQ under the symbol APOG.