Shatterproof Glass Corp. v. Guardian Glass Company

This case concerns the bending of glass for, principally, automobile windshields. The litigants are suppliers of replacement windshields, not original equipment suppliers. For a while, years ago, all that was needed for a windshield was a pair of flat pieces of glass. One piece comprised the left side of the windshield, the other the right. In the middle was a divider strip of some kind. Then in the early 1950’s all of this changed. We began to get “panoramic” windshields, “wrap-around” windshields, which were bent pieces of glass, now common on cars. They are laminated, there being a sheet of plastic sandwiched between two pieces of glass.

*856 The bending is simplicity itself in theory, though in practice difficulties arising from the process operations are experienced. The general idea is that the two pieces of flat glass, one slightly larger than the other, are put on a frame, or mold. As seen by the simplified sketch, this frame is made up of three sections, a center section, and two symmetrical end sections, one left, the other right. These sections are hinged so they can bend, either upwards to support the flat pieces of glass (their position at the outset) or downwards, to support the bent pieces of glass at the finish of the operation. At the start of the operation these sections are so disposed that six parts thereof support the flat glass. The frame, with its glass load is started through a furnace. As the glass heats up and softens it sags and sinks into the mold which, by means of its hinges, bends and receives it. We thus end up with bent pieces of glass. If, as we noted, we take two of these pieces of bent glass and make up a sandwich, with a piece of plastic in between, we have today’s laminated wrap-around windshields. Our problems in this action relate to the molds on which the bending *857 takes place, and more particularly to such things as hinges, pivots, and points of support. In addition, the plaintiff claims that the defendant misappropriated 43 of its trade secrets.

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