On April 30, the Department of Science and Technology of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology publicized 19 mandatory national standards (including 1 amendment) draft for approval and preparation instructions. Two of these drafts are related to the building materials industry, specifically the "Flat Glass" standard, and the automotive industry, specifically the "Technical Specifications for Motor Vehicle Glass Safety" standard.

Before the standards are approved and released, the draft standards and preparation instructions are being publicized to solicit opinions from all sectors of society. The deadline is May 29, 2020.

I. Changes to the "Flat Glass" Standard

The new "Flat Glass" standard will replace GB 11614-2009 "Flat Glass", with a recommended implementation date of 6 months after approval and release. Compared to GB 11614-2009, in addition to editorial revisions, the main technical changes in the new standard draft are as follows: 1. Added iridescence definition; 2. Classification changed from classification to classification and grading; 3. The classification of appearance quality from qualified products, first-grade products, and superior products to ordinary grade and high-quality processing grade; 4. Modified thickness deviation and thickness difference; 5. Modified the minimum value and allowable number of point defects; 6. Modified the requirements for optical deformation; 7. Modified the requirements for the transmittance deviation and color uniformity of inherently colored flat glass; 8. Added requirements, test methods, and judgment rules for iridescence.

The preparation instructions for the "Flat Glass" draft show that the principle of this revision is to resolutely implement the national and industry policies, improve the technical level of the standard, widen the quality gap, encourage advanced practices, and never compromise with backwardness. The goal is to further clarify and reduce quality grades, improve the technical content and requirements of the standard without leaving any loopholes, and prevent backward enterprises from exploiting them. The aim is to improve the quality requirements of qualified products in the standard, raise the entry threshold for product quality in the flat glass industry, widen the quality gap between products for processing and ordinary products, and truly guide the market to achieve high quality and high price. The goal is to further improve the proportion of deep processing of flat glass in China. The revised standard aims to leverage its influence, along with energy consumption and environmental protection standards, to play a leading role in industrial upgrading and the elimination of backward production capacity.

1. Redefining the division of quality grades

China's glass industry has a mix of high, medium, and low-end production enterprises, with uneven product quality and large gaps between enterprises. Therefore, the current standard, based on the actual situation of the industry, divides product quality grades into three levels: superior products, first-grade products, and qualified products. The quality requirements for qualified products are relatively low and are not enough to form an entry threshold for product quality. In addition, the large number of quality grades has created some ambiguous areas, failing to effectively guide market consumption and fully widen the gap between high-end and low-end products to create a situation of high quality and high price. Moreover, low-quality products used in deep processing bring significant quality defects and hidden dangers.

Flat glass products have their particularities. As a product, it can be used directly or as a raw material for subsequent deep processing. The quality requirements for these two different uses are indeed different. Considering the different uses and quality costs, this revision divides product quality grades into two levels: ordinary grade and high-quality processing grade. The grading and requirements are both restrictive and guiding.

Customers can choose products according to their needs, and manufacturers can position their products according to their own conditions. Compared with the original qualified products, the ordinary grade has significantly higher quality requirements, basically the requirements of the original first-grade products, greatly raising the quality threshold. Dividing into only two grades can widen the quality gap, aiming to clarify the purpose, guide market consumption, reflect high quality and high price, and the use of high-quality glass sheets can reduce the quality risks of subsequent deep-processed products, which is beneficial to the production and use of deep-processed products. Raising the threshold reduces the proportion of low-end products in total output; increasing the deep processing rate, this decrease and increase, the numerator increases while the denominator decreases, can achieve the goal of the State Council's policy of achieving a deep processing rate of over 50% for flat glass.

2. Limiting special non-standard products on the market

This is also an important revision. For quite some time, there has been a problem in the flat glass industry: a considerable number of enterprises have been producing and selling glass products of non-integer thicknesses outside the standard specifications, so-called non-standard thickness products. This problem can be divided into two situations: one is that customers have special needs for thickness during processing and use, such as automotive and photovoltaic glass, which is a normal need, but both parties should clearly stipulate this in the contract; the other situation is that the manufacturer deliberately reduces the thickness of the product, reducing costs by reducing the use of raw materials and fuel, cutting corners, which is unfair competition or even fraudulent behavior. However, previous standards were powerless against this.

There are two reasons: firstly, the standard specifies thickness specifications while also stipulating that products of special thicknesses can be agreed upon by both parties, which is equivalent to not limiting the specifications; secondly, the three inspection items in the standard—thickness deviation, optical deformation, and visible light transmittance—only specify requirements for products of integer thicknesses, but not for non-standard thickness products, making it impossible to inspect and determine non-standard thickness products according to the standard. When government departments supervise product quality, and in product certification and entrusted inspections, this situation cannot be resolved. In fact, non-standard thickness products, which are in great need of quality supervision, have escaped quality supervision because the standard does not make clear provisions, which is obviously unfair to most law-abiding and compliant manufacturers.

After this revision, specifications have been added to the mandatory clauses, and clear provisions have been made for the thickness. The glass is divided into thicknesses of 2mm, 3mm, 4mm, 5mm, 6mm, 8mm, 10mm, 12mm, 15mm, 19mm, 22mm, and 25mm, which is conducive to guiding production, fair transactions, and the production of standardized profiles and frames by downstream supporting enterprises. This is the main starting point for specifying the thickness in the standard. The purpose of the revision is not to issue a "birth certificate" for non-standard thickness products in the standard, nor to encourage enterprises to produce such products, but rather to adopt a pragmatic attitude, preventing such products from being outside the scope of the standard, and enabling the supervision and resolution of the backward production capacity that produces these products. This measure should be more beneficial than harmful. Also, stricter requirements have been made for the thickness deviation of products with 3mm

The three inspection items related to non-standard thickness products in the standard—thickness deviation, optical deformation, and visible light transmittance—have also been revised in terms of inspection methods, solving the problem of measurement and inspection of products of any thickness.

3. Introducing requirements for intrinsic quality for the first time

This revision adds an intrinsic quality testing item: iridescence testing. This can simulate the severity of iridescence in flat glass after tempering, which is helpful for distinguishing between high and low product quality and quality control of deep-processed products. Flat glass produced by the float glass process sometimes exhibits iridescence after tempering, causing messy interference patterns on the glass surface, affecting appearance and use. This is a hidden quality defect of flat glass, difficult to detect with the naked eye, and must be tested using simulated tempering equipment. According to verification test statistical analysis, the proportion of products exhibiting iridescence is relatively large. This revision adds iridescence requirements for the high-quality processing grade, providing a basis for manufacturers to guide production.