The windshield in the 2002 Thunderbird is the most complex in the industry, says supplier PPG. The bend is 27 mm vs. the typical 8-12 mm. The angle of installation is 24 degrees vs. the traditional 30 degrees.

The story of the T-Bird reincarnation is filled with engineering successes big and small. The design team worked with vendors to devise the most complex windshield in the industry, and developed elegantly simple solutions to such pesky problems as coefficient of drag, body stiffness, and noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH).

Engineers wanted a steep angle for the windshield to cut down on top-down turbulence. Also, the Thunderbird windshield is the first to combine an extreme depth of bend and an A-pillar wraparound. Those features give it the most complex geometry of any windshield in the auto industry, according to PPG, the glass supplier that designed it.

The Thunderbird engineering team specified a windshield bend of 27 millimeters instead of the typical bend of 8-to-12 millimeters. "Getting that bend and wrapping the windshield around the 64-degree-angle A pillars was like wrapping a sheet of paper around an orange," says Tom Kerr, PPG's general manager for OEM automotive glass.

Additionally, the angle of installation Ford wanted to cut down wind turbulence—24 degrees to horizontal vs. the traditional 30 degrees—made the optics more difficult and placed the wiper blades in a position more forward than accessible by the defroster.

Then, there was the matter of the antenna: Ford wanted it embedded in the windshield to, among other things, prevent snagging on the top during installation or removal, and to reduce the wind noise from whistling that can occur with outside-mounted antennas.

Using its own home-grown computer models in conjunction with I-DEAS and exchanging files electronically with Ford, PPG engineers modeled the windshield shape, highlighting the area around the A pillar. "We had to know if drivers could adequately see through the windshield or whether they would be looking at fun house glass," says Kerr. Working together in real time, PPG and Ford engineers adjusted the shape slightly to get the required visibility.