Walking around the city and looking closely at the houses along the street, you can see many intricate window designs. And outside the city, in some cottage village, house owners give free rein to their imaginations, equipping houses with real stained-glass windows, huge six-meter windows on two floors, unusual arched or trapezoidal windows.
Such unusual designs favorably distinguish houses from the total number of similar buildings. But what is more important: form or content? Do PVC plastic windows lose their unique properties, transforming beyond recognition??
PVC windows, first of all, must have good thermal insulation properties. Up to 30% of all heat loss occurs precisely through the windows. By installing modern structures, a person wants to insulate his home and not suffer from Russian frosts.
The heat-insulating properties of windows are measured using the reduced resistance to heat transfer – R0pr. The higher the resistance value, the better the window protects against heat loss..
Heated rooms cannot be equipped with single glazing, this threatens with the fact that there will be no heat at all. Installation of two- or three-chamber double-glazed windows with several glasses is considered optimal. The distance between the panes must be between 6–20 mm. The air in the spaces between the panes serves as a heat insulator. Mastic prevents moisture from entering such an air cushion.
Changing the composition of the gas inside the glass unit can significantly increase the thermal insulation performance of the windows. The inert gas argon is popular, with its help it is possible to achieve an improvement in performance by 20%. In addition, xenon, krypton, sulfur hexafluoride are used. The distance between the glasses directly depends on what gas will be pumped into the glass unit.
Even greater thermal insulation can be achieved by applying a low-emissivity coating directly to the glass. There is no clearly defined terminology, so one can find classifications of “hard” and “soft” coatings, k- and i-coverage, on-line and off-line coatings. Regardless of the name, they reduce heat loss.
In addition to thermal insulation qualities, you need to pay attention to sound insulation properties. Plastic windows are distinguished by high levels of sound insulation. It is often asked why single-chamber windows are poorly suited for metropolitan areas. Single-chamber windows reduce the noise level coming from the street by 30–35 dB. At the same time, a two-chamber window is able to reduce the level by 32–40 dB. Twin sash increases this figure to 40-49 dB, and double – up to 45-56 dB. It happens that the window, perfectly eliminating street noise, starts to buzz itself. The problem can be solved by changing the distance between the glasses or the thickness of the glasses. If it is different, then the window will not hum. By the way, sometimes triplex is also used as one of the sheets of a glass unit, the main task of which is to reduce noise..
Turning to a competent company for the production and installation of plastic windows, you will not have to choose between form and content. You will get something that fully matches the interior and exterior of the building and at the same time has high functional characteristics.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of using plastic windows compared to traditional glass windows? Are they as durable and energy-efficient as glass windows? How do they affect the aesthetics of a building? Additionally, are there any specific environmental concerns associated with plastic windows? Any insights would be greatly appreciated!