Presidential limousine glass armor

Tom's standing prop (referenced, not produced today). Four layers of glass plus one layer of polycarbonate, adhesively bonded by hand layup with rollers, then pressed in a vacuum system to eliminate bubbles. Used to illustrate maximum-care surface preparation for life-safety adhesive joints.

My little glass armor — you guys have seen that before. It's four layers of glass and one layer of polycarbonate that's adhesively bonded. They have to go through all kinds of processes. It's all hand layup, with people with little rollers squeegeeing on the adhesive, because you don't want any bubbles. The bubbles are going to make a lousy window and the President won't be able to get a clear view of the guy who's trying to shoot him. They squeegee them on and then they put them in a vacuum unit. They actually put it into a press inside a vacuum system and squeeze everything together and try to make a defect-free adhesive joint. It's not easy to make something that doesn't have some bubbles, but you end up trying to come up with lots of surface area.