A clear view screen or clearview screen is a glass disk mounted in a window that rotates to disperse rain, spray, and snow. A clear view screen is typically driven by an electric motor at the center of the disk, and is often heated to prevent condensation or icing. Other common names for it include "clear sight", "spin window" and "rotating windshield wiper".
Clear view screens were patented in 1917 by Samuel Augustine de Normanville and Leslie Harcourt Kent as a stand-alone pillar-mounted screen,
with later patents for telescope and optics covers, followed by the more familiar ships bridge glass. Clear view screens are also used in
locomotives
A locomotive or engine is a rail transport vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. If a locomotive is capable of carrying a payload, it is usually rather referred to as a multiple unit, motor coach, railcar or power car; the ...
and rail transport, and were unsuccessfully marketed for automobiles. They were initially manufactured by
George Kent Ltd, a firm began by Leslie Kent's grandfather, and of which Leslie Kent later was a director. The technology was then acquired by BAE Marine Works to produce clear view screens for military applications. BAE Marines Works was sold to Cornell-Carr Company in 2012 and exists as the sole provider of clear view screens in the continental US.
File:Rotating windshield wiper.jpg, Detail image from inside of a clear view screen on R/V ''Knorr''
File:JNR DD51 111.JPG, A clear view screen of the Type DD51 diesel locomotive in Hokkaidō
is Japan, Japan's Japanese archipelago, second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost Prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own List of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; th ...
, Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
File:Sapporo Tram Type Yuki 10 001.JPG, ''Sasara Trams'' of Sapporo Streetcar are equipped with clear view screens
See also
*
Edgar de Normanville (1882–1968), often credited with the concept of clearing water from a windscreen by this method.
References
{{Reflist
Watercraft components
Windows