Scratch-resistant coatings for bisphenol-A polycarbonate sheets were obtained by the sol-gel synthesis of an organic-inorganic hybrid system based on poly(ethylene oxide) and silica. The organic-inorganic hybrids were thermally cured into hard transparent coatings by using conventional and microwave (MW) ovens. Both techniques proved to be equally efficient in promoting the system's crosslinking, as evaluated by Si-29 MAS-NMR. The MW-assisted curing, however, was much faster. Photoelasticity analysis showed that MW-assisted curing causes localized overheating of the samples, inducing a state of residual plane stresses that bring about dimensional instability of the coated material. Instrumented scratch tests for the coated samples revealed an increase of 1 order of magnitude in the minimal load at which a scratch track appears on the sample surface. However, the friction coefficient values for samples with thermally cured coatings were lower than those produced by MW-assisted curing. (C) 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Adv Polym Techn 27: 117-126, 2008; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/adv.20122