Introduction and in need of serious help! Long post.

Post your windshield repair tips, questions, advice! Note there is a sub-forum specifically for business development questions.
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Mr.W
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Introduction and in need of serious help! Long post.

Post by Mr.W »

I wanted to say hello to all of you on here and thank you all so much for all of the help and information you so generously give. I’ve read tons of posts and I’ve learned a lot from you all already. I am new to this, I’ve been practicing on my own glass for about a month and I’ve gotten the hang of basic chip repairs. I make them using different methods and practice repairing them outside in whatever conditions are present at the time in hopes I can get diverse chips and conditions. I am a semi truck mechanic by trade and have been for the last fifteen years. I live in the Idaho Panhandle and we get a lot of snow. The roads are covered in gravel most of the winter and rock chips are extremely common. During a recent change of employment it came to my attention that our fleet has several rock chips in most windows. Our company has taken the approach of letting the windows get tons of chips and cracking during the winter and replacing them in the spring, mostly because no one is offering an affordable mobile service in the area. Mind you it’s pretty rural but we have a lot of industry requiring large fleets of semi trucks. I was looking to branch out in a side business to make extra income during the day because I work swing shift and everything kind of fell into place. I’ve run successful businesses in the past and from my research the demand is here to make this the perfect part time side job for me. On to the problem. I ran the idea by the boss and they were on board right away they asked me to fix a windshield the next night after work. I had my kit and after everyone left I pulled it into the shop. After inspection of the combination break I knew I was in trouble but this was my chance and I had lots of time to get it right. I don’t have pictures and I was using a Rapid Tech bridge and injector with thin viscosity resin. I know someone is going to ask. It had a large impact point and it was an older chip. The problem is it had extremely narrow tight legs surrounding the break all the way around. At least a dozen. I cleaned it out well flexed each leg and put my injector on it. I put plenty of resin in it witch is much harder on a vertical Peterbilt widow than a pickup. I went through several pressure/vacuum cycles while flexing the legs with my probe. I pushed on the break from the inside trying like hell to get resin to flow into the legs. I got a couple to start taking resin but could not get most of them. Trying to be patient and not break the window I went through this for an hour cycle after cycle and flexing and rubbing. I was out of ideas so I started to use a little heat I got a few more to start filling but I still had six or so left. I kept at this for another hour or so but could not get them. I pulled my injector off got a new bit and drilled the impact point mostly out of desperation and still couldn’t get it to flow into the uphill legs. I finally pulled out a micro torch in a last chance effort and out of frustration two and a half hours later got it so hot it made blisters on the pvb. I started with light pressure and by the end had increased the pressure and the cycle times. I did not try to charge them and I admitted it was an extremely hard chip that I could not fix. I have an opportunity here that could serve me well this is not the only chip we have like it and I need to know if someone knows of some ultra thin resin or a trick to fixing a chip with this many super thin legs. I plan to make it to the Next Delta class and I purchased magnibond and a b300 today in hopes that a higher quality setup may help. I know these posts fill up fast with people claiming they can always get the legs to fill with some patients but I would appreciate some actual useful information, tips tricks or insight. They still want me to fix chips but I need to nail this. I know this is extremely long but it’s extremely important to me and I know a lot of people on here care about helping people succeed and care about quality. Thanks everyone!
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Brent Deines
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Re: Introduction and in need of serious help! Long post.

Post by Brent Deines »

So sorry to hear your first job did not go well...what a bummer! Hopefully that will be the excption to the rule as it is for most windshield repair professionals. Please get training, you will be glad you did!

There are many, many things to talk about here, including equipment, resin, technique, etc., but one thing that immediately comes to mind is that sometimes cracks are on the inner layer of glass and will not fill by injecting from the outside. Has anyone told you how to tell if cracks are on the inside or the outside layer of glass? Not all windshield damage will fill completely, so learning how to identify what will fill and what won't is an important part of your education. Expectations are something else to discuss. We find that sometimes new technicians cannot tell when the damage has been filled because they do not know what to look for. If you expect all damage to completely disappear you will be disappointed. Not saying that is the case here, just another thing we have to consider. Again, this is only one of many possibilities so if you wish to have a discussion with me or another Delta Kits rep I would suggest a phone call would be more productive.

Hopefully you learnd your lesson about applying too much heat and/or applying too much pressure, thin resin is not the answer, and if you do come to a Delta Kits training class be prepared to learn a whole different process of filling the damage. Not saying everything you have learned so far is wrong, or that whoever taught you how to use the equipment you are using now didn't know what they are talking about, but techniques are often specific to the type of equipment being used and even some technicians who use Delta Kits products do not follow procudures that result in the best possible repairs.

I hope we get to meet you in person soon, and in the mean time we will do whatever we can to help by phone. Hopefully other forum members will also chime in here with additional questions and suggestions for improved results on your future repairs.
Brent Deines
Delta Kits, Inc.
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