Windshield Repair Forum

Had a star break yesterday with a gold or bronze haze inside of it. at first I thought it was on the outside or inside of the windshield, but it was in fact in the star. anyone else ever had this problem?

Nope,
Never had that problem myself.
David
Coitster

Interesting. How old was the damage? What year and make of vehicle?

late model plymouth voyager mini-van. It was an old break (6 months or later) according to the car dealer. The windshield was a regular tinted glass, only the star was gold.

While I am certainly NOT as experienced as many of the participants here, I can recall, when I was "practicing," some repairs that had a goldish/bronzeish tint to them.....

I had an "antique" 1969 International pickup truck that remained parked underneath a stand of pine trees on the property that I used to do my first practice repairs. Excluding the de-lamination issue, there were many damages to the windshield, and upon repair, they took on a color very similar to that of the pine pollen that pretty much covers everything on the property during that time of year. The damaged areas had all been there for a very long time (we're talking years/decades) and my assumption was that the areas had been contaminated. Although the repairs looked a heck of a lot better than the damges!!!

Of course, as a marketing gimmick, and just tell the customer that instead of using a regular liquid resin, that you use "liquid gold"

Yup. Contamination is my guess, also.

Yes I agree Contamination...

There are a couple of windshields you might see this on. One is the Pontiac Transport. PPG originally designed a windshield for this vehicle and called it "Sungate". It actually has a metallic base in the laminate to help deflect more of the suns harmful rays. They did this because of the HUGE windshield and the amount of exposure to the dash and front compartment area. If you have ever seen a dash that is severely dry, cracked and warped, you will understand why they created the Sungate.
When the stone hits the glass and creates the chip, the chip of course penetrates down to the base of the outer lite and the top of the outer laminate. This causes some sort of reaction in the metal and therefore causing the outline effect around the damage.
When you see this, it is just really important to notify the customer that the damage CAN be repaired, BUT... the silverish effect will NOT be removed.
http://www.ppg.com/gls_autoglass/sungate.asp

If we repair up in the tinted portion of the windshield, will our repair be different in appearance?
Kenl

It depends. If you are using just regular resin... yes.. it will apprear as a clear spot on the shaded portion of the windshield. Some companies offer tinted resin for those kinda repairs. I personaly just use the regular resin, and customers never have a problem with it. I wouldn't worry about it.
David
Coitster