Windshield Repair Forum

two or three months ago i did a repair for a maryland state inspection station. i nailed the repair. it was only the second repair i did for the shop. they were singing my praises compared to their last guy, and i was eating it up and replying "yeah, this is how they're suppose to be done. some guys just replace them and dont specialize in repairing them. its an art form." blah blah blah. well, at a dealership they did the inspection for, below is what i found. what can make a repair that is pretty much done perfect, and all the air gone, split like that? (p.s. i know it had a big pit, but thats a seperate issue im working on perfecting is filling in pits with thicker resin and polishing )

Must not have been as perfect as you originally thought. I've never seen this happen.

by the way, the bullseye was about 6 times as wide as the pit you can see. meaning about 3 widths of it to each side of the pit.

Not to worry. These things happen. Larger (or even normal-sized) damage as you described can sometimes hide "ghost" or "blind" cracks that can sometimes be identified by gently flexing around the circumference of the damage with your probe or scribe before you start the repair. Then again, sometimes flexing doesn't help to display anything because there aren't any hidden cracks at the time. The glass may just have been weakened or stressed in those areas from the initial impact and developed the cracks later from the vehicle hitting a pothole or a curb or a door slamming or whatever. Don't beat yourself up too much. WSR is not a perfect science - it's just broken glass and the glass was broken before you started working on it, right? Looks to me like the initial repair turned out nicely. Those cracks? Just drill 'em and fill 'em - and this time flex past the end of each crack before you start the repair to make sure that each crack tip is where the crack really ends.

Couple of questions before I answer, did you dry it out properly and allow it to cool very very properly? did you use heat at all during the repair process, also allowing to cool very very very very properly before curing.

I must add to me that repair looked extremely like it had some moisture left in it.

Almost any repair can be fu1234 up by hitting the repair spot on the inside, many repairs will open up. This ''trick'' is used by installers and unhappy customers.
I know, the repair itself (like a weld) won't break, in fact is breaks right next to your weld. Go back there if you have the opportunituy and look again. it may have been a ''fresh'' damage.

There appears to be a drill hole on the upper leg that didn't have a bullseye tapped in it . ?

that upper leg isnt suppose to be there, much less have a bullseye in it.

as far as moisture being in the repair, i saw nothing but a perfect repair when i was done it 3 months ago, and looking at it last week when i had to redo those two cracks, it looked pretty great except for the cracks. i have seen repairs with moisture in them, or rain-x/wax in the repair. they look like crap. this one didnt. im wondering if someone didnt press on it from the inside. but probably it just plain failed. i saw a fingerprint or smudge on the inside, but that could easily have been because someone saw the two cracks and pointed to it, not that the touching actually caused it. but i looked close for that! i was trying to figure if that could have been it.

i usually let a repair cool down if i use heat. i dont always use heat, but i know the resin wants to take up different volumes at different temperatures. no one offically taught me that, i was just working on a theory. i'm self taught, so although i've learned to do good repairs, i seem to have learned as much advanced information in the last 6 weeks being active on these forums as i did in my first year!

It looks like you busted the lamination when you filled the break. It looks like a daisy about the size of a quarter.
That will not help maters.

I could be wrong again.

It just does not looks right. Just a little distorted. when you filled it, did you do one long cycle or a few short cycles to remove the air?