Drilling Philosophy 101

[gt_repair]

Brent
Not every one will follow your way of training. Did the owner come by and get trained when he or she bought their first kit? Maybe they have their way of being trained from what they saw on your video. Some like drilling and some do not....It also depends on how deep you drill and how big and or small the bit is. There is nothing wrong with drillers, just how they drill. Hitting the lamination, That should not ever bo done. Drilling just deep enough is ok.

I drill 98% persent of my repairs. Does that make me a bad repair tech not? That would be a kick in the teeth to me also. Thank you..

Now tell us, what did her repair look like and be fair in your appinion.
Remember you are looking at one repair that was done. You can not judge off of that only.

Not to make it sound bad, but you came across just now sounding like you are the best one out there and it is only your way to be trained.

What you could have done also is to invite her to the fourm. She could read and learn on her own also... and then take you up on your offer. I am sure the offer would still be good.

You may have hurt her pride and that is not one thing you come in off the street to do to someone in there home that was trained one way, and you sorta insult her. I may have done the same as her...

I hope I did not come across on the negitive side.
Here is my .04 cents.

[Brent Deines]

Originally Posted by gt_repair

Brent
Not every one will follow your way of training. Did the owner come by and get trained when he or she bought their first kit? Maybe they have their way of being trained from what they saw on your video. Some like drilling and some do not....It also depends on how deep you drill and how big and or small the bit is. There is nothing wrong with drillers, just how they drill. Hitting the lamination, That should not ever bo done. Drilling just deep enough is ok.

I drill 98% persent of my repairs. Does that make me a bad repair tech not? That would be a kick in the teeth to me also. Thank you..

Now tell us, what did her repair look like and be fair in your appinion.
Remember you are looking at one repair that was done. You can not judge off of that only.

Not to make it sound bad, but you came across just now sounding like you are the best one out there and it is only your way to be trained.

What you could have done also is to invite her to the fourm. She could read and learn on her own also... and then take you up on your offer. I am sure the offer would still be good.

You may have hurt her pride and that is not one thing you come in off the street to do to someone in there home that was trained one way, and you sorta insult her. I may have done the same as her...

I hope I did not come across on the negitive side.
Here is my .04 cents.

Don,

I did not say everyone needed to follow my way of training. In fact I went out of my way to not promote Delta Kits equipment or training, but simply used a Delta Kits customer to make a point. You can have the best equipment in the world, but if you do not use it properly your repairs will not be as good as they could be. Would you have preferred that I used a technician that was using the system you use as an example? No, then I would have been accused of competitor bashing.

No, the owner was never trained by anyone at Delta Kits when they bought the first kit. Since then they have purchased dozens more, and have not allowed us to do any training for them, even though it was offered for free.

I strongly disagree that a drilled repair looks as good as a repair that is not drilled as the drill hole is always visible. I understand that it is necessary to drill to get some windshield repair systems to fill a break properly, but I don't happen to use one of those systems. I only drill when there is no surface chip at the impact point, which is less than 1% of the time because I believe the repairs look better when they are not drilled. But here we go again getting completely off the point. My post was not about drilling, it was about getting properly trained.

I have visited the same location on several occasions, and have seen this technician and several others in action. They never know who I am until I tell them, and I don't think they really care one way or another when I do. I would say the repairs are average for the industry, but no where near as good as they could be.

I do think I am the best technician out there, or at least the best that I have seen so far, and I would hope you would have that confidence in yourself and your equipment as well. If you don't, what's stopping you from getting better?

Please don't put words in my mouth. I did not say everyone needed to be trained by me, or by Delta Kits methods, but if you are going to use a system that I designed and have tested more than anyone else, who better to do the training? I would never suggest to be the one to train on other systems. In fact, I can't even figure out how to use some of them myself. I realize I may come off as a bit cocky, but certainly no more so than you.

I said this technician is very bright and has a lot of potential. How is that insulting? I did invite her to join the forum, but I don't think she will. If she does, I would also expect her to come to training, in which case she would agree with everything I said, and would thank me for it. I have already admitted I worked for a year before I received any formal training and many people learn just fine from a video. My point is that if trained by someone who doesn't know what they are doing, you may not know what you are doing either, so find out if the person doing the training is any good before you allow them to train you. Ask for testimonials from others who have received training from your trainer, watch them give a demonstration and see how good their repair looks, etc.

Look, I know many Delta Kits users have developed their own techniques and that is just fine if they are getting results as good or better than mine, but if they aren't, they should go back to using Delta Kits techniques. I'm pretty sure all the other manufacturers feel the same way about their customers and their products.

Recently I completely revised my way of tapping bullseyes at the end of cracks because a forum member showed me a better tool, and a better method for doing so. I have learned a great deal from other technicians over the years, and I'm sure I will continue to learn for as long as I am in this business.

My post was not about me, and it was not about Delta Kits. It was about taking a common sense approach to evaluating windshield repair products and training programs. I'm very sorry if it came off as anything else. The last thing I want to do is make this thread controversial. That would pretty much defeat the purpose.

[Layne]

Which came first? The chicken or the egg?

All of this is really interesting....but it begs the question where did you get your training Brent? Perhaps there is a real professional out there somewhere that departed his wisdom to you. Enlighten us pardner.

[Blind Squirrel]

The time has come to start a new thread about drilling. Like GT, (Don) I drill almost every chip I repair. There are some variables on how I approach each one, what size bit and how deep to drill. The only time I don't drill is on certain types of bullseyes with the odd shaped impact point.

I am as mystified as I can be when Brent claims that he hardly ever drills a chip. How in the world do you get the chips to fill? Are you willing to take hours to do a repair?

I want to attend a Delta training class to see if the trainers can really show a "no-drill" technique that is as effective as they claim. I don't know if they will be able to show enough different examples that will truly alter my techniques.

Do the Delta training videos show you how to do this?

I've had this issue on the back burner for a couple years now and it's time to get clear on it.

[gt_repair]

Blind Squirrel
I drill just deep enough to get into what I call the vain of the chip, that is about 25 - 50% into the first layer of glass. Just deep enough

I also use smaller bits from what DELTA uses. I use bits from GT that are .035 for everyday drilling and .025 for drilling in a crack line when needed.

The bits that DELTA uses average .047, .039 and their smallest is .024.
It is like shoping for cereal, so many kinds. What to buy, what to buy.

I do not like the ball type head style, they tend to want to break off in the hole.... I do not drill bearing straight down. I do peck into the hole so I do not burn the bit.

My holes are hard to see when drilling. So I will say again you can drill without have the hole shown.

[Brent Deines]

Originally Posted by Layne

Which came first? The chicken or the egg?

All of this is really interesting....but it begs the question where did you get your training Brent? Perhaps there is a real professional out there somewhere that departed his wisdom to you. Enlighten us pardner.

I have stated it many times on this forum in the past. I ordered my 1st windshield repair system through the mail. I had never done a repair before, and I had never seen a repair done before. I did not receive a video, only a simple instruction manual. I think I did pretty good repairs from the start, but made plenty of mistakes along the way. That was in Montana, but I moved to Oregon to work with my dad less than a year later. My dad was trained by a Novus trained technician and had several years of experience before I got started. We worked together for a number of years and I learned a great deal from him.

Since then I have had the opportunity to work with technicians who have been trained by just about every major windshield repair supplier, and many, many who learned by video and/or instruction manuals. Some who are self taught do very good repairs, and some who have had a week's training do very poor repairs, but I can't think of a single person that has come to a Delta Kits training class that did not leave doing better repairs than when they arrived. Hopefully all of my competitors can say the same about their training classes.

Listen guys, I don't care if anyone other than my customers think I am an expert or not, and if you are not using a Delta Kits windshield repair system I don't care where you get your training as long as you do good work, but in the 20+ years that I have been doing this I have seen far too many windshield repair technicians that simply don't do good repairs, and I would sure like to see that change.

[Blind Squirrel]

Don, our techniques are probably similiar. I always drill on low speed and never "bear down". I let the drill and bit do the work. This is where I'm very patient.

I think a point that is important to make is, I don't "not drill" or "drill less" with the thought of making my impact point or drill hole less visible. It's not that I don't care either. I think for me, it's a trade off where it's more important to me to completely fill the chip than to be concerned about how big the hole is.
I show each customer the finished repair from both inside and outside the car and emphasize that the objective and guarantee of the repair process is to seal the damage and stop it from spreading. I never sell a repair with any cosmetic guarantees. In fact, I point that out by saying clearly that there are no cosmetic guarantees in the repair process. This goes back to a thread some time back about lease returns and state inspections. I don't mean to get off the subject here but that's another issue that I want to get clear on in another thread at another time. That is, how can any of you guys offer any guarantee that the repair will pass any subjective inspection? Please start a new thread if you want to comment on this.

Back to drilling, I'm not trying to be contentious here. I truly seek enlightenment on how to do quality repairs without significantly increasing my repair times by not drilling.

[screenman]

I use the round head burs and have since I started, however I do not drill into many repairs but I do use the drill as a powered scribe, this I find for me is more accurated than a normal scribe. I find very few damages need drilling into and would only drill and pop for a few different styles and long cracks. I find by spending a couple of seconds studying the damage it helps me decide on the correct course of action. Anything resembling a bullseye would certainly seldom need drilling into and if you did there would be no significant gain. Looking at a bullseye or similar style break even with legs and you will see a cone shaped piece of glass that has been pushed back, we have come across many old repairs where guys have drilled into the middle of a bullseye. I wonder who trained them I could name some but will not.

[ghost rider]

oh boy, can open, worms allover. I agree with drilling chips, but not for injecting them. i think it's much easier to dry them out after drilling. i think alot of problems i see on here can be solved with better dry out techniques. I use a 9906 dremel bit for all drilling, huge by most of your standards, but i only need to drill for 5 to 10 seconds at most, usually less. and never more than 1/4 into the glass. next, i have not drilled the end of a crack for over 15 years. i don't have comebacks the crack looks better without the drill hole. OK, let me have it!

[Brent Deines]

Originally Posted by Blind Squirrel

The time has come to start a new thread about drilling. Like GT, (Don) I drill almost every chip I repair. There are some variables on how I approach each one, what size bit and how deep to drill. The only time I don't drill is on certain types of bullseyes with the odd shaped impact point.

I am as mystified as I can be when Brent claims that he hardly ever drills a chip. How in the world do you get the chips to fill? Are you willing to take hours to do a repair?

I want to attend a Delta training class to see if the trainers can really show a "no-drill" technique that is as effective as they claim. I don't know if they will be able to show enough different examples that will truly alter my techniques.

Do the Delta training videos show you how to do this?

I've had this issue on the back burner for a couple years now and it's time to get clear on it.

Thanks for starting a new thread for this debate Blind. You beat me to it. You are very welcome to attend one of our training classes any time you like, but please understand that as I keep saying over and over again, our methods will not necessarily work with every windshield repair system. The fact that we can fill almost every break without drilling has more to do with the system than the technique. Come to the training class and you will have no problem "completely" filling breaks without drilling using the Delta Kits system and the Delta Kits methods. Whether you go back to drilling after that will be up to you, but I can tell you that most don't.

Yes, our videos do show how we fill repairs without drilling.