The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post your windshield repair tips, questions, advice! Note there is a sub-forum specifically for business development questions.
Wayneious
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by Wayneious »

Looking through some of the posts and replies I was thinking if the windshield needed to be warmed up, why not use a heating pad and either lay it over the crack/chip area for a bit?

If you have access to the interior, using a piece of foam that has been cut into a wedge shape, then press the pad against the inside of the windshield where the issue is to raise the temp of the windshield and not using a lighter.

I think a combo of the heating pad on the inside with a heating element/moisture evaporator unit on the outside would be very beneficial to the fix and not look so barbaric as pulling out a butane cigaret lighter and flicking a flame to the window and then touching the window for the right 'temp.'

To be honest you could also wrap the heating pad in a slip cover that has your business logo on it if you felt embarrassed about using a heating pad...

Just an idea that's been whirling around in my mind.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by GlassStarz »

Lots of ways to warm the glass in cold weather. I used a blanket on the glass with the heat on in the car sometimes to bring it up slow. A blow dryer also works well.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by screenman »

I like the idea of a heat mat, but to be honest I either use the car heater or work cold using a blow torch. I do however like to see what is going on when using heat so covering it up with anything larger than a drystar is not an option for me.

We are just dropping into minus figures here for the first time this winter, so the next few months gets slightly tougher on the dryout side.
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Brent Deines
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by Brent Deines »

I like a hair dryer with a concentrator attachment, held by a Scorpion tool. It's a hands free option that keeps the heat source out of the way but applies consistent heat across a relatively large section of glass throughout the repair process. Glass temperature can be dialed in easily by adjusting the temperature, fan speed, angle to the glass and distance from the glass. Also gives the added advantage of keeping the injector (and therefore the resin) at the same temperature as the glass.

I prefer heating from the outside whenever possible as it takes far less heat than from the inside to accomplish the same task, although I find that using the defrosters to keep the entire windshield a constant temperature is also helpful in extremely cold temperatures.

Consistency is key in my opinion, so anything you can do to hold a constant warm (not hot) temperature throughout the entire process is should help you achieve consistent high quality results.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by sglass »

Hi.
Brent or Mr. Screenman could you please write a separate post about winter repairs.
Mabe make it like sticky that could be handy for those looking for. There is a lot of ideas on the forum but they spread over many posts, takes a lot of time too find them.
Winter is around the corner and how do you repair in this sytuation:
-2 Celcius, frost or snow on the glass, bullseye or star brake, stone cold engine ?
+5 Celcius, misty, foogy ,bullseye, star brake and 10cm crack from that star, cold petrol/diesel engine ?
Mr. Screenman how low in Celcius can you do a good repair?

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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by Brent Deines »

The point of a forum is to get many different opinions on a subject so I am happy to answer your question but won't make it a sticky topic. We tend to only stick posts that are global announcements, surveys, etc. that we believe every forum member should read as what is important to you may not be what is important to other forum members.

If possible I would start the vehicle immediately and turn the defrosters on high fan and high heat. That ought to earn me some hate mail! The reason I recommend this is that with a cold engine the defrosters will begin blowing cold air and will slowly warm up as the engine warms up, which is exactly how you want to warm cold glass...slowly. Using the defrosters in this instance will warm up the entire windshield which is also ideal and it will make the snow and ice removal easier.

If it is snowing I would move the vehicle inside, under a roof, or place a pop up canopy over the roof of the car and the windshield. I recommend always carrying a pop up canopy with you when there is a chance of show or rain just in case you cannot move the vehicle.

I would then scrape the glass with a plastic ice scraper and brush any snow off the roof of the vehicle so when it begins to melt the water does not run down the windshield, being careful not to scratch the paint.

If not indoors I would put a bubble dome over the damage to block any UV and and any water that might run down from the roof of the vehicle. If indoors I would place a towel across the top of the windshield to prevent any water from running down the windshield and compromising my repair.

I would attach a Scorpion tool to the outside of the windshield, attach a hair dryer to the Scorpion and position it so the warm air blow across the glass and into the bubble dome but enough out of the way to give room to get my hands and tools into the bubble dome. This greatly speeds up the safe warming of the glass inside the dome.

I would place a mirror with magnification on the inside of the windshield to make it easier to see if the damage begins to spread.

I would watch the break carefully as the glass warms, ready to shut off the hair dryer and the defrosters if the damage begins to spread. I can't say I have had that happen warming the glass this way but with any warming of cold glass the possibility exists.

I would then use a Spring Hammer or some other steel point probe to clean the loose glass from the break and carefully flex the damage to determine if there are any hidden cracks to consider.

If there were no long cracks and the glass temperature reached approximately 70 degrees F, I would place a Moisture Evaporator over the damage for 20 seconds to remove any moisture that may be trapped in the damage. Again, watching carefully to make sure the damage did not begin to spread.

If I had a 10cm crack I would evaluate the need to drill but under these conditions would probably drill 1mm past the end of the crack and use the Spring Hammer to pop a mini bullseye, effectively terminating the crack. I would then very carefully use a heat gun with a concentrator nozzle attached to dry out the damage, including the crack, rather than using a heat exchanger. I would not recommend this to someone just starting out unless you have practiced the method and are comfortable with it but with a bit of practice it can be a safe and effective way to remove moisture.

I would then place a "warm" Heat Exchanger on the damage to cool the glass back down to the temperature of the glass a few inches away from the damage. Don't use a "cold" Heat Exchanger as the thermal shock of cooling the glass too quickly could cause it to crack out. The Heat Exchanger will still drop the temperature of the glass quickly as long as the glass is hotter than the Heat Exchanger.

Once the glass has returned to the desired working temperature I would attach my bridge and begin filling the damage. At the temperatures you mentioned the above steps would likely add an additional 10-15 minutes to the repair process depending on if there was a crack or not, if I had to move or cover the car, etc.

Not my favorite working conditions but other than the additional time and having to work out in the cold it's not a big deal and if you live in a climate where those are the typical winter conditions your only other choice is to pass on the job.

It's been a long day and I'm about to go have some dinner so I busted this out pretty quickly. If I missed anything I'm sure someone will point it out and I'll get it corrected when I have a bit more time.

Keep in mind I'm not saying this is the only way to do repairs in the conditions you suggested, just the way I do it if I can't get the vehicle inside, which would obviously be my preference. I have been pretty fortunate over the years as most of my customers were willing to bring their vehicles to my shop in cold weather or they had a place to get the vehicle in out of the weather while the repair was being performed. Hopefully your customers will be equally accommodating. It makes winter repairs much more pleasant.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by sglass »

How do you power hair dryer on mobile service? Like one from picture on Delta facebook page.
I've got 12v hairdryer but it's wery weak.
Today I have my first crack during repair in last 2 yrs, simple repair gone wrong.
Still thinking why?

Tomas
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by sglass »

Thank You.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by Mr Bill »

GlassStarz wrote:Not sure any system uses just vacume. Science is simple though if you create a vacume any liquid pushed into it will flow better. Resulting in those pesky stars filling to the end. This is what the untrained guy is doing when he heats a star. As it cools it creates a vacume pulling it to the end. We all know the average ding dong adds heat after he is almost done resulting n just closing the leggs and they come back later. If he had cooked it before started the repair old school style it might actually work. We all know why you dont want to use heat. The old guys in the bronze age of our industry heated the glass first before trying to push in the resin using the old screw down style pistons. It worked but many were broken in the process.
I never use heat to make resin flow.
My repairs turn out fine.
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Re: The skill/equipment/efficiency balance

Post by bill lambeth »

I never use heat and I have NO problem with stars .
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