Drystar

[jayjacque]

I'm not sure what square ends or blunt ends of legs are. One star or combination situation that I've encountered once in awhile that seems to want to crack out is if on each side of the impact point the legs are like a straight line across (kinda like just one leg with the impact point right in the middle. Sometimes on first viewing your eyes don't pick up on it. But as soon as I can see it's a straight line across I ease up and use caution! One of them there legs might want to run! I haven't tried it yet, but now I wonder if popping would ease the pressure?

[InventorOfDryStarPatent]

Barry,

Certainly nothing new to what I was referring to. I guess the terminology "Anchor" I used in the sense of relieveing stress was misleading. I merely ment drill and pop. Sorry for the confusion. Not sure why you did not have success doing this though. I realize the crack ends that are blunt are very sensitive but you should be able to drill and pop. Personally I Drill slightly past the end of the crack and use very light pressure when drilling. I like to use various guage sewing needles and my tap stick(suction cup remover). Thats just what works for me.

Thank you for the compliment. Certainly one I will only ever be able strive for, but never achieve. There is only one and can only ever be one deserving of this.

Brian.

Thank you for your response in clarifying.

I did drill and pop a little bit down stream of the cracks, but the ones that I didn't have much success with where the ones with the square or as you describe them, blunt ends.

Those buggers would run right on into and thru and past the bullsye I poped!
I did not like leaving money laying on the table or one might say windshield.

Thanks again.

Barry

[InventorOfDryStarPatent]

I'm not sure what square ends or blunt ends of legs are. One star or combination situation that I've encountered once in awhile that seems to want to crack out is if on each side of the impact point the legs are like a straight line across (kinda like just one leg with the impact point right in the middle. Sometimes on first viewing your eyes don't pick up on it. But as soon as I can see it's a straight line across I ease up and use caution! One of them there legs might want to run! I haven't tried it yet, but now I wonder if popping would ease the pressure?

I found some of those you are describing to be sensitive to running also.
I allways tried to drill (Note:I drilled these at the impact point and not at the crack end)and fill them first but used extra light bridge pressure.
If they did not fill, then I would carefully pop, (again at the drilled impact point only) unless it took off on me and I was trying to save my life!, Then I drilled and poped the end, that was very rare tho.

[InventorOfDryStarPatent]

I will add one more comment about 5 minute repairs. It only takes a few seconds to cure a think layer of resin on the surface of glass with a high quality UV light, or even in the sunlight for that matter. However, almost all glass used in windshields today is UV resistant. I don't remember how much UV it blocks right off the top of my head, but we have tested it ourselves and have verified this fact with several windshield manufacturers, and it is significant.

We don't know what kind of light technicians will be using when they cure a repair, so to be safe we recommend 5 minutes, and that is if you are not curing under pressure. If you are curing under pressure, the UV light directly over the pit area is considerably less, regardless of what type of lamp you use, so you should allow even more time.

Brent;

I did some testing also, and my question is;

Did you test U.V. penetration of the glass or U.V. pentetration of the P.V.B.?


What U.V.wave lenght did you use? A or B or other?

When I repeatedly bonded 2 small test samples of glass without any P.V.B. present (I scraped and cleaned the P.V.B from the autoglass first before I also repeatedly tested it on plain flat glass samples) they cured in short order all the way thru.The glass broke before the bond would break. Even when I cured using the most mild U.V. sources.

My question is how you came to the conclusion that (quote) the glass used in windshields today is U.V. resistant with significance (Unquote).

I have found that the glass itself has no significant resistance to filtering for U.V. curing using both U.V. initiated chemicals or U.V. light meters,however, I have found that the P.V.B on the other hand did in fact filter out significant U.V rays.

To conclude, the U.V. does not go thru P.V.B when curing chemical in breaks in autoglass on the outside, hence,finding no significant increase in curing times from whats under the plastic or in the break.

I have found this to be nearly the same when testing many different chemicals on the market

[Brent Deines]

Barry,

I tested the outside lite of glass only as all the repairs we do are on the outside lite of a windshield.

I used a 365nm producing UV light. The 365nm wavelength is of course longwave UVA.

While I certainly respect your results, I believe our tests are a bit more sophisticated. We use a digital radiometer to do all of our UV light and sunlight testing, and the results are quite revealing. Without a radiometer, you have no way to know for sure how much energy your light is putting out, or even what wavelength is being used for that matter. You also have no way to accurately test how much UV a windshield or UV shield blocks.

I am not an expert on such things, but I have consulted many experts on the subject over the years. A former technical adviser for PPG AutoGlass told me that solar green laminated glass, now used in most automobile windshields, blocks approximately 85% of UVA rays and 99% of UVB rays. He was in fact the one who alerted me to the fact that cure times should be increased when curing through solar green glass. Up until that time I advocated a 2 minute cure time, which as I said, is sufficient depending on the light used, but there are many technicians using battery operated lights that do not produce the energy to cure properly in that amount of time. I would encourage you to contact a glass manufacturer, or spend the money to purchase a radiometer and do a bit more testing yourself before you pronounce your results to be conclusive.

If you want to cure your repairs for 2 minutes or 2 seconds that's your business, but I want it to be very clear that Delta Kits advocates a longer curing cycle, and we advocate spending as much time as is necessary on each repair to properly replace "all" the air from a break with a high quality windshield repair resin. I feel it is irresponsible to limit the repair process to 5 minutes, and frankly take exception to that fact that you used this forum to promote that practice.

[InventorOfDryStarPatent]

Barry,

I tested the outside lite of glass only as all the repairs we do are on the outside lite of a windshield.

I used a 365nm producing UV light. The 365nm wavelength is of course longwave UVA.

While I certainly respect your results, I believe our tests are a bit more sophisticated. We use a digital radiometer to do all of our UV light and sunlight testing, and the results are quite revealing. Without a radiometer, you have no way to know for sure how much energy your light is putting out, or even what wavelength is being used for that matter. You also have no way to accurately test how much UV a windshield or UV shield blocks.

I am not an expert on such things, but I have consulted many experts on the subject over the years. A former technical adviser for PPG AutoGlass told me that solar green laminated glass, now used in most automobile windshields, blocks approximately 85% of UVA rays and 99% of UVB rays. He was in fact the one who alerted me to the fact that cure times should be increased when curing through solar green glass. Up until that time I advocated a 2 minute cure time, which as I said, is sufficient depending on the light used, but there are many technicians using battery operated lights that do not produce the energy to cure properly in that amount of time. I would encourage you to contact a glass manufacturer, or spend the money to purchase a radiometer and do a bit more testing yourself before you pronounce your results to be conclusive.

If you want to cure your repairs for 2 minutes or 2 seconds that's your business, but I want it to be very clear that Delta Kits advocates a longer curing cycle, and we advocate spending as much time as is necessary on each repair to properly replace "all" the air from a break with a high quality windshield repair resin. I feel it is irresponsible to limit the repair process to 5 minutes, and frankly take exception to that fact that you used this forum to promote that practice.

Brent.

As stated, I had used meters also.

My experience.

Please keep in mind the 5 minute repair was calculated based on doing multiple repairs at volume fleet accounts at the same time and when filling was complete on one, I dressed the pit and put plastic on it and moved on to the next one that allready was in progress while the sunlight was curing the other ones, sometimes curing was for extended lengths or longer then needed, but never shorter then needed. All the while they where curing, I was not investing any time waiting for them to cure because I was filling breaks,preping breaks,writing bills, service,ect.
When the breaks are 100% full, be it,5 minutes or more/less, when its filled its filled,
I started the cure process and moved on. Along with multiple bridges, that enabled me to do about up to 10 an hour.
Remember, the 5 minute example experience I used in an earlier post was for a "cherry picked bullseye" with a cured pit, along with the sun (son) taking care of my buisness while I worked with the UCM or doing other things, was in fact my experience as was the rest.
No complaints to speak of (untill replys to these posts),years of many satisfied customers, very,very fruitfull and very fun!
My experience.
I hope it helps anyone, because it certainly has helped me.



Best regards

Barry.

[Brent Deines]

I guess I missed the part about you using a meter. Still a mystery why your results would be so different than those of the glass manufacturers, and my own results.

As for the five minute windshield repairs, I'm glad you expounded on your original post as it was not evident to many of us that you were talking about averaging the time spend on multiple repairs and the fact that you were using multiple bridges, as 10 repairs per hour would be an average of 6 minutes per repair including writing invoices, which even under the very best of circumstances is quite a feat.

I'm not worried about the veteran windshield repair technicians on this forum, they will choose to believe whatever they want, and their own experiences will either validate or invalidate what they read here. My problem is this. There are many people that read this forum who are interested in the windshield repair business, but have not yet done their first repair. When they read a post about doing 10 repairs per hour and curing with sunlight, they are reading things that are directly opposed to the new ROLAGS standard, the recommended practices of all of the reputable windshield repair manufacturers, the NWRA and the NGA. In addition, you are undermining all of my attempts to provide a forum that not only provides helpful information to new technicians, but also helps to set realistic expectations.

You can argue that 5 minute repairs are possible, and I cannot refute that fact. It is possible, and some people will do it, but just the vehicle inspection process that is required to be in compliance with ROLAGS takes several minutes, as does the invoicing, and then there is drying out the break, and you also mentioned drilling, so is a 5 minute windshield repair a realistic expectation?

In any case, this thread has gotten way off the subject. Let's get back to the subject, the Dry Star moisture evaporation tool, and move on please.

[screenman]

Maybe you are both right, certainly nowadays most autoglass has UV inhibitors but this was not always the case. Maybe the one that let the UV through was a very old piece. Just think if it had none in you would get a fantastic suntan on the arm closest to the window when driving, even with the window up.