Windshield Repair Forum

I encountered a problem yesterday & I need to know what I did wrong. I was on a big truck that had a large quarter sized, shattered bullseye with a crack that ran thru the center that was wide across the top of the top of the bullseye, tapering to a point on each end, extending about 1/2 " past the edges of each side of the bullseye damage. The bullseye filled in quite nicely but for the life of me I could not get any resin to flow thru the legs of the crack & I re-filled my injector 3 times. I flexed under pressure, went to vacuum, down to pressure over & over. The damage was at the top of the windshield, under the visor, which barely had room for my injector and for over an hour & a half there I am, outstretched over the top of this big motor with my right foot on a tire, my left balancing up on the manifold, leaning on the glass with both elbows. Talk about cramps! The sun was behind me but the glare off the glass was blinding! I removed my bridge and saw that the bullseye was perfect but this ugly gash across it still glittered bright in the sun! I drilled the center of the crack thinking it was separate damage, attached my injector again, pulled another vacuum... nothing would flow... not even under pressure & I know the resin hadn't cured yet as I was doing all this under my UV screen. By this time I was totally baffled & told the shop foreman that I just couldn't fix it and there'd be no charge. Should I have drilled the ends of the crack & popped new bullseyes rather than the center? I'd like to go back & see if I can finish the repair & at least get paid but I couldn't justify charging the man if I couldn't guarantee the repair.

Gwen

Did you remove moisture from the break before starting the repair?
There might have been moisture in the legs of the crack.

Try laying some resin on the whole lenght of the legs and put curing film over them and go inside the cab and flex the legs from there. This will fill most surface type cracks which this sounds like. Not all carcks extend to the back of the glass although most do.

I had something similar on a semi a few months back. I couldn't get the small crack to fill but the bullseye I create filled nicely LOL It was like the crack was over the bullseye. I bet screenmans solution would work I wish I would have thought of that

Jeff

A+++,

Are you sure that the crack was not actually on the inside glass? I have seen many trucks that have had this size of damage and the glass was damaged on both the outside and the inside. Did you use your probe (or finglernail) to verify that the crack was on the outside? Sometimes it can be hard to tell, especially when we have a tendency to assume that all the damage is on the outer layer.