TonyES350

This one's going to make you laugh...I picked up my two-week-old ES350 from the dealership today after having ClearBra installed.

On my way home, as usual, I made sure that there was lots of space between my car and the one directly in front of me so as to minimize the chance that a rock would ding the car.

Out of nowhere, a freaking rock smacked my windshield. Man, I looked like Tony Soprano as I lost my mind cursing up a storm in a fit of uncontrollable rage!

When I got home, I looked closely and saw that a couple of tiny pecks had resulted from the pebble hitting the windshield. My wife has a 6 month old Acura MDX, so I decided to take a look at her windshield...you know, for some piece of mind that if her car had it then it was okay for mine to have it too! :-)

Well, she had lots of little marks on her windshield from pebbles hitting it. I guess it's just unavoidable no matter how hard you try, but isn't it ironic? I got ClearBra put on the car to avoid that type of damage...and on the way home from doing THAT, a pebble hits my windshield!

Tony

SC400-V8

iTrader: (1)

You should meet a friend of mine.... his name is Mr. Murphy, and he is a professor of law.

BobBass

I can't tell you how often that has happened to me with relatively new vehicles. The latest was with my wife's '04 Sienna van. It was about two weeks old and she was following somebody out of a new school construction site when a stone flew up behind him. She wasn't even going that fast.

Called insurance company, Safelite came out a few days later and installed the new windshield IN OUR DRIVEWAY! It wasn't a Toyota WS but the PPG they did use is just fine.

The real kicker was that, unbeknownst to me, the car sales guy somehow managed to raise the comprehensive deductible when he called in the vehicle change, so we ended up paying more $.

Rockville

original Lexus parts as the laminate has an acoustic barrier built in that reduces noise transmission by 2/3rds at conversational frequencies. It also has an infrared filter. It is always a good idea to check your glass coverage and deductible to make sure you are covered when rocks ruin your day.

Rock

TonyES350

Rock - Thanks for the advice.

The marks are actually very small, two round marks about the size of a ball-point pen tip. I don't think they warrant replacing the whole windshield.

But I did read that there is some sort of procedure that can be done to the pecks that involve putting epoxy in them, heating it up, then buffing the spot to fill it in smoothly. There appear to be folks that specialize in doing this.

Has anyone else heard of this? Tony

lexuslover

yeah, i have had the glass fill done on 2 different cars. it works beautifully. i had this small crack that had not spread yet. if you ran your finger across the top of the windshield you wouldn't feel much, maybe just a small speck, but there would be this "interior crack" within the glass pane that was not very attractive. when you do the fill it takes that all away and you can't see anthing anymore. it's well worth it. it costs between $40-$60 for mobile service at your home or office and it is worth every penny. it basically fixes it permanently; the installers usually guarantee the fill for life against cracking or spreading.

p.s. some insurance companies actually cover the entire cost b/c it's a preventative measure. if you leave these specks unchecked, changes in temperature may cause cracking later on, which means the insurance company will end up paying hundreds of dollars for a windshield.

TonyES350

That's all I needed to hear...thanks a lot for sharing your experience. I'll find someone local to take care of this for me tomorrow.

My wife's Acura MDX also has a couple of spots. I'll kill two birds with one stone. Get it...stone?

Thanks, Tony

e-man

Hey Rock. Can you point me to an article or something that I can show to my insurance agent? I have a 99 GS400, and my original OEM windshield cracked last week. I had it replaced on Friday with a PPG windshield. I noticed a small area of distortion in the lower right corner of the windshield, so they are coming out this Thursday to install another one. My insurance agent (who we know pretty well) has told me that there's no real difference between PPG and the Toyota/Lexus glas. If I can show him that there is a difference, I might have a chance of getting a Toyota/Lexus glass.

e

psp

It does work well BUT, DO NOT GET THE WINDSHIELD WET PRIOR TO REPAIR. If you do the water will take forever to evaporate and the resin that they use to "fill" the crack will not "flow" and YOU will will have a constant reminder of your little souvenir.

e-man

Just bumping an old thread here. I got in a fight last week with a salt truck on the highway and guess who won. I've got 4 or 5 pin or pen-point sized nicks on the passenger side of the glass. I figured I would just leave them alone, but if there's a chance they will spread, I'll want to take care of them.

Tony -- did you get the nicks on the windshield of your ES350 taken care of? Can anyone provide some insight?

Rock, are you still around?

e