I had a chance this past week to begin taking apart the windshield. The windshield frame has only surface rust, so that’s a relief, but it does have two cracks. One crack should be easily fixed, but the other is on the arm. It is complete severed except for the cables(?) on the inside. This will be a little more of a challenge. Here are some photos:
Fractured support arm:
Crack at the top of windshield:
The glass is good, as in not broken, but there are bubbles at the edge of the glass:
The spot welds came loose on this softtop door support (which means it must have had a top at one time), so the previous owner first tried welding, and, when that failed, bolted the support to the windshield.
This is the front. Most of the twist pieces are no good. I suspect the frame’s face must have started to come loose from the structure, so there are some welds at the very top.
So, there’s some work to do!
Interesting, Those cracks, stress cracks? anyway, If you have a lot of patience, I think this windshield is repairable with one of those low voltage mig welders. Eastwood ells what they call a stitch welder, which works with a arch welder,, does a nice job and easy to use. Keep us informed Dave.
I’ve never heard of a stitch welder. I’ll check it out. Thanks!
Lets do some detective work….
..why busted at the same small area in so many different directions????
If I didn’t know better….
And in this case I absolutely don’t…..
But the nature of those cracks sure looks to me like that part of the tubing on the windshield at some point filled up with water….
…….and then at another point the temperature fell below freezing…..
And the water turned to ice which then swelled up and busted that tubing just like if it was a frozen water pipe…
Might be easier to cut that support off and weld on a new one. I’ve got several frames I can help with or trade you one that’s in better shape. I see the manual wiper bracket is still on there. Those are hard to find. Looks like the correct vacuum wiper motor and it has the original style rear view mirror. Those upper door support brackets do take some abuse when the frame is thrown around and they are held on with a couple tacks
I think that frame is repairable as well. The manual wiper handle can be found and are a nice touch. Most Surreys had that feature. Mine came from a cannabalized DJ3 hardtop.