shattered shower door

[supro]

I recently bought a Century frameless shower door with 1/4 in. glass. As I tried to install it, in trying to fit it against the slider frame, it shattered into many small granular pieces (as I believe tempered glass is supposed to do). When I spoke to the dealer from whom I purchased this, he seemed to indicate that this was quite common and that the glass panels cannot take any flex during install. Once they are on their tracks apparently there is no problem. This surprises me a bit since I did not really flex the panel. Furthermore a glass door should be able to take a bit of flexure, especially with kids who might push or knock on it while bathing. I am somewhat worried about this since if "normal" frameless panels are indeed this susceptible to breakage as I have experienced and which the dealer indicates may be typical, I am concerned about safety aspects. Any comments? Are these panels really that delicate during mounting? Or could this be a quality control issue?

Supro

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Perhaps your termonology is wrong. Glass does not flex. It should take a certain amount of pressure from normal use, but it will shatter before it flexes. How is this held in place? Clamps or some pressure device? if not perfectly aligned, it will put a lot of stress in a small area and cause breakage. Was it scratched at all during shipping or handling? That can have nasty effects, sort of the way a glass cutter works. Ed

I am somewhat

[jriegle]

Glass can certainly flex (bend). Take an 18" long x 1" wide strip of single strength glass and hold it down on a table top so that it is mostly overhanging. Take the free end, while holding the other end firmly against the table top and move it up and down. There is about of inch of movement! (wear gloves and safety glasses during the experiment incase of cuts or breakage).

We once had a screen door with full length tempered glass. the glass had a slight bow in it. If you pushed on it, the bow would pop inward and if you pushed the other side, it would pop back out. Strange but true.

Glass is certainly much more stiff when compared with other clear glazing materials we are used to, such as plastics, but to say that glass will not flex it pure B.S.

John

[Charlie Spitzer]

the way glass is tempered frequently causes bowing in panels. almost all tempered glass has some; the larger the panel the more evident it becomes.