Dont know if any of you guys can help. After doing some cutting and grinding on my patio at the weekend I noticed that I have managed to get some of the debris off the grinder onto our patio windows. It seems to have welded itself to the glass and doesnt want to come off.

Any ideas what I should do?

Is there some kind of polishing paste that might remove it?

Mrs G is not impressed

Toothpaste is a very good mild abrasive for cleaning glass.

I used it on my watch once when I scratched it and as if by magic the scratch vanished.

It does depend on how much area you have to clean of course. Not sure if you can get Macleans in 5 litre containers.

Cheers

Mark

PS. I am NOT joking!!

i did just the same thing when renovating a metro.

it was pretty well embedded and i left it alone.

Perhaps you could compensate by impacting the glass with some other car part, thereby making 2 evils make a right with a new pane of glass.

helpful, thats me.

atb

steve

I have done this and you will probably find that the hot particles have got them selves pretty well embeded and are beyond polishing.

Anyhow here is a plan that may work:

The obvious problem here is that she of the fairer sex is non to chuffed on the basis that you have been utterly stupid by:

not doing it properly/not preparing properly before starting/not foreseeing problem/attempting to do oneself something that you were not capable of (delete as applicable).

She would not of course have had this problem beacuse she is cleverer than you! Don't worry - this is genetic programming.

So step one is to convince her that this is a fuss about nothing, it always happens and is quicker, easier and more effective to fix the problem after the event than to have avoided it in the first place. So - gather a collection of 'stuff' and say to her that with this 'stuff' (of which she can be expected to understand nothing) you will have it off in a jiffy. Hopefully at this point she will relent and realise that she just didn't understand beacuse she is a girl!

This leaves, of course, a problem - you were fibbing!!

therefore step two is to arrange for an accident to happen to your window whilst you are preparing to fix it - some local kid will no doubt kick a ball through it for a few quid.

She will therefore not have the oportunity to realise that you were talking complete nutsack and admire you once more.

Simple eh!

Some of the more devious of the speices will of course rummage through for a piece of damaged glass and expect you to demonstrate that it still wasn't a problem - that sort are best avoided in my opinion.

Yours deeply cynically

Phil

Go over it with one of those scraper doodahs with a stanley knife blade in it,you should get most of it off,did when I did the same thing anyroad
At least the glass will be smoothish, as for the deeper bits your right royally f@cked.
As far as I'm aware theres no compound for glass.
As for your watch glass mark, its probably plastic,one thing you wont have to take it to the dentists.
Cheers,
Bob

[Edited on 27/9/04 by splitrivet]

[Edited on 27/9/04 by splitrivet]

[Edited on 27/9/04 by splitrivet]

i like your style philgregson!!

Unlucky Jim!

I've done similar myself. Death toll so far has been:

1 spare (unused!) bathroom suite.
1 Mug
1 Glass door of spare cooker (since sold! )
1 double glazed window
1 small patch on Mum's car window

rust stains on newly painted garage door and surrounding window frames.

Aah well, if you wanna make omelettes you' gotta break eggs and all that!

Good luck,

James

great post phil

a very devious mind!

atb

steve

Thanks guys.

What you alluded to then seems to be the case ie. "right royally f@cked"

Tried a stanley knife blade which removed the debris together with a nice bit of glass

Will try some toothpaste and cutting compound this evening.

James - "1 Glass door of spare cooker " total respect for angle grinding in the kitchen . My missus would have my n@ds if I tried that.

Hi Bob

My watch did have a glass face.

I was reliably told this trick by a designer friend I know and it worked. Not for large scratches mind you or indeed real deep ones. I misread the angle grinder situation. Don't think there is enough toothpaste in England to sort that one out.

Cheers

Mark

PS. I love the smell of angle grinder sparks in the morning! Ahhh!!!

autoglym do a glass polish but it's very very very mild. might do something as a final pass.

I think you'll find the hot particals have welded themselves to the glass. If you do manage to remove them, there will be craters left which won't be removeable with any polish. If you bombarded the glass with metal filings, there will be pretty orangey brown rust marks on the glass after a while.
Incidently, if you want to clean non spark-damaged glass, the best cleaner is 0000 grade steel wool. Even 00 works well and doesn't scratch the glass.
Another alternative is to wipe the glass with a dilute vinegar/water mixture and polish dry with scrunched up newspaper.
I can vouch for both these methods as I've been doing it weekly for many years.

Did exactly the same to back door double glased panel
You can buy a new panel or leave it like I did, then:
a) the particles will rust and become very visible
b) they'll full rot away after about 6 months leaving textured glass behind (but far less noticeable!)

I find the best approach now is to aim the stream of hot flying metal particles at the clean-easy salesman as he approaches the drive - saves a good 10 minutes wasted telling him to **** off!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH GUYS!!!!!

As my wife kept repeating it i started to think that i realy was the only idiot who painted his kitchen door glazing with hot metal particles.

Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you

Just had a thought Jim, last year the Unit double glazed unit broke down on our patio door. I arranged to get it repaired at a local glass merchant of course putting it in the car I broke one of the panes anyway the guy replaced the pane and resealed the unit, total cost £50.This was a small family run firm who I found out later make most of the sealed units for practically all the local PVC window wallahs.Theres gotta be a similar company in your vicinity
Might be worth having a ring round.
Cheers,
Bob

Did a similar thing when welding a door top on the landrover. Weld spatter all over the door glass. Wife wasn't impressed since it was on her side. Tried to say that it was normal etc, didn't work.

Two years later, she still reminds me of it at certain times.

So then Jim, what was the outcome?

Has MrsG forgiven you yet?


Cheers,

James

Try Jeweller's paste, which not unsuprisingly you can get from a Jeweller, just explain what you want it for and they should be able to help you out.

I did similar thing to a MGB GT, ( I was young and naive) windscreen years ago and this worked quite well.

We had similar problems a few years ago when the next door unit at work vented something over our cars. It etched into the glass like sparks and would not come out.

We were supplied with some "Citric" acid, (I think it was called) in powder form. This diluted with water stunk like urine, but turned the particles rusty very quickly and within a couple of weeks had gone.

You had to look very closely to see the marks left by the particles and were invisible to general scrutiny.

Where you might get hold of the acid I do not know, but it has to be worth looking out for. It would depend on the splatter partical size as to whether it will be visible after, but if it is just grinder sparks it shouldn't be too bad.

Good luck
Terry

Mee too.. Ive done both patio doors cuttin steel on the patio, all embedded in the glass as well...

'er indoors is NOT impressed

And they are big doors as well

Regards

Geoffw

Ive done the same to my windscreen glass on my kit. I have scraped the particles off but now its a nightmare in the sun lots of dots everywhere. I have seen glass polishing compounds for sale im wondering if it will remove the tiny craters or not. Ive seen plenty videos kn you tube of people polishing glass with variable polishing mops.

Probably to late but just deny all knowledge in the future, If many days have passed in between the 'incident' and her indoors noticing the problem then simply denying it is best. 'oh thats awful, I wonder how that happened?' If she does't buy it then go on the offensive by coming up with a obscure reason its her fault 'I saw your cat/dog messing around there the other day' or 'maybe you used the wrong cleaning fluid on it'. Its best to have these excuses stocked up beforehand. If she hasn't noticed in a few weeks then point out the issue yourself because why would you point it out if it was your fault. Then roll out the excuses/blame.

Believe me women do the same thing, just go and check out mumsnet. That place is nearly as much of a information goldmine as locostbuilders.

My Dad did this years ago to our patio doors. He just plain denied any knowledge and blamed parties unknown. This must have been 20 years ago and they are still there embedded in the glass.

I bought a set a gauges of a member on here and he let me have some money off because one of them was 'marked'. Upon available it was marked with 'weld shrapnel'. Copious polishing with salvo autosol helped slightly.

I've just killed the brand new screen on an st220 doing this.

As long as you protected yourself from grinding dust then you're OK. Glass doesn't sound broken and I suspect you have to be quite close to notice the mishap anyway. Lesson learnt - move on!

many many years ago when i dabbled in double glazing we used to have a bit of success polishing scratches out of the glass with DYNOCUT dont know if it is still available but you could try 1200 wet and dry then polish with tcut might work for the smaller bits

http://www.glasspolishshop.com/glass-scratch-repair-starter-kit-gp-wiz-system

Going to try this as i allready have a variable polishing mop and 50odd quid is cheaper than a new windscreen

I've used something similar to remove scratches on the windscreen of my last car. It did a decent job, but there are a few things to bear in mind:

1. You might see some visual distortion where the glass was polished, especially if it's in your line of vision - you are removing glass, after all.
2. You have to keep the area wet and must keep the polishing head moving - if you concentrate your efforts in one area, or let it run dry, you can generate too much heat and crack the glass. The glass does get warm.
3. It's very messy - I sprayed polishing compound all over the garage! I had taped polythene sheet all over the car's bodywork, but some still worked through. You have to be very careful (and quick) to get the compound off paint.

Coming back to the original question - this may remove grinder spatter marks, but you might still see where you've polished. Worth a try though...

Ok try my trick

1) scrape excess off with a glass scraper
2) when the wife starts moaning roll eyes
3) get a girlfriend
4) divorce wife
5) sit back and relax as suddenly the shards of metal in the glass are the least or her problems

Just use Clay bar and detailing spray before going in with anything abrasive.

I mistakenly bought a glass lens for my welding mask, thinking it would be tougher than plastic. After about five minutes it had got so pitted and scored that I had to bin it!!