Although the glass is beautiful and often practical, it also has its downsides. Glass, of course, is notoriously fragile in its basic form, being susceptible to chips, cracks, and outright shattering. Special glass treatments and tempering processes can lend added strength, but even then, glass must be treated with care.
Fortunately, for many relatively minor problems, glass repair in Downers Grove is a realistic and practical option. Any time that a pane of glass remains basically intact, in fact, repair is typically possible, with the desirability of this option depending on a number of factors.
The most basic and simplest form of glass repair in Downers Grove is the addressing of relatively small chips. Especially when these problems occur near the edges of a pane of glass, where they will be less obvious, repairing them is typically a better option than replacing the entire pane.
In order to fix a chip, a technician makes use of a special repair compound. Similar in texture and with regard to many of its properties to epoxy, the substance is used to fill the chip and then smoothed out before it begins to dry. Although the cured compound will not be as completely clear as natural glass is, it will often be transparent enough that the repair will be difficult to notice.
For larger chips and cracks of a certain length, the same basic approach can be used. In these cases, though, it is likely that the repair work will be more obvious once completed, so extra attention will need to be paid to smooth over the signs of damage. Still, of those who Visit Bolingbrook Glass every week, most are more than satisfied with the results of such efforts.
Once cracks extend beyond a certain length, typically somewhere around a third of a pane’s size, the structure of the glass weakens considerably. While a repair will restore much of this structural strength, this issue will need to be taken into consideration. At this point, it can make more sense to have a pane of glass replaced instead of repaired, particularly when the cosmetic factor is weighed in. In practice, though, cracks of this size are relatively rare so that repairs are often entirely advisable.
