Experience + Ignorance = Fear

The first time my windscreen shattered to pieces was in 1990 when I drove a 1981 Datsun Pulsar.  The 2nd time was when the rear window of the same car shattered while parked in the factory compound.  I discovered the damage only at quitting time. 

After I changed to a 1983 Toyota GL the same nightmare occurred while I was driving home one evening with some carpool partners.  The piece of rock was large, but the dent was almost negligible and the windscreen didn’t shatter on the spot.  It only happened about a month or so later while I was on the way to work in the morning.  I had to steer from the fast lane to the emergency lane and punch out the rest of the broken glass before continuing the journey.  I dropped the guys off at the factory, took the day off in search of a replacement windscreen. 

Add that to an occasion when I volunteered to drive my sis-in-law’s 1990 Toyota GL without the windscreen all the way to SP to have it replaced because workshops elsewhere didn’t have any in stock.  Talk about experience, I have an abundance of it.

So, when a pebble hit the Myvi’s windscreen the other day out on the expressway, I said, “Shit!  Here we go again...”  Memory went back to those times of having to drive with my windscreen broken into bits of thousands of pieces after hearing a sudden ‘pop’ and then a ‘crack’.  But miraculously the thing didn’t go to pieces.  I was afraid another shattering experience might await me some day right in the middle of the expressway.  Who knows it might even happen in a heavy downpour with my family in it.  I wasn’t going to allow that to happen.  Like I said to a fellow car owner at the workshop, it’s like ‘tunggu jatuh hukuman’ (waiting for the judge to pass the sentence).  But you won’t know when it‘s gonna happen.

After the initial cursing & swearing I made inquiries all over the place on availability and costs of replacement until I finally decided I’d go back to Perodua workshop.  With prices of everything on the upswing, nobody was ready to give me a fixed price.  I imagined another RM500 flying away.  But to my surprise, the workshop manager advised me to get it repaired. 
Huh?  He assured me it’s perfectly normal and I could even come away with a lifetime guarantee.  He showed me how to get to Jackson Conversions.  The Jackson guy called it a Bull’s Eye.  The job was done in only a few minutes.  The bill: RM80.

And here’s the enlightenment.  Tempered glass windscreens that could shatter into smithereens has been phased our more than 20 years ago.  My fears were totally unfounded.  Now to find out why experience + ignorance = fear.

And this is the result of the repair job...