914 Windshield inside OEM Glass Sticker logo?, Anyone making these OEM Windshield Mfg. Stickers Options

[TJB/914]

Looking for help if anyone makes these OEM Windshield Sticker's?
Are they different for every model year?
Many years ago while restoring my 914 I used a solvent to clean up the windshield glass & destroyed the letters. I would like one for my OEM original windshield (IMG:style_emoticons/default/pray.gif)
This is off as recent 1976 in a local shop for repairs in this photo.
Tom Michigan

[JeffBowlsby]

Interesting. Can you decipher the date or date code from the first photo above?

[vitamin914]

Interesting. Can you decipher the date or date code from the first photo above?

Unfortunately I can't. The codes all depend on how the manufacturer sets them up.

Since I worked at PPG I knew their system. DOT 18 was PPG.

Some of it was standardized... The M number defines the glass makeup and processing - I vaguely remember the M number had to be registered with UL or CSA as standards conformance testing had to be proven for the thickness, materials and processing of that configuration. Testing included ball drops, penetration, broken shard size, etc. US standards differ a bit from Euro.

AS1 mark defines the primary vision area - the windshield. AS2 is secondary vision areas like side and rear windows. AS3 would be for things like sunroofs. If the windshield has a blue / green tinted shade band at the top there will be an AS2 mark with an arrow on it, indicating it is not part of the primary area (they were also used in production for workers to line up the shade band of the laminated inner vinyl layer). The color was dyed into the vinyl not the glass.




This was made at PPG works no. 80 (Hawkesbury, Ontario) in November 2005.



This was made at PPG works 28 (Evansville, Indiana) in March 2004.

These are both OEM windshields. There was really good money in ARG (automotive replacement glass). Back in my day, a COMPLETE car set of glass sold to Honda for about $100. For replacement glass, just the windshield alone we could get more than what we sold the car set for. Tooling for windshields was cheap - that is why all glass companies make it (and it is usually the one that gets chipped and broken the most). I can't think of anyone that made tempered back and side glass for the aftermarket. The tooling and process was much more complicated and expensive. A single OEM run would make 10 years worth of replacement tempered glass and you could not compete with that because of tooling costs if you were not the OEM.

Is there a difference between OEM glass and ARG. Hell yes.
For OEM glass we had drawings and data for bend and size from the automaker. For ARG glass we would go out buy a piece of glass from a replacement auto glass company (that was hopefully made by the OEM). We would make tooling by cloning everything off of that single piece of glass. Typical glass size tolerance was +/- 1.5mm. God knows where that sample glass was at. We would wait for complaints from glass shops before making changes.

Thing is, glass that did not meet automaker specs (for size and bend) often found their way into the ARG market. It was good from a safety perspective, just would be rejected by the auto maker. Robotic installation would be a problem if the size was out but not a big deal for a guy at an auto glass shop to fiddle with.

I guarantee that Chinese made replacement windshield glass is made the same way. For our 50 year old 914s my question is how bad is the photocopy, of a photocopy, of a photocopy, of a photocopy...

As a general rule, anyone can make replacement windshields. Side and back glass is generally always OEM.

Naturally I'm a bit anal when it comes to windshield glass since I know how it was made. Is ARG glass garbage? It really depends on the source. I bought mine from Porsche for a reason maybe it is a photocopy closer to the original document.