I bought my 'Glass Pack' from Parallel. It comes with 2x door glass, 2x quarter-lights and the windscreen. All the glass is original spec and indeed is bought by owners of genuine cars because the Lambo parts are so expensive. This to me proves that all the glass is curved properly like the original, rather than some replicas which use totally flat glass for the windscreen, or even cut-down glass from other cars. All the glass comes with black finishing on the inside edge and the door and quarter-lights have a green tint. The screen has a top-tint and is laminated, again like the original. All the glass is tempered for strength.
DOOR GLASS
First thing to do is get the window frame to fit the door recess. I suggest that you do not make the frame fit the recess perfectly because you will find that when you try it with the glass fitted as well the whole thing is miles out again. Basically, I could not get the frame to fit what I would call 'evenly' all round no matter what I did. The glass is simply not the same shape as the doorframe. Apart from breaking the glass or re-moulding the door it'll never be right so you just have to get it as good as you can. Once you have roughly trimmed the bare window frame to fit the door, line the windowframe with the glass rubber runner.
I found that my offside frame was much, much further out than the nearside. In fact, To look half-decent the recess had to be ground right out and the original recess line filled in. Plus, the rear of the glass had a much more prominent curve in it than the door so we also had to build up the door frame in the middle to match the glass. Definately an aggro job.
I suggest you decide beforehand if you are ever likely to have windows that go up and down because if you are you will need to spend much more time on getting the correct fit. I was originally going to go the electric route but after seeing how much work it will involve I decided against it. If you are going to have fixed windows you can afford to be more complacent with getting the correct fit as you can forcefully clamp the perimeter of the frame to the door whilst letting the bonding agent set. Once the bonder has set, you will find that because the frame and glass is being held at an angle it doesn't really want to be in, the glass is very tight in the frame and hence why having it move up and down, electrically or otherwise, isn't really an option.
If you do want the glass to move, you will more than likely have to do a lot of filing and sanding of the recess so that when the frame is held against it it's not under tension. BUT it will look worse because you will have to take so much material off the door that the frame will not be very evenly sited all round.
It's catch 22 I'm afraid. You can have windows that work, but with loads of aggro to do it and an uneven frame depth, or windows that are fixed (which is a downer), with far less hassle and that look better asthetically.
REAR QUARTERLIGHT GLASS
Not too difficult this job. Just offer up the glass to the body and see why and where it doen't fit right. On my car the offside fitted considerably better and only needed slight trimming to fit pretty squarely all round. The nearside was quite different and even after a fair bit of fettling the bend of the glass did not really follow the line of the aperture. Not too much of a problem though as you can get away with a fair bit because of the depth of the recess it sits in. As long as you can get enough contact between the glass and the body at various places the bonder will hold it firm once set. It's not a highly stressed part so you haven't got to go overboard with fixation. Any gaps can be filled in with black silicone sealant. My advice is to leave the final fitment until the engine is fitted. The ability to enter the engine bay through the hole in the body can be a real help when it comes to hooking up the engine.
WINDSCREEN
Not much to say or do about this. The supporting edge on the body shouldn't need any work other than to check there are no obvious raised points or moulding marks. My only other advice is to not fit it yourself unless you are a trained vehicle glazier. The special bonding process required is not something you can easily do, nor is the correct spacing that needs to be carried out. The bonder itself is highly specialised material and once set it makes the windsceen an integral part of the car. In short, pay a local glazier 50 quid and save yourself the worry of the screen falling out at 120 mph....UPDATE 03/11/02: I managed to break my windscreen by accident. Words cannot describe how angry I felt, or how scared my wallet was. See more details on the 'How it ended' page.
REAR BULKHEAD GLASS
The rear bulkhead glass panel does not come included in the Parallel glass 'kit'. Personally I would have thought it would make sense to include it but when I questioned Parallel about it their answer was 'some builders may want to make up their own glass panel as this would also give them the choice of going for single or double-glazed." UPDATE 15/11/02: Parallel now supply the rear panel in the kit, and charge an extra £60 for it.
Quite who would want to drive around with a 4 litre V8 engine inches from their lug-holes with only a single piece of 3mm glass between them is beyond me. OK, these cars sound lovely but theres loud and there's excessive. I decided that there was no other option but to go for a double-glazed panel as this was what was fitted to Parallels demonstrator and even that could hardly be called quiet. The panel cost £60 which didn't seem too bad and has been made so that it fits the gap in the chassis nicely. My only gripe would be that it's not very well finished. The corners of the inside edge are 'squared off' which looks a bit cack and some of the silicone sealant has seeped between the glass and the metal inner edge. This will all be seen when fitted as the inner edge of the glass panel is the one you work to, not the edge on either the body or interior trim panel that goes over the bulkhead panel. Anyway, theres no way you can get to the offending areas to clean it up as the whole thing is sealed so I'll have to live with it.
The panel is made from 2 pieces of 3mm thick glass with an 8mm sandwich, bringing total width to 14mm.
I bonded the panel in using Sikaflax and made a neat seal around the edge (engine bay side) using black silicone as it's easier to make look neater than Sikaflex. After that I sealed the area around the panel where the body is close to the chassis using a mixture of P40 filler for any big gaps and silicone for the smaller ones. It's actually quite a tricky job as you can't even see the bit you are supposed to be sealing as it's arouind the hinge for the engine lid. Obviously you don't want to get any P40/silicon on the hinge so you need to be careful. The aim is to seal the cabin entirely from the engine bay, including any nooks and crannies and thats what I arrived at. The only way through to the engine bay now is via the quarterlights, which still need to be fitted.
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