I done messed up.

[Chiroshi]

Posting in beginners because this was definitely a rookie mistake.

Yesterday we'd driven 3hours across the country (Switzerland) with the bikes to do some epic rides this weekend. 10 minutes after arriving at the campsite, we started setting up for dinner. I had some suction pads that I wanted to hang on the inside of the cooker glass to attach a sponge / washing up liquid holder to. I leant across the van, pressed on the suction cup and BANG. The whole glass shattered everywhere coating almost the whole van except the boot and bed in tiny tiny shards of glass.

We turned tail and drove the 3hrs home and I've now spent the entire day hoovering the van and all the contents. I even had to dismantle the cooker top to get the shards that had fallen in there. So 500km, 6hrs driving, 6hrs hoovering wasted and probably looking at 500CHF+ for a replacement glass, but I'll have that surprise tomorrow when the dealer re-opens.

Hopefully we can still get a few days riding in after we recover from the shock.

TL;DR - I broke the cooker glass; it's a massive mess and I don't advise it.

 

[Hotel California]

That's horrible , good that you own a T6 so two parts glas top ...the olderones have a full size glastop so more shattering glas .
Hope you yourself where not injured?

Think we all need to know what kind of sucktion cap you where trying to fit , take a picture and show us ....then trow it away asap so you will not use it agian!

 

[B J G]

Posting in beginners because this was definitely a rookie mistake.

Yesterday we'd driven 3hours across the country (Switzerland) with the bikes to do some epic rides this weekend. 10 minutes after arriving at the campsite, we started setting up for dinner. I had some suction pads that I wanted to hang on the inside of the cooker glass to attach a sponge / washing up liquid holder to. I leant across the van, pressed on the suction cup and BANG. The whole glass shattered everywhere coating almost the whole van except the boot and bed in tiny tiny shards of glass.

We turned tail and drove the 3hrs home and I've now spent the entire day hoovering the van and all the contents. I even had to dismantle the cooker top to get the shards that had fallen in there. So 500km, 6hrs driving, 6hrs hoovering wasted and probably looking at 500CHF+ for a replacement glass, but I'll have that surprise tomorrow when the dealer re-opens.

Hopefully we can still get a few days riding in after we recover from the shock.

TL;DR - I broke the cooker glass; it's a massive mess and I don't advise it.

Accidental 'like above.
Feel your pain!

 

[Chiroshi]

That's horrible , good that you own a T6 so two parts glas top ...the olderones have a full size glastop so more shattering glas .
Hope you yourself where not injured?

Think we all need to know what kind of sucktion cap you where trying to fit , take a picture and show us ....then trow it away asap so you will not use it agian!

It's a 2015 T6, so was the full size. It was the ikea bathroom jobbies, can't remember the name and was too embarrassed to take a photo.

 

[kurienp]

That's horrible , good that you own a T6 so two parts glas top ...the olderones have a full size glastop so more shattering glas .
Hope you yourself where not injured?

Think we all need to know what kind of sucktion cap you where trying to fit , take a picture and show us ....then trow it away asap so you will not use it agian!

@Chiroshi , feel your pain. But, well, on the brighter side, something that can be fixed fairly easily.

A question though, did you try and attach the suction cup after you had started cooking dinner/cooked dinner? Unlikely that a suction cup alone will have that kind of an effect on the glass top.

@hotel california , OP does mention cooking and dinner. It could be the heat difference on parts of the glass ... and the suction cup just making happen, what happened?

 

[2into1]

I imagine it was one of those twisty ikea fittings. I tried them but could not get them to hold.... Never mind to shatter the glass.

 

[soulstyledevon]

That sucks...

I’m thinking, a laminated sticker to cover the glass should the worse happen to me.
Broken glass is a nightmare to clean up inside a vehicle. You’ll be finding bits months later.

I hope you get sorted and back out riding.

 

[Eber123]

Good afternoon,

I am very sorry to read your story. That is terrible.

There are 2x things I can't get my head around, 1.) how can the glass lid so "explode" that in the worst case scenario it can injure somebody (or a pet in the van) and 2.) how could the replacement glass lid be so expensive?

If the glass lid is so expensive, why is it no like a front windscreen? In case (god forbid) of a car accident? Does that mean there is a chance that the glass peaces flying around in the van? Terrible!

What happend to you was very bad, but could you imagine you are on a summer trip in e.g. Spain, Italy or Albania? I have to think about it, maybe it is a good idea to cover the glass lid to prevent flying glass like in your case.

Best of luck with the replacement.

Regards,
Eberhard

 

[SusiBus]

We had the fridge lid explode on SusiBus T5.1. It was just like someone firing a gun in the van - jvery, very frightening. Not just the noise, but glass shards flying everywhere. Luckily it happened during the day when we were parked. Another Cali owner has previously posted that it happened to them in the middle of the night while asleep with their young daughter.
Our van was under warranty, so a visit to Hatfielld followed, where we were informed that broken glass is not covered. A call to VW Customer Service then, when they said they had never heard of a glass top spontaneously exploding. Luckily due to the forum l informed them that l had! God they must hate the forum!
It was replaced under warranty!
The cause was put down to the lid being under tension due to a problem with the hydraulic opening strut. This lid fixing has been altered on later T5's. If your lid appears a little hard to close, be warned!

 

[chez786]

Has anyone fitted a safety film to stop the spread of the glass?

 

[larrylamb]

we have had the vinyl worktop protectors sold by a forum member fitted for a few years now. Gives a bit of piece of mind in the event of a breakage.

 

[chez786]

might look into this sounds like an accident waiting to happen. Anyone got any suppliers

 

[soulstyledevon]

might look into this sounds like an accident waiting to happen. Anyone got any suppliers

Personally I would Pixers it. To your own taste

 

[Louis II]

Good afternoon,

I am very sorry to read your story. That is terrible.

There are 2x things I can't get my head around, 1.) how can the glass lid so "explode" that in the worst case scenario it can injure somebody (or a pet in the van) and 2.) how could the replacement glass lid be so expensive?

If the glass lid is so expensive, why is it no like a front windscreen? In case (god forbid) of a car accident? Does that mean there is a chance that the glass peaces flying around in the van? Terrible!

What happend to you was very bad, but could you imagine you are on a summer trip in e.g. Spain, Italy or Albania? I have to think about it, maybe it is a good idea to cover the glass lid to prevent flying glass like in your case.

Best of luck with the replacement.

Regards,
Eberhard

Toughened safety glass is heat treated in such a way the the external surfaces are held in a permanent state of compression by tension from the inner layer. This makes them highly durable as it prevents cracks & surface defects propagating in the outer layer. The downside is that if a scratch or defect gets to the inner layer the failure is dramatic. The nature of failure does however mean that it breaks into tiny pieces that are unlikely to cause serious injury. Hence the term safety glass which is also used in the side windows.

As for the the cost of a replacement part I believe VW pricing policy works as follows:
Parts shared with the builders van - reasonable
Parts shared with caravelle / multi van - premium
Parts specific to the cali - take the p*ss

 

[B J G]

Has anyone fitted a safety film to stop the spread of the glass?

Yes some time ago after reading tales of shattered glass.

 

[Sunshine&Snow]

You shouldn't be paying a fortune for the replacement glass, that should provided free and you should be compensated for the expense, inconvenience and potential risk they've exposed you to!

I think this should have been a recall, exploding glass in a moving vehicle, right next to where the kids travel is pretty scary, as is glass exploding in your face.

You said you're in Switzerland, have you legal insurance as is often customary here? I'd speak to them if you do.

 

[Chiroshi]

You shouldn't be paying a fortune for the replacement glass, that should provided free and you should be compensated for the expense, inconvenience and potential risk they've exposed you to!

I think this should have been a recall, exploding glass in a moving vehicle, right next to where the kids travel is pretty scary, as is glass exploding in your face.

You said you're in Switzerland, have you legal insurance as is often customary here? I'd speak to them if you do.

I have various insurances, not specific legal insurance. Do you mean liability insurance?

 

[Chiroshi]

Has anyone fitted a safety film to stop the spread of the glass?

I think this is the way we’ll go for the replacement.

 

[ArunAlec]

Has anyone fitted a safety film to stop the spread of the glass?

I covered my worktop with window film, the sort that you use to makes glass opaque (for bathrooms etc). I think it cost less that a tenner for a metre roll. I put it on as protection for the glass tops but I think it would help should the glass shatter.

 

[Chiroshi]

The cover wasn’t that hot. We’d boiled some water on the left hand burner and had the window open so there probably was a small temperature differential across it though.

It was an Ikea Tisken fitting: Link
You normally give it a small push and it clicks into place. This time I didn’t hear a click, just a bang!

 

[kurienp]

You shouldn't be paying a fortune for the replacement glass, that should provided free and you should be compensated for the expense, inconvenience and potential risk they've exposed you to!

I think this should have been a recall, exploding glass in a moving vehicle, right next to where the kids travel is pretty scary, as is glass exploding in your face.

You said you're in Switzerland, have you legal insurance as is often customary here? I'd speak to them if you do.

Is that a serious comment? #headbang

Safety glass was invented to reduce the risk of sharp glass pieces maiming you in the event of a mishap.

1 shattered glass in a million - a recall? You joking. Btw, the vehicle in question was not moving.

VW legal would love to take you on on that one ....

 

[Hotel California]

As with everything that breaks down or goes wrong there's always a number of facts that need to be there to come to the breakdown , and bad luck.
Many of those glas tops survived attacs from kids slaming on it , falling down by accident , ....ect
Once a while one breaks and written about on this forum , it's always when it goes wrong it's been spread out here , which is good to know offcoarse and we should be aware of this could happen.

Imo VW will not be intrested that much in a claim , you will be waisting energy , they putted off much more bigger claimes without an issue.

Putting a protective film on it could be the only good solution i think.
Thousends of glas tops have survived in the years doh without a problem so as always decisions to make....

 

[AndyWT]

A glass top on the gas rings or sink is a stupid idea at the best of times, in a camper a very stupid idea, style over function seems to the way theses days, or am I just getting too old to appreciate.

 

[Amarillo]

Exploding glass is a relatively common phenomenon. I once had a glass coffee table explode in the middle of the night.

Tempered glass - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Don’t blame yourself.

 

[Ting Tong]

@Ajspicer is your man on here for worktop projection film. About £30 delivered and precut to shape.

The main issue with glass breaking on later vehicles (with the 3 part top) is cooking with sink top down.