Finally had my windscreen replaced today by Autoglass in Romford in Essex. Total cost was around £2,300 plus mark. Nice clean job, taking around 3.5 hours and installed by Alan who's got lots of experience in Ferrari's. Nice bloke and does the job carefully. Only problem was the drivers side wiper arm. When removing/re-fixing a small 5mm piece broke off on the lower arm requiring a new arm. Replacement cost for drivers wiper arm............ £330 plus vat! From what I've learnt is that if you take it to a Main Dealer for a replacement screen, they farm it out to another cheaper company. Autoglass are more expensive, which is why they mainly do insurance work. Also, finding someone who can do a good job even at Autoglass is a bit hit and miss. All depends on the person doing the job. My advice is to go to the Romford branch and ask for Alan.
I was advised that the car shouldn't be driven for approx 12 hours afer the screen was fitted to allow the bonding materials to "go of" correctly, hence I had mine done on a friday afternoon and collected it saturday morning. Were you given the same advice, or did you drive it straight after the job was done?
Waited about an hour and he said it was ok to go. It was done at their depot, so I did'nt really have any choice. The true test is when it rains. But then...I have'nt got a wiper at the moment!
Autoglass are, as it was done during the repair process. Hopefully, it should be sorted out in the next few days. The scary thing was, it could very nearly have scratched the new windscreen as it broke off.
Sy Glad it worked out ok (barring the wiper) in the end! The bit I didn't want to comply with when I had mine done, was to take it to their depot. Obviously I don't know your "work" circumstances, but if you had to take a half day holiday to get it done, who would compensate for that?
I work from home, so I tend to be more flexible timewise. 99% of the work done was by one person. However, it took 3 people to put the windscreen. Although light, it needed two people to place it on the screen and one person to connect the windscreen aeriel. Technically, I suppose the work could be done at your home/office, but to be honest, you want to be standing there when they do it. So you might as well take to the depot. If it was a Ford Focus etc, it's a simple job, but as Ferrari's are handmade, there's a bit of work to make it fit.
