Glass Window Replacement

A few weeks ago, I blogged about a glass window that broke due to Typhoon Basyang. Well, finally a handyman, Mang Dods, became available and dropped by to fix the window, among other things.

He has an ongoing job in Tagaytay working on a vacation house extension. Dods was the foreman during our house construction and has done odd jobs at the apartment like fix the leaky roof.

As it was still early and a bit cool in the morning, Dods decided to start work on the roof. He cleaned out the rubbish from the roof gutters. These are mostly tree leaves that got blown by the storm.

He put some sealants in the funnel of one of the gutter downspouts. Finally, he put an additional gutter shield to filter out garbage from getting into the downspouts.


Fixing the Broken Window

For the broken window glass pane, the first thing he did was to get the dimensions of the glass pane to be bought. It was a Sunday and I was a bit worried that the glass and aluminum supply shops were closed.

I asked him and go buy the window glass as I thought that those glass and aluminum stores that open on Sundays were were only open in the morning and closed in the afternoon.

The materials he needed to replace the window are the new glass pane, an aluminum glass clip piece and a silicone-based sealant. The reason I was missing a glass clip (the top piece) was because the typhoon winds dislodged it from the window frame.

We practically exhausted efforts to find that missing aluminum glass clip after the storm.

We scoured our backyard area, as (well as the neighbor's!) hoping it was just tucked away among the plants. I had no idea how much the glass clip cost, although it looked cheap enough, or how easy to get it.

That's why I was adamant on getting it back. Fortunately, he found an opened glass and aluminum supply shop just right across the main road!

I already had leftover clear silicone glass sealant and so Dods only had to buy the glass piece and the glass clip. Dods overestimated the cost of the glass pane.

And why not, the glass was actually only 1/8" thick! A thicker glass would certainly cost more. The glass piece measures 12 3/4" x 22" and cost Php 72. The glass clip measures 12" and cost Php 10.

He then proceeded to take away the glass shards and silicone sealant from the window frame. He cleaned the steel window frame with a spatula. The old silicone sealant was scraped away from the old aluminum glass clips.


Installing New Glass Window Pane

With everything clean, Dods got outside the window to install the new glass pane. For this he got outside the fire exit, which luckily, this window had!

I had to help him by passing the glass piece to him as he squatted on the outside window sill. This is because his one arm and one leg was continually hooked on a window grill bar to keep him from falling.

He put silicone sealant on the metal frame's inside and positioned the glass piece on it. He then put more sealant on the glass clip's two edges and attached the clip to the metal frame. He locked the window from the inside to keep it from moving as the silicone sealant partially dried.

The actual window glass replacement task was quick and easy enough to do. It's the element of danger in working OUTSIDE the window on the second floor that made it difficult.