The body shop that's repairing my rear window rust bubble called to say that the channel that the rear seal fits into is rotted and the fix is to replace the entire rear window. Since that's another $1,000 -- should I do that? They said that they can try to fit/glue in the seal, but the proper repair is to replace the window.

Make sense to do that?

For those that are interested, I posted a pic in this thread.

Chris.

 

I had the rear rust bubbles repaired over the summer. The front was repaired four years ago by a different shop. Both front and rear had surface rust that did not penetrate through the metal.

The glass expert for the rear stated the rear glass and seal were factory original. The front was replaced at least once before I got the car. Several months after the rust work was done on the front, the body shop replaced the windshield at its expense because they had been unable to fix post-repair water leakage. I remain convinced that the leakage was due to poor installation technique, not reuse of the existing windshield.

Unless the shop offers you a clear and convincing reason, I would replace the rear glass only if it gets broken during removal, which sometimes happens. Perhaps your body shop needs to find a good/new glass guy to handle removal and reinstallation.

 

I think the point is that the plastic channel that is glued to the rear window and offers the locking channel for the putside trim is borken - and the will require a new rear window since they cannot be ordered seperately. If you remove the rear window, the channel comes with it so that gets you nowhere. I have confirmed this with sunset.

I have also heard the you can buy the channel from 3rd party suppliers, but i have not found them yet.

Cheers

Mike