Ford Prefect Hot Rod - Windscreen

Well not much has happened for the last month or so as all my time has been taken up with moving house, or more precisely getting rid of 14 years of accumulated treasures and valuable artifacts. So far we have done over a dozen charity shop runs and about 9 car loads has gone to the dump. Several car loads of high value crap and good quality rubbish has been sold at car boots and auto jumbles. Nearly all my big machines have now gone - the lathe, guillotine, bandsaw, bead roller, motorcycle lifts and so on are all gone, the only big bit of kit saved from marketplace is my pillar drill, which I know I will need and I would never get another one as good as that for the 20 quid I paid for this one. All my old air tools have gone, I use battery tools almost exclusively these days, so much more convenient than having air hoses trailing across the workshop and I don't have to stop work every 5 minutes to let the pressure build back up.  I will keep the compressor though as I will need it when I come to spray the car.

One job I have been holding off on for a long time now is the windscreen, I just didn't fancy doing it and held off but had to come to face reality and get the job done. The IVA regulations demand that you have the correct testing / marking, which is a massive challenge when it comes to the windows. You have to have laminated, which is not a big issue but the required 43r markings are. To get a custom screen made you have to have 5 made - 4 for destructive testing and the one that you actually fit. The cost is beyond prohibitive, the people that make the rules clearly never have to follow the rules. Anyway the way around it is to use an already approved marked screen and cut it down. Land Rover Defender screens are perfect for this job - they are flat, plenty big enough and laminated, they have the correct mark which is printed on the plastic layer that sits between the two laminated panels. They can be cut down without shattering, unlike their toughened counter parts. 

First job is to make a template, I made mine out of 3mm plywood, it's easy to cut, fairly light to handle and gives the glass cutter a good edge to work to. I bottled out of the actual cutting and took mine to a local glazier - Beesons of Boston, who did the cutting for me for just 30 quid, which I thought was fine. They did the job accurately and quickly, the screen came from Rimmers in Lincoln. They are by no means the cheapest but they are the closest, they had the items in stock and I was able to click and collect the same day. In all the screen cost just a little over 100 quid, not bad at all for 2025, I can't imagine I would have got any other solution cheaper. I had been looking for a used screen for 3 years at this stage but the only ones that came up were chipped or scratched and the sellers wanted 50 quid or more for them. Well bugger that and the horse it rode in on.

Anyway, getting the screen cut is one thing, fitting it is something else, I decided on polyurethane adhesive as it gives a nice cushion, goes off quite quickly and can be cut out if I ever need a new screen. The down side is that the bloody stuff gets everywhere, it's hideous. Fortunately acetone is very effective at removing it but I ended up with half a blue roll use and covered in the stuff. While I was quite pleased with it overall I didn't like the way it sat in the rather deep recess on the Prefect bodywork. I decided that some of the 10mm d shaped stick on rubber trim was the ideal thing to make it look a bit more cohesive - I didn't want any more shiny chrome on it, there is enough already. I am quite pleased with it although I had to take some action to disguise a slight cock up along the top of the screen. up there the return on the aperture is about 20mm wide and the PU adhesive didn't quite cover it in a couple of places so blue paint was showing through, which looked awful. A  inch wide strip of stick on carbon fibre look alike vinyl soon had that hidden and made the whole thing look a lot better.

With that done I was able to fit the windscreen wiper arms for the first time and set up the washer jets. It all works splendidly and should satisfy the IVA tester, although you never know because of the good ole "in the inspector's opinion" catch all clause. It's pretty crazy really, nobody in their right mind would want to drive something like this in the wet, damp or even mildly moist conditions. I guess they have to write the rules as a catch all though and it's pretty sensible in the main, I have seen plenty of hot rods with one single wiper that only clears a 10 inch semi circle pass so I think mine should be good.

Next job is the interior, not been looking forward to that either, I started doing it a while back and got so far before deciding I didn't like what I was doing. I was hoping to have some sort of epiphany but nothing has come to me so far. Cant put it off any longer though, it's time to stop thinking and start doing.