Windscreen repair or replacement?
Repair if the damage is smaller than a 20-cent coin, sits outside the driver’s line of sight, and does not touch the edge of the glass. Replace if any one of those three is untrue.
That is the whole decision and it takes ten seconds to make with a coin in your hand. Everything below is why each of those three lines exists, what happens if you get it wrong, and what the job looks like either way.
Three questions, in this order
Work down the list. The first one that fails decides it — you do not need to get to the bottom.
Is it smaller than a 20-cent coin?
A 20-cent piece is 28 mm across, which is a useful proxy for the roughly 16 mm limit an inspector applies to a chip. Under that, resin can fill the break and restore the strength of the laminate. Much over it and there is too much broken glass for the resin to bond through, and the repair will still be visible.
Is it outside the driver’s line of sight?
Anything sitting in the area the driver looks through gets replaced, not repaired, even if it is tiny. A cured resin repair leaves a faint lens — barely noticeable at the edge of the glass, genuinely distracting directly ahead at night in rain. It will also fail a roadworthy inspection where a repair elsewhere on the screen would pass.
Does the damage reach the edge?
The perimeter of a windscreen is where it is bonded to the body and where all the stress lives. A chip or crack running into that band has already compromised the bond, and a repair there will not hold. Edge damage is a replacement regardless of size.
How long is the crack?
A single crack under about 150 mm that is off to the side and not touching an edge can sometimes be stabilised. Past that length it will keep travelling with heat and body flex, and replacement is the only honest answer.
What we do with what we see
The damage patterns we meet most often, and the call we make on each. Times are the actual job on site, not a booking window.
| Damage | Outcome | On site |
|---|---|---|
| Chip smaller than a 20c coin, off to the side | Repair | ~30 min |
| Bullseye or star break, off-centre | Repair | ~30 min |
| Several small chips in a cluster, none in the driver’s view | Repair | 30–45 min |
| Any damage in the driver’s line of sight | Replace | 60–90 min |
| Crack longer than about 150 mm | Replace | 60–90 min |
| Crack reaching the edge of the glass | Replace | 60–90 min |
| Chip that has already started to run | Replace | 60–90 min |
| Any replacement on a car with an ADAS camera | Replace + calibrate | 2–2.5 hrs |
What a repair buys you when it qualifies
A repair is not a lesser version of a replacement. Where the damage allows it, it is the better outcome.
You keep the factory glass and the factory bond. The urethane bead laid at the factory, cured under controlled conditions, is the best seal that windscreen will ever have. Every replacement, done as well as it can be done, is still a second bond made in a driveway. Not replacing glass that does not need replacing is worth something on its own.
It is quick and it is cheap. Thirty minutes, and on most comprehensive policies it is either free or costs a reduced excess — some insurers include one chip repair a year at no cost. See how windscreen insurance claims work in Queensland.
No recalibration. If your car has a camera behind the glass, a repair leaves it exactly where the manufacturer aimed it. A replacement means ADAS calibration, which adds time and cost to the job.
It stops there. A filled chip does not spread. An unfilled one in a Queensland summer usually does.
A chip is a decision with a deadline.
Left alone through a few hot afternoons and one cold morning, a repairable 10 mm chip becomes a 300 mm crack and a replacement. The cheap fix has a shelf life measured in weeks, not months.
What actually makes a chip run
South East Queensland is hard on damaged glass. Four things push a chip past the point of repair.
Heat cycling
A dark dashboard behind glass parked in the sun gets far hotter than the air. The inner face of the laminate expands against a cooler outer face, and the tip of an existing chip is where that stress concentrates.
The aircon blast
Getting into a hot car and putting the demister on full cold, straight at the windscreen, is the single most reliable way we know of to turn a chip into a crack. Start with the vents down and let it come back gradually.
Body flex
Driveway crossovers, speed humps and unsealed shoulders twist the shell of the car, and the windscreen is a structural part of that shell. Each flex works the crack tip a little further.
Water and grit
Rain carries dirt into an open chip. Once the break is contaminated, resin cannot wet the glass properly and the repair will not be as strong or as clear. A chip repaired in week one looks better than the same chip repaired in month three.
What a replacement involves
When the answer is replacement, this is the job — done at your address, on the same visit.
Glass identified from the build, not the model
One model year can take four different windscreens depending on rain sensor, heating element, acoustic interlayer, heads-up display and camera. We work from your make, model, year and where possible the VIN, so the right glass turns up the first time.
Old screen cut out and the pinchweld prepped
The bonded perimeter is cut, the old urethane trimmed back to a consistent height, and any bare metal primed. Skipping the primer is how a screen leaks and how a pinchweld rusts two years later.
New glass bonded at the correct bead height
Automotive urethane, laid at the height the vehicle calls for, set in one pass. Bead height controls both the seal and how the glass sits relative to the body — which matters if there is a camera aimed through it.
Cure time, stated before we leave
Safe drive-away time is typically about an hour, but it depends on the urethane and the weather. You get the actual figure for your job, not a generic one.
Calibration if the car needs it
Cars with a forward-facing camera get the camera re-aimed on the same visit. We do not send you somewhere else for it.
Keep reading
Can any windscreen chip be repaired?
No. A chip can be repaired if it is smaller than about a 20-cent coin, sits outside the driver’s line of sight and does not touch the edge of the glass. If any one of those is untrue, the windscreen has to be replaced — a repair either will not hold or will leave optical distortion where you cannot afford it.
How long do I have before a chip becomes a crack?
There is no fixed window, but in a Queensland summer it is often weeks rather than months. Heat cycling, a cold demister blast onto hot glass and body flex over driveways all work on the tip of the break. Booking in the same week you notice it is the difference between a thirty-minute repair and a full replacement.
Is a repaired windscreen as strong as a new one?
A properly injected repair restores the structural strength of the laminate in that area and stops the damage spreading. It is not invisible — you will usually see a faint mark if you look for it — which is exactly why we will not repair damage sitting in the driver’s field of view.
Will a repair still be visible afterwards?
Slightly. Resin has a marginally different refractive index to glass, so a cured repair leaves a faint lens. On a chip out to the side you would have to know where to look. Directly ahead of the driver it is noticeable at night in rain, which is why that area gets new glass instead.
Does a repair affect my ability to sell the car?
A repaired chip outside the driver’s viewing area does not stop a car passing a Queensland safety certificate inspection. Unrepaired damage in the critical viewing area, a crack over about 150 mm or chips over about 16 mm will fail it.
Not sure which one you need?
Send a photo or describe where the damage sits and we will tell you straight — a repair if it qualifies, a replacement if it does not. No call-out fee anywhere in Brisbane, Ipswich, Logan or Bayside.