Shower Door Enigma......

[bluesypicky]

I'm guessing there's an AC vent aimed right at / towards the door. When the shower's in use, due to the heat and humidity, the interior surface is expanding while the exterior surface wants to shrink because it's exposed to cooler, drier air . Over time, the cool-on-one-side v. warm-on-the-other fatigues the glass and it fails.

I knew I was gonna hit the right brain here.... don't feel bad everybody else, your insight was also very helpful. :lol:
Thanks John, it makes HUGE sense, plus it's a tiny bathroom, so it is basically divided in two areas, with the A/C vent blowing outside the shower only.... I suspected something thermic behind this, as there was no plausible mechanical explanation.
I will now reassure the wife and let her know that it was NOT a supernatural phenomenon. :lol:

And I'll look for the Riviera Beach guy too, thanks again!

 

[killdeer43]

I will now reassure the wife and let her know that it was NOT a supernatural phenomenon. :lol:

I like the supernatural phenomenon angle....keeps the ladies on their toes, and makes us seem useful! :lol:

Joe

 

[bluesypicky]

I will now reassure the wife and let her know that it was NOT a supernatural phenomenon. :lol:

I like the supernatural phenomenon angle....keeps the ladies on their toes, and makes us seem useful! :lol: Joe

Maybe I can convince her that the evil forces will spare us as long as I get a new guitar every month... :shock:

 

[ladytexan]

Pascal,

My goodness, what a shattering experience! (Sorry, just couldn't resist....) Here is an article that explains a similar incident and some possible causes. So, it seems that although quite a freakish event, it is not uncommon.

 

[bluesypicky]

Wow Tony.... thanks for the article, and glad my case wasn't so bloody!!! :shock:
Actually in my experience the glass never shattered in the shower, we just saw the door "spider webbing" as we could hear it crackle very slowly, but I actually had to shake it to make some pieces fall off, so it wasn't an explosion like in this article. And of course it had to happen while the poor bastard was in the shower! Ouch!

 

[davismanLV]

Hi Pascal; that's safety glass ... when it goes ... however it goes, it's supposed to fracture into lots of small pieces ... not those dangerous big angular shards.

I'm guessing there's an AC vent aimed right at / towards the door. When the shower's in use, due to the heat and humidity, the interior surface is expanding while the exterior surface wants to shrink because it's exposed to cooler, drier air . Over time, the cool-on-one-side v. warm-on-the-other fatigues the glass and it fails.

It's the same reason sliding glass doors self-destruct. We had a slider - with AC vent pointed at it - that let go one night into thousands of itty bitty little pieces. There's a guy in Riviera Beach who used to do business as the Window Doctor ... he fixed ours and that was the explanation we got.

But while he was at our house, I asked him whether it could have been another shooter on the grassy knoll or maybe UFOs ... he said he didn't think so.

See? The good captain either knows stuff (most likely) or makes up stuff (less likely, but usually more hysterical and entertaining) and .... this is the answer I was looking for.....

 

[bluesypicky]

Case closed!.... Some elbow grease and 300 bucks later:

Hoping I'll stop stepping on tiny pieces of glass in the near future.... :roll:

 

[killdeer43]

Could we get a shot of you inside playing a Guild?
It's the ultimate humidifier!! :lol:

But seriously folks, it looks great!

Joe

 

[taabru45]

Maybe it just lost it's temper.

Of course, this is my favorite explanation. :lol: Steffan

 

[geoguy]

Many years ago I worked on a high-rise building where they had a problem with large window panes occasionally shattering. Highly problematic to have pedestrians showered with broken glass (and sometimes office contents!) from above.

In that case, it turned out that the glass panes were seated on little upside-down U-shaped saddles that rode on an aluminum track. The glass was too flexible for that particular application, & as the large panes flexed, the little saddles could gradually move around. If they got bunched up at one side of the pane, the glass would eventually shatter (either simply due to its own weight, or from external forces including wind load).

Your glass may have been similarly unsupported, for some reason, or maybe years of getting bumped when the doors were opened/closed eventually caused a defect that propagated in the manner that your wife discovered.

Nice looking shower stall, btw!

 

[bluesypicky]

Highly problematic to have pedestrians showered with broken glass (and sometimes office contents!) from above.

And how might that be a problem? :lol:

Thanks George.
There is no doubt that what shattered the door is stress accumulation over the years, I'm personally more inclined to believe in the impact of the temperature variations, due to the exposure to the very near A/C vent (as explained by the good Capn' earlier), that resulted in some kind of delayed thermal shock.
Whatever that is, I consider myself lucky: No one got hurt (unlike in the case forwarded by Toni above), and I end up with a prettier bathroom, after a job that was much easier than I thought it would be.
So now I can get back to focusing on creating monsters.... :lol: (Sorry guys, private joke)

 

[bluesypicky]

Could we get a shot of you inside playing a Guild? It's the ultimate humidifier!! :lol: Joe

How about two Guilds without me Joe?... I like to keep them in pair so they don't feel the favoritism too much.
Ah kids!... :roll: