Ten minutes, from most of Wilmington. Glass World works out of 3520 N Market Street, north of the Brandywine, so a car from downtown, the east side or the blocks above 30th reaches us on ordinary city streets instead of a run out to a highway strip. A chip fill is $60 to $130 and takes about half an hour. A windshield is $250 to $450 fitted, roughly an hour in the bay plus the safe drive-away time the adhesive needs. Door, quarter and back glass is $200 to $500. Posted hours are 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Call 215-608-1108.
Wilmington is a small city that parks like a large one. North of the Brandywine and east of Market, most of the housing is rows and twins built long before a household owned two cars, and almost none of it came with a driveway. Cars sleep at the curb, under trees, in the salt spray thrown off the plow in February, and damage is usually found in the morning rather than watched happening. People turn up holding a grocery bag of glass they swept off the seat themselves.
The other half of the picture is that nobody drives far here. The school run, the shift downtown near Rodney Square, the trip out Kirkwood Highway for groceries, and back. Short trips on patched city streets work a windshield harder than an equivalent number of highway miles would, because every utility cut and sunken manhole flexes the body a little and the glass goes with it. The shop being at 3520 N Market Street is the practical part of that: it is a city address on a city street, common windshields for the cars people actually drive here are stocked, and anything unusual gets ordered rather than pushed into next week. The number is agreed before the car goes in, and it covers the glass, the urethane, the moldings and the labor.
Market Street is the spine. It runs from Rodney Square north across the Brandywine, through Brandywine Village and up past 30th Street, where we are at 3520. Downtown, King and Orange take the traffic one way each, and Delaware Avenue and Pennsylvania Avenue do the same job heading west toward Trolley Square. I-95 cuts straight through the middle of the city on a viaduct with its exits stacked close together, so drivers merge hard and follow closer than they should. Northeast Boulevard and Vandever Avenue carry the east side out toward Governor Printz Boulevard and the river. There is still Belgian block under the asphalt on parts of the older downtown, and most residential blocks north of the creek have been cut and patched for utilities so many times that the surface reads rougher than it looks.
First, I-95 through the city. Between the Wilmington exits the traffic runs close and fast, the surface near the viaduct joints is worn, and a stone off a truck tire at that speed stars a windshield without you hearing much more than a tick. Second, break-ins on blocks where every car lives at the curb. Side and rear windows are tempered, so they do not crack; they collapse into thousands of pieces that end up in the seat rails, the door card and the heater vents. Third, the freeze. A chip that sat quietly all autumn runs across the screen the first cold morning somebody aims the defroster at it and goes at the ice with a scraper. Fourth, the streets themselves: utility cuts, sunken patches and pothole season flex the shell enough to keep a crack that already started moving.
North Market Street answers this from almost anywhere in the city. From downtown, take Market north past Rodney Square, over the Brandywine and straight on through Brandywine Village; we are at 3520, past 30th Street. From the east side, come out Northeast Boulevard or Vandever Avenue and cut west onto Market. From the west side and Union Street, run Delaware Avenue to Baynard Boulevard, north on Baynard, then east to Market. Off I-95, use the downtown Wilmington exits and work over to Market rather than following 202 north out of town. Six to ten minutes from most addresses, more like fifteen from downtown at five o'clock.
Glass World works across Wilmington and the surrounding towns — pick your neighborhood:
About an hour of actual fitting, then safe drive-away time on top. The urethane bead that holds a windshield in is structural, and it needs to reach a certain strength before the glass can do its job in a crash or hold the passenger airbag against. On a mild day that is roughly another hour; in cold weather it is longer, and we will tell you which before you sit down rather than after. Budget half a morning and you will not be caught out.
Yes. Mobile work covers the city and it suits a car that should not be driven, a window that will not stay up, or a workday you cannot leave. The van carries the glass, the urethane and the vacuum, and the price is the same $250 to $450 for a windshield or $200 to $500 for door and back glass. The one thing to know is weather: bonding glass in driving rain is not something to force, so an outdoor job on a bad day is better moved under our roof.
Fill it, if it is still fillable. A chip smaller than a quarter with no long leg running off it takes about half an hour and costs $60 to $130, and the repair stops it spreading. A windshield is $250 to $450, so the arithmetic is not close. What ends the option is the crack reaching the edge of the glass, because that edge is where the bond carries load, or a crack sitting directly in the driver's line of sight. Bring it in early and you usually keep the cheap option.
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