Strimmer smashed Sunroof, who pays?

Oldernotwiser

Did you find the stone/rock that broke your sunroof? Presumably it would have been inside the car.

loobyloo2

patman99 wrote: »

How do you get on with the Police?, your vehicle is a Nissan Homy, but the insurance state Toyota Previa. Your insurance docs don't match-up to the real make/model.

This has been a concern of mine too, but one that can be easily explained, it does seem to be the norm in this situation. Fortunately, I have never been stopped by the police, involved in an accident or collision so the problem hasn't yet presented. However, when speaking with Tesco today, i asked them to check on their list to see if it is now included, strangely no, yet when booking ferries or Eurotunnel in the past it wasn't listed there, but is now. Tesco have alot of catching up to do what with all these grey imports over here now.
oh, and even with it being the size it is, the tax is the same as my sons Ford KA, and is still classed as a car, a plus for me.

Lum

It's normal for imports to have the wrong model in all sorts of places, including the logbook. On mine the make is Nissan and the model is blank.

Most insurance quotes I got either correctly stated it as a Nissan Cefiro or listed it (incorrectly) as a Nissan Cefiro (Maxima). The only thing it has in common with the Maxima is a similarish external appearance and a few shared parts bin parts like the speedo and internal door handles.

loobyloo2: I hope the supplier you are getting your bit of glass from isn't Nissan as you'll be waiting more like 6 months, not 6 weeks for the damn thing. I went through all this with my windscreen after some chavs dropped a brick off a bridge onto it. For the most part Direct Line were pretty good, put it through as a vandalism claim, so that I wouldn't lose my NCB but could still get the bodywork fixed as well as the glass, however their courtesy car cover is useless, if you get the courtesy car plus option you still only get 3 weeks.

No idea why the glass was so expensive, £850 plus VAT (so £1000) just for the piece of glass.

I've since been advised that I should look for glass suppliers in Australia or New Zealand. They'll be pattern parts just like Autoglass normally use over here but they're fine. They cost a reasonable price and the people you have to deal with speak English.

Another supplier I use from time to time is irs.co.jp. Just need to give them your VIN number and a description of what you want and they have a guy who speaks very good English who will work with you to figure out what you need, go and buy it from Nissan and ship it over. I got a primary turbo for my old Subaru Legacy B4-RSK from them, it arrived in a week and cost me £712 after shipping and UK taxes. Subaru UK wanted £2000 and said it would take 3 months to get one.

skiddlydiddly

Yes, grey imports can be a pain to insure and often you are left with Hobsons choice over who to use.

I have an import too and it isn't even listed with most insurers despite me having personally owned it in this country for 10 years.I remember too that when Subaru Impreza turbos first came over to this country legitimately they were noted as 1.6 gl or something on the logbook, despite being 2 litre turbocharged engines.

photome

Glad you have got your problem sorted

but I cant see how the insurers will prove it was a stone from the strimmer that broke the sunroof.

Still that doesnt matter to you(OP) as the insurer is paying

skiddlydiddly

neilmcl wrote: »

What sarcastic comments! Nobody has said they can't send stones flying and if you're parked right next to one in use then it can cause damage. What we're not buying is that a stone thrown into the air will have enough energy coming back down to smash a toughened glass sunroof, not unless it was damaged or cracked previously.

Quick Googling found me this:

Toughened glass must be cut to size or pressed to shape before toughening and cannot be re-worked once toughened. Polishing the edges or drilling holes in the glass is carried out before the toughening process starts. Because of the balanced stresses in the glass, damage to the glass will eventually result in the glass shattering into thumbnail-sized pieces. The glass is most susceptible to breakage due to damage to the edge of the glass where the tensile stress is the greatest, but shattering can also occur in the event of a hard impact in the middle of the glass pane or if the impact is concentrated (for example, striking the glass with a point). Using toughened glass can pose a security risk in some situations because of the tendency of the glass to shatter completely upon hard impact rather than leaving shards in the window frame.

Something like a stone?

photome

skiddlydiddly wrote: »

Quick Googling found me this:



Something like a stone?

But how does the insurer prove it

haveibeendone

but shattering can also occur in the event of a hard impact in the middle of the glass pane or if the impact is concentrated (for example, striking the glass with a point).

The way this incident has been presented is that the impact was on the roof therefore there would be no hard impact.
The "stone/brick/gravel" would be falling due to gravity. To get a high speed impact the "stone/brick/gravel" would need to be propelled very high into the air. The combination of height and weight of the falling object would determine it's impact energy but the heavier the object the less height it would attain and the lighter the object etc etc.

Any lateral speed would not add much to the impact on the roof.

If it was a side window then that would be more credible as the object being propelled by the strimmer would be exerting the force in its direction of travel.

Also the quote contains words such as "hard impact" "impact is concentrated" "striking with a point". I imagine we will never know the shape of the suspected object and the part of that shape that hit the roof but I think that as the object had to rise in the air and then fall back the energy of the impact would be dissapated not concentrated.

There is no reason to doubt that the roof shattered and there is no reason to deny the presence of a strimmer person and it may be a genuine fluke but it may aslo be something unknown not connected with the strimmer such as a large chunk of ice falling form a passing aircraft.

I suspect we will never know but if I were the nursery owner I would not be losing much sleep over the prospect of the man from Tesco calling round.

System

I have had a toughened windscreen shatter on me while I was driving along an empty road. It was just a single jolt from an uneven road service caused it. Presumably there was a slight stone chip that I wasn't aware of on it already that may have been the 'seed' for this.

Who is to say that the sunroof didn't suffer the same fate? Somebody, at some time, has placed something heavily on the roof that has caused a slight chip which is then a weak point in the glass. The shattering can then occur weeks or even months later.

But a piece of gravel under normal gravity would have insufficient energy to cause it.

skiddlydiddly

Yes, OP please provide us with pictures of the stone, its weight and closeups of any sharp edges.Also can you get details of the strimmer model, cutting tool used and atmospheric conditions on the day so we can establish if it was likely that this stone could have attained enough altitude to have sufficient force to smash your sunroof.

Or, is it possible we can give the OP the benefit of the doubt as they were there and we weren't?