Durable replacement for glass on front door

muhandis

I moved into my current house a month ago. When I got back from work yesterday, I saw that the outer pane of glass (about 50cm x 80cm) on my front door has been shattered from what looks like the impact of an object hitting it. The inner pane is fine.

The culprits are probably local kids who knock a football around on the road in front of the house. There isn't any way for me to stop them playing so this will in all likelihood probably happen again in the future.

I've been quoted between £250-£350 to replace the glass pane so don't want to be spending that amount every few months.

Short of replacing the whole door with one that doesn't have any glass panels, does anyone have any advice on -

- suggestions for replacing the glass pane with something more durable?

- is there any alternative material that can replace the glass
pane but will still let light in?

- would it be possible to just replace it with a wooden panel?

Many thanks in advance.

Hoploz

It's probably just bad luck and won't happen again.

You can replace it with whatever you like, but you want it to look nice, don't you?

Reece_

£250-350 sounds relatively steep but you haven't given much info on the door or glazing... is it a wooden, pvc, composite door? is it single or double glazing? how big is the glazing panel ?

As said you could pretty much put whatever you want in there, you could use a sheet of acrylic ( perspex ) which would probably be cheaper and let light in or as you suggest a wooden panel would also work. Personally I'd still replace the glass, depending on location and size of the glazing, I'd put toughened glass in if you were concerned about it being broken again.

warwicktiger

Is the door upvc, aluminium or wood?

Ectophile

Polycarbonate is immensely tough - it's used for riot shields. But whether you can get polycarbonate double glazing is another matter. However, it does tend to go cloudy and yellow after a few years of sunshine, and it can scratch easier than glass.

phil24_7

Double glazing is strong stuff...unless it was old/damaged/blown. There's a reason you need to be able to escape though a window opening and not just smash the window, it is also why they used to recommend keeping a spring loaded punch upstairs to break a window.

I would just replace like for like and be done with it as me and my brother used to play football inside when we were kids and we only ever broke 1 window, and that was single glazed!

Regards
Phil

27col

You don't need to change to a new door.
All you need, is to get the broken glass panel replaced by a solid one.