[somervillearron]

hey

i am wondering if anyone has ever seen these solar reactive windscreens? i cant even find any info or pics about them,i am due to ask for a new windscreen from my insurance but was told if i can wait i am better to wait for better weather as it will adhere better or something!

but i have decided to tell them mine is the solar reactive with rain sensor,i may as well! why not.

but what does this mean?i am just assuming its better because of the price!

FORD MONDEO FRONT WINDSCREEN FITS YEARS 2000 - 2007

In green £160.000

In green with rain sensor £150.00

In green with heating £190.00

In green with heating plus rain sensor £270.00

In solar reactive with heating plus rain sensor £440.00

 

[oldbod]

I can see its tempting , but your insurance co know what your car came out of the factory with.
Unless you've told them the car has been modified, they insured you on that basis. Undisclosed mods, insurance may be invalid,claim declined, you have to disclose that to any future insurer,increased premiums or no insurance.
You cant say u didnt know, because youre telling them thats what you have.
Autoglass or whoever may feed back to company what type they took out - their relationship with insurers is valuable to them. They may not even do it and still report you.
Its fraud (criminal sanctions)
It puts my premiums up (a tiny bit)
If your name is really a.s. you just plastered notice of criminal intent over a public forum - in this case, google is not your friend

All that was pretty negative .. you could probably negotiate wirh them for a better screen and pay the difference...

 

[oldbod]

Sorry that was a bit of rant.. i wouldn't want to put you offmaking your car the best it can be - used to be like that myself and still regret some of the things i didn't do... i could still tell you exactly what i intended to do to my first car (which came out of the factory with a screaming 39 bhp power output - but had a forged steel crank so LOTS of scope) but never got round to and wish i had. Never had the money to spare and when i did it went on a different car...

 

[raynkar]

Just get the correct screen for your car.
Do you want the rain sensor as you plan to fit the entire rain sensing loom and wiper stalk etc?

The screens are all similar but the rain sensor one may have a different mirror mount to your current one and may require you to buy a new mirror.

If you tell your insurers you are having a different screen than what was originally fitted then it clearly wouldn't be fraud, but your insurers may assume (with good reason) you intend to retrofit auto wipers and may raise your premium, but then they might not lol

 

[raynkar]

I've just seen that your car is a 2002 on your signature. If that's the car we are talking about just get the proper screen.
If you want the auto heater (EATC) function that the heat reactive screen could provide it's fairly easy to retrofit. I did it to one of my mk3s.

 

[somervillearron]

yeah i want the rain sensor really,i dont see how its fraud if i ask them for a different windscreen. would be different if i told them thats what i already had!

i dont see how it would be a issue with my last car there was a few different options for the window and they didnt know what it was so they just told me to choose the one i wanted.

they might make me pay extra for the screen but if its not much i will go ahead with it.

really i wanted to know what this solar reactive stuff is!

 

[somervillearron]

is it them windows with the purplish tint?

 

[somervillearron]

the side windows on my car are pretty dark for a factory tint and my front window definately does not have a green tinge like a few other cars we have had,but the only other choice apart from green is the solar one! but mine does not have the rain sensor.

the window i think is the original as it does say ford on it but if it does not have a green tint then what can it be?

 

[raynkar]

First thing for you to do is look up your car on Ford ETIS. You may have Ford privacy glass fitted to your car. The privacy glass fitted to the mk3 was just more tinted than the usual clear (obviously) or the green tinted glass, and is nothing at all like limo glass etc.

If your windscreen is clear or different to the side (and rear?) windows then it's probably an incorrect replacement screen the mk3 suffers badly with chipped or damaged screens so a replacement screen is a likely option.

From what I know the solar reactive screen is just referring to the fact there is a sun load sensor in the screen and has no reference to glass colour.

 

[raynkar]

If you look at my cars in the pic below the black one has ford privacy glass which is just a bit darker green and is a factory fitted option.

The blue car has aftermarket tints on the rear windows which is a lot darker

 

[somervillearron]

If you look at my cars in the pic below the black one has ford privacy glass which is just a bit darker green and is a factory fitted option.

The blue car has aftermarket tints on the rear windows which is a lot darker

yes my window is like yours!

but the front is not mine is completely clear! although it does have a ford emblem on it!

 

[raynkar]

There's no reason not to have a ford emblem. There are at least three colours for windows that I know of.
My blue car has the light tint (visible on the front windows) and the black car has the privacy tint, then there is also a clear option.

 

[somervillearron]

There's no reason not to have a ford emblem. There are at least three colours for windows that I know of.
My blue car has the light tint (visible on the front windows) and the black car has the privacy tint, then there is also a clear option.

i was wondering do both of your cars have xenon lights?

if not can you tell me what are the xenons like compared to the standard lights?are they a lot better? its just they dont look like much compared to the projectors on other cars,they look pretty small! and also what is the thing around the outside of the projector for?

 

[raynkar]

The black one has factory fit xenons and the blue one had retrofit OEM xenons, but without the self levelling function.

Before I answer, I'm not sure what you are referring to about the thing outside of the projector.
The projector unit isn't just the inner frosted part, it's the whole glass unit you can see and is in fact larger than a lot of projectors fitted to other cars.

The difference between OEM halogen lights and OEM xenons is massive IMHO.
The xenons produce a beam that throws light further, wider and is more concentrated. Apart from more light thrown longer another MAJOR benefit is the colour output of the light itself. The halogens (even blue tinted ones) give out a yellow light which in turn makes it harder for the brain to understand what the lights are illuminating as items appear in a different colour to how you see them in daylight. The Xeon light is lovely and white and as this is closer to daylight the brain can process the road ahead more easily.

With OEM halogens the main beam adds quite a benefit on twisty country roads (where you may typically only be able to see 50-300 metres ahead. With the OEM xenons the addition of the main beam in the same country roads often justs makes the light output look yellowy and of no advantage. The man beam is still useful on long straight sections where the extra light output will always help.

I think I've seen you asking about OEM xenon retrofit compared to aftermarket xenons and my preference would always be for the OEM set up. It's not that difficult to retrofit OEM xenons if you don't add the self levelling feature as this only involves adding some connector plugs and two direct live feeds from the battery. When the blue car had xenons fitted I did fit headlight washers to the car but not self levelling. This meant I needed to keep an OEM halogen set that I popped on for MOTs etc.

 

[raynkar]

Here is more of a close up showing the xenon dipped beam glazed area.

 

[somervillearron]

Here is more of a close up showing the xenon dipped beam glazed area.

thanks for the info mate! i always wondered what the glazed bit around the projector lense was for! i thought it was either just a shroud or a reflector!well i ordered a pair of oem xenons today but they have no ballasts or ignitors!