We caught up with Joe at his place of employment, a glass company in Livonia, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, and just a short distance from the Ford Proving Grounds. We asked him to share a few thoughts about the Betaseal U-216 test.

So Joe, was it really zero degrees?

Yes it sure felt like it was! I normally use a temperature and humidity gauge  when I do installs for any Ford tests, but unfortunately they don't read down that low. So I will take their word for it.

To start with, how tough is it to cut the windshield out when it's that cold?

Well actually, I removed the windshield a couple of days earlier under "normal" conditions, but didn't strip it down until the test day when the car was 'cooled' down in their special cold chamber.

Then you primed the pinchweld in the cold?

Yes. In the cold I stripped down the old urethane, and applied the U-413 pinchweld primer. Using a heat gun, the primer was dried (what they call flashing).

And how was the urethane applied?

The windshield was prepped and primed outside of the cold room. But the urethane was put on the glass inside the zero degree chamber. Then it was installed. Oh, and of course the crash dummies were inside the car the entire time.

How long did you let the urethane set up before they crashed it?

After it was set, a couple hair dryers were used to warm the urethane for fifteen minutes. Then the tow truck came and way it went to the barrier. It was one hour from the time it was set  until the time it was crashed.

Did you get to see the crash test and what happened?

Yeah, from about a hundred feet away. It got mangled up pretty good. At first one of the guys said "it didn't hold!", that the sides let loose. But when I went up to it right after the crash, it was just the sides of the wrap-around molding that had came out. But the glass was all intact.

Pretty awesome, huh?

No kidding! The hood was all crumpled and got shoved hard against the lower part of the windshield. And the passenger side air bag really did a number on the glass, but it didn't budge.

Go ahead and forget modesty. Do you think that the installer (being you) had some bearing on the success of the test?

Well, well. Let me answer it this way. I normally apply the sealant to the pinchweld, but for this test Essex wanted it put on the glass. It is a chore to make sure that the bead gets in the right spot so as to line up with the old urethane on the pinchweld. If it's off, it can make a big difference.

Do you know any details of the other manufacturers tests?

No, not really. I heard that one of them almost passed, but that the passenger side air bag blew the 'shield right out when it deployed.

So were you surprised that the Betaseal cold test worked?

To be honest, yes. Right after the crash I went up and stuck my screwdriver under the windshield. The urethane was still 'gooey'.