My glass shower door exploded this morning!

Holy Crap! Sounded like a bomb went off. Shattered into a million little pieces. We were in the next room when it happened. Apparently it''s not uncommon since tempered glass can explode at any time if there is any flaw on the edge. Scared the crap out of us! Anyone else have this happen?

Mary!
Interesting news. I didn''t know this was a possibility. I will stick with my see through shower curtain.
You have a poltergiest!
Domenique Dunne
That happened to my front door. It was weird. Nothing was going on, and then BOOM, it shattered in a million pieces. I never knew why.
Get out of the closet!\ \ Just missed the right door
Is your house built on an Indian burial ground?
Glass can only be tempered after it is cut or cast to size/shape. If the anealing process is flawed (uneven heating, impurities within the glass etc) it will only take a small scratch or a torquing of the glass to cause it to shatter. This can happen to glass lenses in eye glasses and pyrex utencils and all other uses of tempered glass.
The same thing happened to my stereo cabinet door about a decade ago: nothing was wrong, then suddenly SMASH!\ \ My poor cats were terrified for days afterwards. :(
A be bop a loop bob a be bop a lop boppa BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Aretha, jammin next door
Is Carrie White your neighbor?
I saw that happen once to a car windshield on the freeway. Apparently a pebble got kicked up from a vehicle in front and it hit the windshield of the car just behind it just the right way and the whole thing just went KAPLOOEY! Thankfully the millions of little chunks of glass fell into the car so the driver could still see how to drive well enough to get the car off to the side of the freeway.
Believe it or not, as late as the 1950''s there were many cars with untempered glass windshields. The horriffic cuts drivers and passengers suffered in collisions were unbelievable.
Someone posted a similar story on Reddit last week. There seems to be a lot of this glass exploding lately.
http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/gsnzg/my_glass_door_exploded_for_no_reason_wtf/?limit=500
[quote]A be bop a loop bob a be bop a lop boppa BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE...by: Aretha, jammin next door %0D\ %0D\ Oh, DEAR!
Ella
The glass door of the Uniqlo store at Broadway and Prince exploded one morning as I was walking past; miraculously, the shards of glass did not hit any passersby.
Not sure what caused it, but I think Star Jones was spotted nearby ...
Thank you, R13! I think you solved The Mystery of the Disappearing Wit at DataLounge. They all went to reddit, apparently.
Poor ol'' Della Reese almost died many years ago when she plowed her bulk through a large glass door. I read she had hundreds of stitches.
WEHT our ghost thread? Did it get lost in the Amazon cloud?
GREAT. Now, I have another thing to worry about.
Chycken Lytle
The glass in the door of our wood-burning stove (which was not operating) cracked (with a loud noise) around nine or ten o''clock one morning. The chimney sweep said that this happens from time to time and can be due to such things as a sudden change in the respective temperatures on each side of the glass - for example, a gust of icy cold wind coming down the chimney when the room is considerably warmer.
Have none of you studied the principle of exterior compressive stress against interior tensile stress? It''s the same principle as the Prince Rupert''s drop or also called Prince Rupert''s balls. When damaged, the large amount of potential energy stored in the drop''s crystalline or amorphous atomic structure is released, causing fractures to propagate through the material at very high speeds.%0D
Isaac Newton
Let me tell you, it''s a sound you never forget. Sounded like a bomb went off! Then some of the glass went down the drain, and had to call Roto-Rooter to get that out! I''m really considering going with a shower curtain. You look at these doors now like you have an unexploded bomb sitting in your house. You don''t know when and if it''s going to blow! Crap! Glad no one was on the "terlet" at the time!
OP
Are you sure the glass exploded on its own? I mean, it was the bathroom and all kinds of explosive things can happen there.
Ina Garten
scary...thank God you weren''t in there when it happened!!!,,you both must have a guardian angel
Is this glass made in China perhaps?
I did have that happen to my shower door, OP, and it was 9 million pieces to clean up. \ \ Fortunately, the shower door company replaced it at no cost. \ \ But, it was loud and messy--kind of like kinky sex with the glass bits.
OP here. Shower door people came out today to measure for replacement. They think that the washer on the door handle had broken/decayed over time, which created the problem. They had all kinds of stories about exploding tempered glass. Yikes! New door next week.
OP
This just happened to me today as I was having a glass shower door installed.\ \ The guy picked up one of the pieces of glass and it just basically shattered in his hands.
I''ve read numerous articles about this issue over the past decade which generally blame the move to cheap overseas manufacturing (tempering) practices. Most of the articles discussed exploding Pyrex, oven doors, and (more recently) glass table tops. At one time there were quite a few websites devoted to just this issue - no idea if they''re still around.
Our exploded this morning while the wife was taking a shower. it was loud and glass every where.
I was at a dinner party once and the hostess served us on hand-blown glass plates. Right after I finished eating - boom - my plate just shattered without my even touching it. I was very poltergeist-like.
OP=liza
example
http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3D6V2eCFsDkK0
Is this what it sounded like OP? :10 seconds in...
http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DrxMcQRZ62Fc%26feature%3Drelated
There were probably glass worms in it.
Sounds kind of like what killed film noir actor Charles McGraw.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_McGraw
Oh fess up OP, you were in the bedroom lip syncing to your Victor/Victoria soundtrack when she hit the B-flat.
Have you noticed the calendar?
Dead%20Mayan
OP = Lucy and Viv
Great. We're getting ready to order a shower door at Lowe's. Doesn't tempered glass just break and fall? Does it explode in all directions? Isn't the purpose so it doesn't cut you to pieces?
This happened to a Pyrex glass dish I had. It was still hot - I had accidentally left it in the oven (I had turned it on to clean it), and I placed it on the countertop to cool, and it simply exploded.
I read through that reddit link for a bit, but I didn't see anything remotely witty. Where was the old-DL-worthy funny part? When we moved into our house, there was an old oven we didn't want. As we were in the process of pulling it out to replace it, there was a loud sound between a bang and a pop, and tiny shards of glass flew through the air as if shot out of a confetti gun. Took forever to find them all, too, but with 6 pets that roam around, missing one or two wasn't an option.
OP are you a screeching queen? Were you watching the Golden Globe red carpet on TIVO? That would explain a lot.
Showers will NEVER go away!
"scary...thank God you weren't in there when it happened!!!,,you both must have a guardian angel" Or a really devoted childhood imaginary friend!
Can you get glass with a sheet of plastic inside, similar to automobile glass? At least if that breaks, shards aren't going to go flying everywhere. I had that kind of glass installed in my windows in Washington, DC, as a substitute for putting bars on the windows.
OP here. It' like a car windshield. It just breaks up into little balls when it explodes. Not jagged glass, but I wouldn't pick it up without gloves.
The glass had Morgellon's. Don't touch it OP!
My rear window on my hatchback, in the 90's, did the same thing. I was driving down a stretch of highway, and I thought that I had been shot at. My back window exploded. The glass replacement guy said this happens sometimes. Freaky!
I know this is an old thread, but our Fleurco glass shower door just exploded yesterday (April 2012). I had taken a shower about 45 minutes prior to the spontaneous explosion of glass that blew glass out of the bathroom and down the stairs to the living room. Scared the hell out of me as I was the bottom of the stairs. Been doing some research to see what happened. Had no idea that this seems to be a fairly common occurence. Not sure what to do now. Do we put up another glass door? Just thought I would post so people know about the danger.
Dana
Pyrex old or knew can explode if you move it from temperature extremes (ex freezer/cold fridge to micro). The term is thermal downshock. I think people just notice it more because of the advent of microwaves. Essentially any tempered glass can go through this. I store all my leftovers in glass, but if I plan to reheat them I transfer the desired portion to another plate or bowl before microwaving. The event is frequently documented among vintage Pyrex collectors.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gretchenm/3053043733/in/pool-1347806@N20
[quote]Pyrex old or knew can explode My head just exploded.
re 52 LOL thank you for making me laugh. knew=new havent had my coffee yet Starbucks hear I cum. ;)teehee
re 51
R50 (...)I was the bottom of the stairs.(...) Didn't it hurt?
Just tape cardboard over the hole.
My dick exploded in my father's ass last night.
OP, you have no one to call and tell this story too? You have to run straight to DL? Sad...
My uncle's patio door shattered once. Well, I don't know if you'd call it shattered. It cracked into this kind of neat looking spiderweb pattern, but the glass didn't 'break'. Whatever coating was on the glass held it together. It was the oddest thing I ever saw, but like I said, it looked really cool. Not safe, though.
made in ...
As beautiful as those glass doors are on showers - the frameless ones - I have tried to avoid glass in the bathroom as much as possible. I am a klutz when wet and I want to feel safe and comfortable in my bathroom.
OMG, OMG, are you and your common-law domestic partner okay? Did you immediately shriek and say "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, what was that?!" Then, proceed to briskly sashay to the bathroom while your caftan waved in the breeze like Blanche Devereaux retiring to her bouduir? Have a blessed Sunday.
baths are better for you than showers.
Was Ella Fitzgerald in town?
OP, you don't perchance play with ouija boards, do you?
Should they all be of Plexiglas by now?
JEEZUS, OP, glad you weren't injured. And here I was thinking I was safe from Norman Bates' mother by replacing my shower curtain with a see- through glass door.....
Rethinking%20thr%20bath%20option
Mine exploded last week. Praise God that no one was in the bathroom because the glass went at least 8 feet. Glass was on the window sill ledge 5 feet off the ground, in the toilet, in the sink, in the shower, on the floor, on the counter, everywhere!
My 4 month old shower door exploded today, too. Thankfully my husband was not in the enclosure. He had his hand on the handle and it just exploded into a million pieces. He was cut slightly, but not seriously. I called the company and they will replace it along with my towels and throw rugs which were covered with glass. My main concern is that they were not at all surprised by the explosion. They just said that sometimes happens. I'm not sure what to do next. Will I ever be comfortable in the shower again?
Diane
A shower glass door exploded on my hand while I was taking a shower and sliced right through a tendon ! Been over two months now and hand is still in the healing process .
[quote] baths are better for you than showers. Not necessarily.
The%20Late%20Whitney%20Houston
same thing happened to my shower but i was standing next to it- cut my arm to pieces- thankfully i was clothed or i could have been gelded