Since I like my black Ascends.....

[curtis]

....look what I did to my 4Runner......





Actually, I went back and forth between chrome and black....and decided to be a little different. I wanted to upgrade the wheels and tires, found a good deal on used rims with tires I wanted as well....tires were only two weeks old, then I took the rims to get powder coated black. Came out great!

[Kurt C.]

Very Stealth. I like it.

[BradJudy]

Nice look. Why no driver window tint?

[curtis]

Thanks guys.

Nice look. Why no driver window tint?

There is some tint on the driver window.....but obviously not nearly as dark as the rear windows. In California, the law is the front driver and passenger windows have to let at least 70% of the light in....the rear windows can be as dark as you want.

In Colorado, I believe you are allowed down to 27%.

I have gotten a ticket before for having too dark of tint on the front windows. A huge hassle to get the tint off and take the car to the police department to get OK'd...on top of the fine.

The tint on the 4Runner now is all stock....just like it came from the factory. I have thought about getting the fronts tinted to allow 70%...maybe before next summer.

[curtis]

So....driving home Friday from work, minding my own business, I hear this loud and sudden "CRACK!" from the windshield.

Looks like the car ahead of me kicked up a pebble and it put a nice dime size crack in my windshield. Yeah...I was pissed.

An aftermarket windshield installed at the dealer was $200, actual Toyota windshield would be a little over $300. The Toyota glass has some kind of coating to help shed water easier...kind of like built-in Rain-X.

What I ended up doing was researching a bit and had the windshield repaired by Safelite. What they do is drill a small hole to access the crack, pull the air out of the crack(which is what causes the crack to be visible) and then inject the crack with resin. Looks pretty good....you can still see the defect, but it is much less noticeable. The cost was $60 with a lifetime guarantee.

The guy came to my house to do the repair..only took 10 minutes or so...nice little business.

More research and I found DIY kits to do the repair as well.

Anyways, I am very pleased with the outcome.

[tjennings]

Yep, Safelite made that same repair on our car perhaps 4 years ago... still no problems with it! Knock on wood...

[Lou-the-dog]

NICE rig Curtis! I really like it.

My insurance company will fully cover a windshield repair as you described (no deductible). If I were to have the windshield replaced then the deductible kicks in. Check it out if you haven't done so already... maybe they'll pick up the tab.

Randy

[sensibull]

Must be something about California roadways and SUVs. When we lived in the East Bay our old Cherokee's windshield got rocked twice in one week, just days after replacing it. Later that year my neighbor weed whacked his lawn for the first time in months and kicked up another UFO that took out our driver-side window. Of course it poured that night. Guy was Brazilian, lived with about a dozen family members, and spoke absolutely zero English. Long story short, I ended up in their living room, watching futbol, trying to explain myself in my feeble Spanish (I knew they spoke Portuguese, but it was the best I could do), while their incredibly gracious matriach stuffed my face with delicious empanadas. In the end, he peels a hundred dollar bill from a roll and hands it over, we shake, all is well.

Boy I miss California. Things like that just don't happen to you in Connecticut...

[bikeman]

Boy I miss California. Things like that just don't happen to you in Connecticut...

Oh, please. How can a bunch of Brazilians compete with Martha?

David

[curtis]

Nobody has ever given me empanadas and a $100 bill.

Mmmmm....empanadas!!

I'll call my insurance company tomorrow morning. $60 will get me some empanadas.