windows leaking due to microcracks

[agoodsnail]

heyo. thomas c2 safety liner 2009 here.

id like to share about our endless trying to seal the ******* windows journey to see if anyone has some advice

we have done the stuff. removing the windows, resealing the frame. deglazing where the actual glass/pyrex meets the frame, globbin up the corners etc etc. after testing it post-reglazing....we still have the same leak

out of frustration we decided to cut through the frame to inspect the hollow area that connects the frame to the bus ribs and lo and behold we have water coming through a teeny crack. this crack extends to the exterior part of the frame

every window is leaking. upon inspecting the two windows we took out for our deletes we have confirmed that there are microcracks running on the plastic on all of them in one spot or another

some cracks are accessible but most are not (when window is all the way up the bottom covers the access, when window all the way down, the top covers access)

do. we. give. up?
and just pay out the butt to install new RV windows

or does someone here have a secret crack solution that will help.

im bummed as hell man.

[cadillackid]

the gen 1 C2 had some of the worst windows made ever.. 09 was right around when they changed them but the originals looked like they werent all the way closed even when they were.. water could get down inside and freeze in the winter.. since the frames are aluminum it resulted in corrosion from any salt, and general deterioration of the frames.. later C2 windows were much better but still school bus windows.. school bus windows in busses without A/C esp get opened and closed hundreds of times, constantly vibrated around and really were never made to be energy efficient.. after all in a bus you half a quarter million BTU of heat if not more.. thats enough th heat a 5500 square foot house in Ohio...



RV windows are much better design but of course will require fabrication and altering of the bus structure to install...


to fix windows you really need to take them out of the bus and disassemble them.. ive never heard of having to cut them open to see the inside.. but i also havent torn apart C2 windows.. you might have some success filling the void with a flexible resin or such that would fill the voids..

[agoodsnail]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

the gen 1 C2 had some of the worst windows made ever.. 09 was right around when they changed them but the originals looked like they werent all the way closed even when they were.. water could get down inside and freeze in the winter.. since the frames are aluminum it resulted in corrosion from any salt, and general deterioration of the frames.. later C2 windows were much better but still school bus windows.. school bus windows in busses without A/C esp get opened and closed hundreds of times, constantly vibrated around and really were never made to be energy efficient.. after all in a bus you half a quarter million BTU of heat if not more.. thats enough th heat a 5500 square foot house in Ohio...



RV windows are much better design but of course will require fabrication and altering of the bus structure to install...


to fix windows you really need to take them out of the bus and disassemble them.. ive never heard of having to cut them open to see the inside.. but i also havent torn apart C2 windows.. you might have some success filling the void with a flexible resin or such that would fill the voids..

so all the window frames are plastic except our emergency windows, which are alluminum.

doing a hose test on two regular windows with new sealant on the frame to bus seam AND on the glass to frame seams showed leaking. hose test on the emergency window with the same showed no leaks.

this says to me that the leaks are very likely from just the cracks?

we also just tried sealing, the best we could, with a scraper the visible cracks from inside and out on one window just to check if that helps.

i will attach photos of what i mean by "cutting the frame up". it was just an interior part of the frame that overlapped with a bus rib and hid a hollow area.

[agoodsnail]

these are cracks on the windows that we deleted. we theorize they all have them to one extent or another, whether fully visible or not

[cadillackid]

wow!!! i Never knew C2 windows were plastic. explains why after I saw a C2 on fire all the windows and frames were gone and I never saw pools of metal on the ground.. the damn frames are plastic.. UGH! I wonder if regular thomas High headroom EFX or HDX windows would fit a C2

[agoodsnail]

so i hear they switched to alluminum window frames after 2008. but we got lucky and had the old window install in our 09 ��

[musigenesis]

I drive two-year-old C2s for work and the windows are aluminum. They work smoothly and don't appear to leak - which doesn't achieve much because the roofs all leak badly.

We just got a few brand-new International CEs in the fleet and they all leak an astonishing amount of water around the windows. The window units themselves don't leak but they're just set into the bus frames without any kind of sealant and plenty of water gets past them every time it rains.

[cadillackid]

Originally Posted by agoodsnail

so i hear they switched to alluminum window frames after 2008. but we got lucky and had the old window install in our 09 ��

so you have those windows that still look open even when they are closed..