Pro tip: measure the opening, not the old glass

Had a job in a 1950s apartment building downtown last month where the customer insisted the replacement window pane was the same size as the broken one. The original was a 28x54 inch single pane. I cut the new tempered glass to that exact spec, but it wouldn't fit because the frame had settled and warped over seventy years. Had to eat the cost of the glass and recut it to 27 and 7/8 by 53 and 3/4. Anyone else run into this with old buildings?

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3 Comments

gracem326mo ago

Classic case of the customer always being wrong... at least about window measurements.

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mitchell.daniel5mo ago

I saw a thing on a home improvement forum where a guy measured his window opening at 36 inches, but the actual frame was warped and varied by almost an inch and a half. The quote was for a perfect rectangle that didn't exist. That's probably what happened to nathan_hill. You think you're giving them a straight number, but old houses shift and nothing is square. The installers should always double-check, but sometimes they just trust the paperwork and you end up with a three inch gap and a big problem.

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nathan_hill6mo ago

My last window quote was off by a solid three inches.

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