The door and rear window glass on a CL are not double-glazed units, this is misleading to suggest that they are; on the contrary, its 6mm laminated glass. To suggest double-glazing implies that there is an air gap between the two panes, there isn’t, these units are constructed as one with 2 x 2.5mm panes bonded together with a 1mm plastic membrane polymer known as Polyvinyl Butyral (PVB) and unfortunately, PVB is hygroscopic in nature, meaning, it absorbs moisture.
If the glass panes are exposed to excessive moisture/water adjacent to the edge of the membrane, then the bond to the glass is reduced and delaminating can and does occur. This is often due to allowing excess moisture/water to collect in the area of the door/window frame apertures (especially after washing the car and not drying the glass edges) where the front and rear window glass overlap, or poor installation where measures intended to reduce moisture/water build-up is negated. The edge of the PVB membrane “must” be allowed to ‘breathe, similar to laminated front and rear screens.
The CL glass exhibits delaminated evidence on the vertical/horizontal edge on the doors and the horizontal edge on top of the rear windows. If you look at the rear window glass on the CL, you will also notice that it has a bonded frame to its vertical edge where the front glass can overlap forming a sealed joint or lap joint when the doors are closed. Similar to many types of laminated glass, replacements are very expensive on this model of car. The idea of this laminated process gives rise to the many tinted colour designations anyway; it’s the membrane that’s tinted here, not the glass.
I haven’t got the time at the moment to go into all the bodywork/paint issues. To put things in to perspective though, these cars are of the hybrid design, in other words, they don’t rust as has been suggested by others on here, they are made of magnesium, extruded and panel sheet aluminium with several body panels (front wings, boot lid and spare wheel carrier) being of the typical polymer plastics. The only steel components on the vehicle are the front end chassis and crumple zones, the rear boot floor panel/chassis sections, the internal “A” post pillars and the headlamp/bonnet slam panels. All of these steel components are specifically designed and fitted primarily as the steel construction absorbs any crash energy deformation far better than that of any aluminium equivalent (safety cell construction zones).
The aluminium elements do have a tendency to develop corrosive characteristics; but not rust, aluminium is actually very prone to corrosion, however, aluminium corrosion is referred to as aluminium oxide, an extremely hard material that actually protects the aluminium from further corrosion, but left unattended, it will eventually develop into disrepair, just like its steel counterpart would. As I said, If I do get time over the weekend, then I’ll come back on to the forum and explain what to look for and the causation of the defects, and there are some defects to be aware of in these cars.
Regards,
Dash1
