This project involved a complete rebuild of a very large front door panel.Front doors get a lot of harsh treatment, with wind, rain and banging when being opened or closed. Such vibrations can shake out the cement and even crack the glass; both issues had happened in this case.The pieces highlighted in red had cracked.This is the original panel, which I used to give me an accurate cartoon. It also shows the sorry state of the perimeter edge lead, which had seriously deteriorated and, in fact, not one of the soldered points around the edge was attached. When I came to dismantle the panel I simply unpeeled the entire perimeter in one piece.This image shows the panel completely dismantled to its constituent lead and glass. Next job was to clean up all the reusable glass and then cut the the broken pieces from new glass.Here the cartoon has been drawn, reusable glass is sparkling clean and the new glass ready for use.A clearer picture of the cartoon.Now with all the glass in position. I adjusted the design in the corners of the semi-circles at the top to strengthen that area.Ready to start the construction of the new panel.Half way through and all going well. Tricky, considering all the curves, including the semi-circles at the top. Construction finished, cemented and smothered in talcum powder to soak up liquid from the cement.Remove all the excess cement, clean the whole thing and polish.Fitted back in the door, looks amazing. Note also the addition of two vertical steel rods to which the panel is attached to soak up some of those vibrations and improve security.
