Rear window exploded....

My wife just rang me, she pulled up at work in the Defender, stopped, and without warning the back window just shattered! Can this ever happen? Has anybody heard of it happening? There's no spare wheel on the rear door as it was nicked a few weeks ago. I took the carrier off at the time.

When they nicked the wheel did they leave any signs of brute force?

My guess is that either there was a chip in the glass or the relay for the rear screen stayed live causing it to get too hot and shatter.

I had a look at the glass (most of it was still in the frame) and there's clearly been an impact, which is a mystery as my wife says there was nobody about.
It looks like a stone, there was a street sweeping truck going past on the other side of the road, the glass has been replaced now.

I did not notice any damage from the theft of the wheel, but I could have missed the mark on the glass....never thought of that.

Most likely the flying stone . This is quite a problem in Oz when towing trailers on dirt roads, the stone get thrown from tyres and rebound off the front of trailer and explode rear window, the Land rover was better than most as it has a flat rear screen, the higher the curvature (and stress) the more likely to go bang . They do go occasionaly if they were a good close fit (unusual) when new , and the rear door frame gets attacked by the rust bug ., flex and then bang . HTSH

lightning said:

My wife just rang me, she pulled up at work in the Defender, stopped, and without warning the back window just shattered! Can this ever happen? Has anybody heard of it happening? There's no spare wheel on the rear door as it was nicked a few weeks ago. I took the carrier off at the time.

Click to expand...

that must have been a right pane