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Dumbass- Almost Lost a Window Panel

bsmith

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I was in Long Beach Island for the weekend and had the doors off and soft top down. On Sunday, I put the Jeep back together for the drive home. Just after I got on the Garden State Parkway, doing about 75 MPH in the left lane, the driver’s side rear window flew off. The two dogs in the back were not happy! I was able to make an illegal u-turn in one of the “police only” median cut throughs, and u-turned again in the Forked River rest stop. Just as I was entering the highway, there was my panel sitting on the dashed white line between the rest stop acceleration lane and left lane. I was able to safely grab the panel and got off the highway at the next exit. Except for a couple scuff marks from hitting the pavement at 75 MPH, the panel was undamaged- no one ran it over!

Not sure exactly what I did wrong, just that I must have rushed and not snapped everything back together correctly. Dumbass (me) got lucky.
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mrtm1970

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Might not have had it fully "in place"...I have had the upper bullet tube pop out of the channel when sliding it in place and not realizing it till later and slowly all the other bottom clip & side clip (along the door) started to come out from the pressure pushing from the inside.
 
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bsmith

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Might not have had it fully "in place"...I have had the upper bullet tube pop out of the channel when sliding it in place and not realizing it till later and slowly all the other bottom clip & side clip (along the door) started to come out from the pressure pushing from the inside.
That’s probably what it was. I’ve had it happen before with the bullet tube pops out as I’m putting the windows back on.
 

R3TRO

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I had a C7 Corvette. The top panel would come off similar to our Freedom Panels. Many would put the panel back but forget to turn the latches to 'lock' it back in place. Well... as soon as you hit freeway speeds, it was just a matter of time before you'd join the 'topless' club! It would pop off like you were about eject someone and scare the sh!t out of you! I did it once and thank god it landed in a patch of grass on the freeway embankment. Never did that again!
 

cripton805

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I had a C7 Corvette. The top panel would come off similar to our Freedom Panels. Many would put the panel back but forget to turn the latches to 'lock' it back in place. Well... as soon as you hit freeway speeds, it was just a matter of time before you'd join the 'topless' club! It would pop off like you were about eject someone and scare the sh!t out of you! I did it once and thank god it landed in a patch of grass on the freeway embankment. Never did that again!
Happened to me in the C7 at 20mph. 🥴
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