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Shipping, Shipping, and more Shipping

Let’s talk about SHIPPING!

We spend a lot of time on our product, process, and bringing you the best polycarbonate windshield in the industry! Part of that includes shipping andshields there is a lot to shipping – so let’s dive in

Lead Times

Let’s start this off by addressing the big thing here…LEAD times! Our lead times at SHIELDS vary. It all depends on what you order and how many. We have our general retail that we do our BEST to keep stocked; however, we cannot seem to keep them on our shelves. We are currently asking 3-5 BUSINESS Days to get our in-stock items made and out the door to you. For our other items that are made to order we ask 20-30 business days. That covers most of our products. Anything that is custom or special you will have to call to get a current lead time. The key thing I want you to remember here is BUSINESS Days. We are open Monday -Friday 8am-5pm (office hours). What that means for you is that if you order on Friday night or 3am on Saturday, that is great, but we won’t be able to process your order until that following Monday. That starts the lead time.

Types of shipping

FedEx shipping

Many of you already know what kind of shipping is out there, option-wise. We offer FedEx shipping on our online store. However, if you are wanting to overnight or the next day an order we ask that you call so we can get you the best rate possible. If you prefer UPS over FedEx due to experience, then order over the phone and let us know your preference. Reminder for the next day, 2day, overnight shipping – this is ONLY for shipping. We see you select this and we will get your part out ASAP, but it does NOT change our lead times.

Does your order need to go freight? Give us a call to order that, you may even qualify for a quantity discount.

Control over shipping

One thing that I feel is important to discuss is control over shipping. Once a product leaves here we have no control over the delivery. If your order gets held up along the way, damaged, or lost we will do our best to make things right. We will do everything in our power to get you your order. We just ask that you are patient with us. Trust me, we are as frustrated as you, but we will fight the carrier for you. We only ask that you are understanding with your account person as it is mostly out of our hands.

Shipping Errors/Refunds

Did you select the wrong shipping on accident? No worries, let us know and we can cancel, refund, and generate the shipping you wanted. Two ways we can do this. If you create an account with us then we can do this automatically. If you do not want to do that, no problem. We will give you a call when it is ready to ship and get your payment over the phone.

On our site, we have a “flat rate” shipping option for many of our products due to the size of the products. If you accidentally select this and do not want it what we can do is create the shipping you want then we will refund you the difference. We will send you a receipt of this as well through our Stripe portal.

Multiple Orders

If you order multiple items online, you are our favorite customer, (wink). We do appreciate this but we want to communicate to you that depending onshipping what you order products may get shipped in multiple boxes and your shipping cost will be split. To do this we cancel the original shipping label and create two or however many needed to get you your product safely. We have come to learn that trying to fit different shapes in different boxes results in extremely expensive shipping. We want to save you money and get you your order safely. If we are going to do this you will be notified!

Important things

Some things to consider when selecting shipping. First, if you have a business address we recommend that you use that to save yourself some cost. Shipping residential is 100%, okay but you might save some money with a business address. However, we know many of our customers’ business is out of their home. If that is you your delivery is still considered residential and we will have to change the delivery to “home” or “resident”. Another thing to consider is 95% of the time, PO Boxes cannot be shipped to. This is hit or miss depending on the area. So if you give us a PO Box address we will call to verify that this will be okay for you. We may ask for this in an email so we have something to share with the carrier. Another thing to remember is that shipping FedEx “home” or “residential” are shipping 7 days a week rather than 5 for a business address.

Lastly, if you are curious as to our process please check out some of our other blog posts. We are growing. As we grow we are doing our best to maintain quick turn arounds for our amazing customers. As many of you know with growth is a balancing act of maintaining our standards while growing! To keep our high quality we guarantee our lead times may fluctuate, but we will get your order out the door as fast as we can. We know that every day you are without a window you cannot work. If this is your case please give us a call and we will do our best to get you back to work!

P.S – Need something ASAP? Call and ask about our Seconds Program. It is not guaranteed that we will have what you need, but we just might!

Your SHIELDS Team.

By |2022-03-18T16:39:35+00:00April 12th, 2021|About SHIELDS®, Products|0 Comments
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Heavy Equipment Replacement Doors

Hey SHIELDS People, Let’s chat about our heavy equipment replacement doors, specifically about our 1/4″ doors and all of our gauges! To make it easy below is a bullet point list of what we recommended our polycarbonate doors are used for, but not limited to the following:

3/8″ Polycarbonate Door

  • Grass Mowing
  • General Contracting
  • Material Handling
  • NOT for Demolition
  • NOT for Brush Cutting
  • NOT for Wood Processors

1/2″ Polycarbonate Doors

  • Demolition
  • Forestry Application
  • Ground Clearing
  • Brush Cutters
  • Tree Shears

1/4″ Polycarbonate Doors

People are sometimes not sure if they should get 1/4″ polycarbonate to replace their glass. If that is you we have one question for you….did your glass keep you safe? If so, then our 1/4″ polycarbonate is perfect for you. Our 1/4″ is great for replacing glass for general work. If you feel like you might buy a mulcher head or another attachment then we encourage you to upgrade to the 1/2″ for safety reasons. Another point I would like to share is that polycarbonate is FLEXIBLE. Polycarbonate’s strength comes from its ability to flex. Some applications ¼” will flex and have movement due to how it is installed in your cab. If this will bother you, we recommend looking at our 3/8” or ½” thicknesses.

If you have questions about what thickness you need, give us a call! 1-800-554-7527

Want to learn more? Check our our blog post about our Form Fit and Function. Check out our full retail line for Heavy Equipment Your SHIELDS Team!

By |2024-03-01T13:49:28+00:00March 8th, 2021|Heavy Equipment, product properties, Products|55 Comments
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When To Order a Custom Windshield

Ordering a Windshield

Ordering a SHIELDS® Windshield in your car?

There are some things we want to share with you about ordering a SHIELDS® Windshield. First and foremost we want to share that due to material costs going up over the past couple of years, we are having to increase our prices. These prices will be effective as of April 1, 2021. Here is a link to our catalog that you can see the new prices. We don’t like having to increase our price but we hope you understand why we had to. If you have questions please use the email at the bottom of this article and we will be glad to help!

Now, let’s talk about ordering your custom windshield. When you order your windshield you are going to be given many different options. We know this can be overwhelming and create more questions, so let’s break it down.

Size Options

  • Stock Trim – this is where we trim the windshield down to the OEM size all the way around for a drop fit.
  • Oversized – this is where we top line the windshield at the OEM line, then the rest of the windshield is 1.5″ large around the rest of the windshield
  • Custom – our custom trim is…everything else! If you want 3″ large around the whole thing or if you have a custom-built with special dimensions. Now with our custom trim, some windshields work better than others for custom trim. Our team has years of experience with this and will be able to guide you so you get the perfect windshield!

Thickness Options

For thicknesses AKA gauges we offer a few for motorsports. The front windshield and rear windshield do not have the exact same gauge options.

Front Windshield –

  • 1/4″ Clear
  • 3/16″ Clear or Tint
  • 1/8″ Clear or Tint

Rear Windshield –

  • 3/16″ Clear or Tint
  • 1/8″ Clear or Tint

Coating Options

The last thing will ask you is what you want on your windshield. Starting to sound like a cake order, right? Well the coating is important. Our SUPERCOAT™ is a proprietary process, you can learn more about it here.   We offer 2 variations for our front windshields. You can get your windshield with SUPERCOAT™ on both sides, or you can get one side with SUPERCOAT™ and the other with our Anti-Fog. We recommended that you contact us and let us explain how to handle the anti-fog. For our rear windshield we offer the same as the front but we also offer uncoated versions of this. Now know that these will scratch up, but can save you weight and money. 

We are always adding new products to our line so be sure to ask us if we have your cars make and model! Another thing to consider when ordering with us, 90% of our windshields are made by hand to perfection. With that we have longer lead times and due to demand we recommended if you are working on a project be sure to order your window earlier than you think you need to. Our windshield makers are in high demand and are currently booked out for the next three months! We love it, but we want to be forward with all of you when ordering you windshield!

If you have questions about anything above please give us a call! 1-800-554-7527

Website- www.shieldswindshields.com

Your SHIELDS® Team!

 

 

By |2021-03-05T19:45:56+00:00March 5th, 2021|About SHIELDS®, Education, Products|0 Comments
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Safety withouth Sacrificing Quality.

Safety without Sacrificing Quality

The longer we are in the business of operator safety the more ways we see people coming up with ways to stay safe. This is great, people are focusing on safety more and more. However, when we see how people are doing this we just shake our head a little. We believe that you don’t have to sacrifice quality to focus on safety.

By quality, we mean a few things. When you add a cage to the outside of your glass window you are sacrificing the quality of your view. When you buy uncoated polycarbonate, cut it up and put it in your cab. Again, the quality of your view goes down as the uncoated polycarbonate scratches. You have also lost some quality in your machine because we both know that door you made does not fit perfectly. We believe that your safety

is the most important factor; however, we don’t think you need to sacrifice the quality of your door, cab, or your view…heck, let’s not forget about your precious time!

Polycarbonate is the #1 choice on a windshield or door to keep you safe. Poly is 260X stronger than glass and if you go with 1/2″ that amount even increases! But you can’t stop there. Your poly door needs to fit right. There are so many factors to consider with this. Does your door have a shape? Do you want to use your original hardware? Do you want a  simple installation? These are all factors that we realized you have to consider; so when developing the SHIELDS Advantage we thought through all of this. We ensure your polycarbonate replacement door fits the same as your glass using original hardware. If you can install glass in your machine you will be able to install ours no problem! If you find you are having some trouble check out our YouTube page and follow one of our installation videos. 

We have checked off the quality of your time and of your door! Now let’s look at the quality of your view. We have worked with polycarbonate for over 45 years and we know how frustrating it is when your poly scratches and hazes the same day you install it. This was one of the first concerns that we tackled years ago. All of our doors and products get post -coated with our proprietary SUPERCOAT hardcoat. This is the toughest coating in the business. Our coating is scratch resistant to steel wool and allows your windshield wipers to work as much as needed! You can learn more about our coating in this article. 

Time, machine, and view – we have checked those off. However, there is one more extremely important factor we have considered when it comes to the quality of your machine, your wallet. We are believers that quality comes at a price; however, that price does not need to break the bank. We are not the cheapest windshield and door out there we know. We pay top dollar for the best optical polycarbonate we can buy but we know that even the highest quality stuff has to be affordable and when comparing we fall in the middle in price. We can’t have the quality and be the cheapest but we will never price gouge our customers. We care about the affordability of our product for the average person.

You don’t have to sacrifice quality to ensure you are safe while working. We work to give you the best safe door and quality door to enhance your machine and your work!

Stay safe,

Your SHIELDS team.

By |2021-03-05T14:23:31+00:00February 12th, 2021|About SHIELDS®, Heavy Equipment, Polycarbonate, Products|0 Comments
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SUPERCOAT™ What Makes Us Different

SHIELDS® people, today we are going to dig into a part of our business that sets us apart from our competition. Our proprietary SUPERCOAT™ is the hard coating that we add to our polycarbonate products. This coating gives you a windshield with a scratch-resistant surface that is abrasion resistant to steel wool! So, you get the perfect OEM fit and function with the best scratch resistance, but how? Let’s dig into our SHIELDS® SUPERCOAT™ and talk in terms of candy!

Yes, candy! To explain how we have a hard coating on our products with the perfect form we like to use a 3 Musketeers candy bar as an example. When you buy a new 3 Musketeers candy bar you have a flat bar with hard chocolate all over it. What happens to the chocolate when you bend the candy bar, it cracks and breaks, right? That is what happens when you try to form and bend polycarbonate with the coating on it. Many of our competitors know this so they use a coating that is softer, not hard chocolate. They can then bend the candy bar without the coating cracking. That is okay, but the scratch resistance is not nearly as good.

 

That is when we realized there is a better way to handle a candy bar. We don’t accept not having both the best coating and the perfect form, so we do not compromise. To get this we take our candy bar and shape the nougat into the perfect form first! Then we bring in the chocolate and add it to the nougat. You end up with the best of both, our SUPERCOAT™ and the advantage of SHIELDS® form, fit, and function! If our windshields were a candy bar, they would be the tastiest and the coolest looking in our opinion.

That is a quick take on our hard coating we have a video demonstration of this on our Instagram page. You can also learn more about what we do on our other posts like, how polycarbonate is better than glass. But, don’t just take our word for it, check it out for yourself, and try a SHIELDS® replacement windshield! You can find our entire retail line here and order quickly and easily online. 

Until next time,

SHIELDS® Team.

 

By |2020-08-24T18:00:22+00:00August 24th, 2020|Education, product properties|6 Comments
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