Windscreen replacement with snorkel

I'd read a few stories on social media about people with raised air intakes on Discoveries having trouble getting windscreens replaced.

This is a tale for anyone who has trouble with fitters sucking through their teeth and making all sorts of protestations. Luckily mine did very little of that.

It is hardly any more difficult fitting the screen with or without the snorkel. Yes, they had to work round it a bit taking the screen out and it does need a pair of hands to pull it slightly out to help get the A-pillar trim back on but other bits of the job, nowhere near the snorkel, were more difficult.

When mine acquired a 3" crack, probably from a stone, I made sure I informed Auto Windscreens in advance so that they could be prepared.

The snorkel on mine is not removable. By stripping down the inner wing liners and breaking all the carefully sealed joints it might be possible to remove it but for most practical situations it is not a good idea.

Of course when the fitters turned up on the day they had no idea despite me being very specific with the person I booked the call with. They did however do all the right things. They were concerned and made a few phone calls. Eventually it just needed confirmation from me that if they could not re-fit the trim that I would deal with that.

At the end of the day it was not the raised air intake that caused them most of the problems.

I drilled out the rivets and detached the plate from the A-pillar.

They had no trouble getting the trim off. They had far more trouble cutting through the sealant along the top and the side away from the raised air intake.

The most difficult part of refitting the screen was the upper edge trim that comes new with the screen. They admitted that Discovery screens are some of the more difficult that they have to do.

The technique for getting the A-pillar trim back on was to fit the clips to the plastic then clip that on to the body work. They started with the bottom clip but they had to align all of them in one go, near enough. It was a fiddle but the drivers side (UK) took far longer than the side with the snorkel!

Three of us worked on the offside. I held out the air intake as far as I dare without bending the wing panel. One held the bottom clip in place as the other person snapped in the other clips. The snorkel was not the tricky bit, just getting the clips aligned is what makes it hard.

There is a rubber strip attached which had to be pulled back out with a small hook once it was all clipped in.

They put in new trim clips and after they had gone I riveted back the support plate and re-attached the plastic pipe to that. Amazingly the originally holes lined up exactly.

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This story does not end here, see the leak that followed!