What is the best way to smash open a car window?

[RJ]

Just watching the evening news tonight, with the scorching heat across the country. Up comes a news story about a child left in a car; the video footage shows a group of good samaritans attempting to crack the driver side window.

It's not clear to me if they were using a tool, but it did occur to me that I could ask ya'll your thoughts.

Assuming it is important to get air to a locked car to rescue a child or maybe even animal, what would be the best way to do that?

Are these tools that you see advertised effective when used by the average civilian (assume for the sake of argument I am the average civilian).

I saw this tool come up in my Amazon suggested items recently, and wondered if I should buy a couple of these for emergency use?

http://www.amazon.com/resqme-Origina.../dp/B000IE0EZO

[Drang]

I saw this tool come up in my Amazon suggested items recently, and wondered if I should buy a couple of these for emergency use?

http://www.amazon.com/resqme-Origina.../dp/B000IE0EZO

Get the one with the clip, so you can attach it to the visor.

[Gadfly]

Whatever tool you use, attack the corners of the window. Smacking the middle of the window is usually not as effective as popping the window in the corner.

[Default.mp3]

At the VFD, we use an automatic center punch for the tempered glass, usually used at the corner of a window. IIRC, there is a move for newly manufactured vehicles use laminated glass instead of tempered glass for all the windows on a vehicle, not just the front windshield. This makes things a little more complicated, as you'll have to tear the glass off after you crack it.

[Totem Polar]

Whatever tool you use, attack the corners of the window. Smacking the middle of the window is usually not as effective as popping the window in the corner.

This. Not that I would recommend it, but I can personally vouch that a single round of 9mm fmj in the far lower left corner of an Accord's rear window will vaporize the entire thing. FWIW.

[theJanitor]

I have the Surefire pen with the ball bearing in the cap. I don't know if it really works or not. Does it help to score the window first? I'm sure my strider can handle that

[TGS]

Tire iron to a corner of the window.

Side windows are tempered glass, so the whole thing will shatter once it's compromised.

ETA: Unless you want to get sued for slicing the kid up, be sure to strike a window other than the aisle the kid is sitting in, yeah?

[TGS]

I have the Surefire pen with the ball bearing in the cap. I don't know if it really works or not. Does it help to score the window first? I'm sure my strider can handle that

Yes, it absolutely works. Don't know if scoring is of any benefit though.

Best way is if you also have a hammer in the car (you know, tool boxes, that kind of thing), to place the tip against the window and then tap it with a hammer.

People make the mistake of throwing haymakers at the window, which is unnecessary and asking to injure yourself.

[Lon]

Take an old spark plug. Break up the porcelain, put it in a little plastic box. Keep it in your car. When you need to break out a side window, take a handful of the porcelain and throw it at the window. Boom. Breaks the window. Criminals do it all the time.

[OnionsAndDragons]

Glass is hard, but brittle. You want something with a very high Rockwell; ceramic (like on a spark plug), lots of Tungsten items, things of this nature.

I've tried it with the spark plug, old carbide end mills and the little ceramic stone I keep in my bag to touch up knives. They all do the trick, and don't take much more than a brisk tap generally.

One of my buddies' dad owns a junkyard. Sometimes we get bored.


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