In the past, laminated glass was usually installed in the windshield, with side and rear windows being tempered only.
The difference is that tempered glass is per-stressed so that when it cracks, it shatters into many tiny and dull pieces. Laminated is the same thing, but with layers of plastic sandwiched with layers of tempered glass. Laminated glass will still shatter, but will be held together by the plastic layers.
In an emergency, small improvised, or purpose built tools meant to shatter tempered glass will be useless if the glass is laminated.
They’d go the way of the cheap little tire change kit, if the car even has a spare. Nobody would remember where it is, and it’s probably buried under whatever junk is stuffed in the pocket.
It pisses me off to no end that 2 of the 3 cars I’ve owned have not had a spare, but that shitty flat repair kit. Thankfully, the one time I needed a spare I had one, as the flat repair kit would have been worthless the day I clipped a curb on a turn and completely blew out my tire.
Fucking cheap asses making life harder for people…
Yep. The shrinkflation of cars. Cutting out extras like spares to save a buck. Yeah it’s weight that affects economy, but I don’t want to calculate the weight of a 40lb spare on gas consumption vs the cost of the tire or a tow service. FWIW the do make these little collapsible/inflatable spares that can fit in small spaces, but I’d be wary of them with some AWD cars. Can really F up the limited slip allowed in some of the systems.
That honestly sounds worse than using a donut, and the one car that came with a donut got it replaced with a full-sized spare because fuck donuts.
It’s better than no spare being the point. If it gets you somewhere better instead of being out $$ for a tow and waiting for the tow to show up. YMMV, though.
The one time I had to use a donut, it was plenty to get me to a tire shop. And because I changed the tire myself and was able to hand it to them, they were able to take care of it immediately even though their bays were full