I can't believe that I made the mistake of thinking that, like Andersen, Pella Windows were the cream of the crop. I was so brainwashed into believing this that I neglected to Google "Pella window complaints" before making a purchase at Lowe's. Afterwards, did I get an eyeful, but knowledge, albeit garnered on the Internet, too late seldom benefits even a wise man.

What prompted this situation was in discovering that the six windows that recently were installed in my new home leaked air. What was I thinking? Did I really want to risk replacing six windows that leaked air with six windows that leaked air? But I had discovered that while the original windows were of decent quality, they were installed without adequate or any insulation and consequently allowed the pass-through of air completely around the outside of their frames. Besides, I was told repeatedly by a couple of Pella window salesmen that having comfort was totally dependent on the installation of the windows. (This might have been a clue to research a window product without a name that wanted one and had good installers.)

I have to admit that Jared Delmont, a Lowe's manager of install sales in Springfield, was very attentive to my problem and set up an appointment to have a Pella representative appear on my doorstep within two weeks.

Before "Kevin," I think he finally admitted his name was, even stepped over the threshold, he was dissing my Lowe's installer. Your windows were installed by Lowe's, he expounded. "They are the worst installers."

Ha, I thought, remembering how Google commenters had reported that while they tried to show what the defects in their Pella windows were, they were told how it wasn't the windows...but the installation.

Thermometer placed at edge of new Architect Series replacement window by Pella reads 56-degrees Fahrenheit in a home whose nearby thermostat was reading 72. Pella's rep refused to admit that there was an air leak around the window.

Tightening a couple of screws and ceremoniously moving his hand along the frame of one of my front windows (the more expensive Architect series) and at the same time assuring me that there were no air leaks, this man moved quickly to the rear where I knew that two windows were leaking air so badly that I wished I owned an electric blanket. Along the way, of course, I kept insisting that the Pella windows were bad, to the point, apparently, that this man asked me if I wanted him to leave; you're being so negative, he accused.

Taking out his level the rep was bent on assuring me that the back windows were installed crookedly when the doorbell rang. It was my Lowe's installer, Joe, whom I had requested be in attendance.

Well, Joe did in a matter of minutes what I would not have been able to do in a lifetime, and that convincingly was to demonstrate how his install was perfectly by the book (he had been trained by Pella to install their windows) and that, indeed, there were problems with the construction of those windows.

The last two windows in the bathroom, by the way, had summarily been dismissed by the Pella rep as not having air leaks. And how could they, they still had the insulating tape that he hadn't removed that I had used to supplement the windows' inadequate weatherstripping .

Okay, so based on this guy's report, Pella apparently would replace the two windows in the bedroom. But what of the other windows that he breezed (good word to describe air flow) by?

On one of them, admittingly, he had tightened the crank operated device, creating a tighter window seal. But before he left, he also had to re-loosen the screws after I couldn't get the handle to fit back into its socket--and that reveals the problem with all of the casement and awning windows that were installed. Pella is relying on a less than desirable weatherstripping to reduce air (and water) leaks to compensate for their SureLock system that doesn't in all cases of manufacturing line up or pull the window sash tightly enough against it.

All the windows after all presumably were made in the same manufacturing plant by the same people. at the beginning of a week in February. Were they hung over or just in training?

More to this sad song to come.....

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