I wish to model a large window which a large object has crashed through…lots of broken glass spread out on the floor. The “glass” should be of scale thickness (1/35 - 54mm) and be be able to be broken into small particles and shards. Light bulb glass is the right thickness but are round - I would prefer flat sections of glass. Blister pack clear plastic is a good thickness but won’t shatter into bits. So…the “glass” should be:
scale thickness (no more than 1mm; preferably less)
easily shattered into realistic pieces
inexpensive
easily acquired
Any suggestions?
Microscope slide cover slips. Not the slides themselves, but the cover plates. Put them in a mortar and smash them with the pestle, they’ll look perfect. Unless you have a laboratory supply store nearby, you’ll probably need to Amazon these. .13-.17mm thickness. Nothing else even comes close in appearance.
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What paska says.
Can’t beat the real thing …
Artefakt shattered glass is the best I have seen, realistic and safe:
That has been used on a diorama or two on this site.
Was just going to suggest microscope cover slides myself. Quite cheap and perfectly in scale.
Be very careful though, the shards are razor sharp!
I’ve accidentally cracked a few of those things and cut myself a few times in the past. Fortunately for me they were clean and unused at the time, so no nasty infections.
On the plus side, the first time was an opportunity to see my own blood through the microscope!
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Yep! razor sharp indeed! Safety glasses on while you mash them, and don’t feed them to the carpet monster either, you’ll be very sorry when you are trying to extract them from your bare feet!
One other positive, you can’t do this with plastic;
Not a bunch of scribbled lines with a X-acto blade trying to look like random cracks, these are made just like the real deal, one shot and you’re done! …and yes, there’s a trick to do it.
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Thanks for the great replies! I’ve used the slip covers before and vowed never to use them again. With my eyesight I missed most of the broken pieces until I cut myself on them - they’re like dozens of tiny razors! Looks like I’m going to go with the Yenmodels product.
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Paska’s glass looks 110% superb but I’ll certainly be going with the safer alternative soon - you’ll still need to chop up (& scribe cracks in) a transparency sheet or similar for big shards & whatever’s left in the window-frame…
I should add that the Artefakt shards can be easily crunched to make ultra-small shards, they might look too regular but it’s for a good reason, you can decide how much gets more shattered 
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Is Artefakt only available from themselves, or are there retailers in North America?
It’s not the way I wanted to go, but I bought a pack of microscope slides at a local (1 hr. drive!) hobby shop, while I was looking for other things. Unfortunately they did not have cover slips, and, the sales clerk, who looked to be a high school student, told me that most slip covers were now made of plastic! Anyway, they were right there and I didn’t have to wait a month or more for delivery. I realize the glass is too thick, in scale, for typical window glass, but some windows have extra thick glazing (industrial strength) to make them more shatter resistant (?). As my project is a school window, I can explain away the too-thick glass as being this type. If it doesn’t look right I can still order the Artefakt “glass”.