"Roy" wrote in message
...

First its not glass........usually fireplace screens have pyrex, yes
thats a type of glass but a wood stove does not have glass. Its a
clear ceramic material commonly kown as Robax.........Look it up. It
will withshatnd much higher temperatures than cast iron will, and as
for breaking, its probably as strong as cast iron and a lot of other
materials even if hot. Its rare that these Robax panels ever break, as
yu really have to go out of your way to break them..

I have seen demonstrations of this stuff where its heated to over
5,000 degress, and imediately dunked in a bucket of ice water, or have
a bowling ball on a chain swung into it in ice cold and super hot
conditions, and not suffer any damages.As to cleaning, its a
snap......no big hassle involved, no worse than cleaning a regular old
window.......It does add a nice aesthtic look and does radiate more
heat than a solid metal panel does, but does not retain heat as much
as a solid panel, but odds are its an even trade off.......with
radiated heat vers heat holding.


Besides, if the original poster, as stated, truly doesn't care about how the
thing looks, there's no need to ever clean the transparent parts.