Hi all,
Just posting here incase anyone stupid like me ends up here after breaking their front glass element of Tamron 17-70mm f/2.8 Di III-A VC RXD lens. I did not find any useful information for myself for this particular lens so decided to make this post for the future idiots.
My Tripod got misbalanced and fell on a hard rock with my lens hitting the ground and creating a chip in the front glass element which quite obviously also affected the photos.
Anyway, lesson learned always put on a filter and a hood to avoid spending $200 bucks to replace this. In the US, I believe the cost to get it replaced properly by Tamron is upwards of $300 - $400. If you want to fix this yourself like I did, you can follow the steps I followed below:
What you need :
The front glass element from Ebay like this one .
A rubber lens remover tool like this one
Depending on what all you broke in the process you might need additional replacements like the cover ring or the barrel ring which you can also find on Ebay. If you're unsure, message the ebay seller who is selling relevant parts and you might get some help like in my case where the barrel wasn't available anywhere on ebay and the seller ordered it for me.
What to do :
First off I recommend you vacuum your room, clean your working surface to avoid dust getting in.
Use the rubber lens tool kit to unscrew the cover ring
This will expose the screws that you will need to unscrew to remove the barrel and get to the front glass element.
Once you have unscrewed (6 screws ,3 of a kind) you will see a sticky grey colored glue that sticks the front element to the barrel. Take a pointy sharp object to cut it off, and then you will be able to take off your front glass element.
Replace the Front Glass element with your new one and do everything in reverse to fit everything back.
Don't forget to order those Lens filters and put on those Lens hoods.