Ultra Optics question

[snowmonster]

I'm curious about the Ultra Optics systems.

How do you clean a lens prior to coating? Do you put it in a washer/washing machine (I know, I'm opening myself up for lots of stupid comments with that one) or do you just clean it with some sort of soap/water and then alcohol?

I'm used to the Clean 'n Coat and was just curious about the differences.

Thanks!

[braheem24]

you can put it in there dirty, but water usually works well enough.

Ultra optics cleans the lens in one chamber and moves it into another to coat, you manualy move it to the UV chamber to cure it.

Much better the the "clean" and spotty coat:p

[snowmonster]

I don't know, it took 6 months to get a reproducibly flawless coating with our CNC but I think the machine was dirty. The guy we got it from hadn't taken care of it at all, and it was a mess. We got it for only $995 for the CNC and Quick Cure III. I bought a new UV cure bulb and ran a ton of solution through it to clean it out. Our spoilage rate now is extremely low.

In my opinion, it beats the $16,000 price tag (or whatever it really is) of a new UO coater!

[braheem24]

A poorly maintained ultra-optics machine has almost 0% spoilage. The machine can coat an edged lens with almost no imperfections on the edges, whereas the the CNC requires you use larger blanks because the outer 2-3mm is wasted on all of the coated lenses.

PS, you cant compare a $995 USED machine to a new one, unless you want to penalize the Ultra-optics machone for keeping thier value therefore it's not 16K. They would be 16K minus the sell price (usually $13K) so total usage price would be 3K, whereas the CNC was sold for MSRP new and $995 when it came time for the owner to get some of his investment back.

[snowmonster]

[skepticism]Really, it reliably coats an edged lens?[/skepticism]

We've been coating to the edge of our uncuts successfully with our current cleaning procedures. I would say our spoilage rate is maybe around 0.5% (1 lens out of ever 200), but we can still save them if we're good. :)

Realize I'm not insinuating the CNC is better than the UO, I'm just saying we've developed a good procedure that works for us for a machine that cost us less than $1,000.

I was just curious what you have to do to a lens prior to tossing it in the UO machine.

[MIOPE]

I understand that Ultra Optics has two models of coating machines.
We have the simplest one, Mini II. My experience is that it is excellent.
We do clean the lens manually first specially to remove any waxs from the blocking.
Also inspect carefully each lens once the coat has been applied (before putting it on the oven). Most of the time the coat is perfect but if there is dirt or a bubble you just put it back on the cleaning stage and coat it again.
We bought one coating machine 2 or 3 years ago made by a company that sells baby food. That was the worst investment we has ever done in this bussiness.

[AWTECH]

I understand that Ultra Optics has two models of coating machines.
We have the simplest one, Mini II. My experience is that it is excellent.
We do clean the lens manually first specially to remove any waxs from the blocking.
Also inspect carefully each lens once the coat has been applied (before putting it on the oven). Most of the time the coat is perfect but if there is dirt or a bubble you just put it back on the cleaning stage and coat it again.
We bought one coating machine 2 or 3 years ago made by a company that sells baby food. That was the worst investment we has ever done in this bussiness.

For UV cured lenses the Ultra Optics mini ll is an excellent machine. What makes it so good is a simple design and a proven process.

(The basic machine is the same as was used before they switch to 100% solids coatings)