Spectacles
Cleaned more often than anything else a person owns, almost always on a shirt tail, which is the one method the lens manufacturer names as damaging.
Precautions
- Test on an inconspicuous area first
- Check the manufacturer's instructions
In detail
Spectacles are probably the most frequently cleaned object in this catalogue, and the usual method is the one the lens maker singles out. Wiping them on a shirt, a tie or a tissue is called out by name, and the reason is the everyday dirt trapped in the fabric, which scratches the lens and risks damaging the coating. What makes this worth a record rather than a note is that there is no recovery. Scratches cannot be wiped away from plastic or glass lenses; a scratched lens is replaced. Almost everything else in this catalogue has a remedial step, and this does not, so the whole answer is about not causing the one event. The cloth is the variable that matters most. A reusable cloth accumulates the same abrasive particles as clothing, so a favourite microfibre kept in a pocket is not automatically the safe option; cloths are not to be washed above 40°C or with fabric softener, both of which leave them worse than before. Heat is a separate hazard: extremes of temperature are advised against, with a car on a hot day given as the example.
Related
- Spectacles is made from Coated spectacle lens
Sources for this page
Sources
Lens and Screen Cleaning: how to clean your glasses
Carl Zeiss Vision · Manufacturer documentation
Relied on for: That reaching for a tissue, tie or sleeve is called out by name because trapped dirt scratches the lens and risks damaging the coating, that reusable cloths retain abrasive particles, that cloths must not be washed above 40C or with fabric softener, that scratches cannot be removed and scratched lenses should be replaced, and that extremes of temperature are to be avoided. (states this directly)
Verification: a person has read the passage relied on.
Read on — The what-not-to-use, cloth-care and scratch sections. Supports a narrower statement — our claim was reduced. This supports the ABRASION half of the lens question and not the chemistry half. The page read does not state that alcohol damages coatings, and CleaningHQ therefore does not assert it — which matters, because the demand batch carried exactly that claim from consumer sources and a manufacturer page recommending its own products is not evidence against a competitor's chemistry. The alcohol question stays open, and it is recorded as open next to an electronics answer that permits 70% isopropyl alcohol on a display.
Last reviewed by a person on .