Cleaning eyepieces

[Vapouriser]

Having used Viking cleaning stuff a few times and having a lot of fluid left. I dont reaaly want to buy another just to get a clean cloth. I was warned about buying any lense cloths as some have silicone in them! and anyway may not be good enough for telescopes, wonder if I can clean it somehow. I suppose soaking it the fluid is the obvious way? Thanks.

[Qualia]

For the relatively inexpensive cost of decent cleaning material and the actual very real cost of most EPs, I really don't think it makes a lot of sense in cutting corners.

I'd suggest you get yourself a large blower like this one to begin by blowing the dust away from the EP. After, I personally like to give the EP a little and ever-so-gentle brushing with the brush end of a pen like this before giving the EP a little spray with the Baader Wonder Fluid and a gentle rub with the Baader Micro-fibre Cloth. I then give the EP another little blow and if it is necessary - if grease still remains - another little spray and gentle rub with the Baader gear. Finally, with the carbon end of the aforementioned pen, gently buffing up the optics which leave the EP looking like it's just come of the production line.

I cannot speak about cleaning telescopes optics for I have never really bothered. I think the rule should always be "Do No Harm" and you can't really do any harm to optics if you don't clean them.

With the frac only once in over a year of constant use did I think it was absolutely necessary to give it an ever so gentle clean (it was caught up in a desert storm and then literally a few days later in a maddening summer storm in the mountains). Most times, about once every month or two I just give the lens a little blow with the bulb and that's about it. I have heard from reflector users pretty much the same story. Clean with extreme caution and very rarely.

As a warning, do not use your breath to puff off dust and do not use compressed air cans to blow off dust. Stick with the air-bulb, the Baader gear and perhaps the carbon pen and you'll be doing yourself right.

[Vapouriser]

Thank you Qualia. Trouble with the pens are there a bit big for ep lense. My televues are only a few mil diameter.

[rory]

i use a blower and a lens pen (lens pen only occasionally when needed) seems to work well. the pen has a soft brush one end and a cleaning pad on the other.

[Moonshane]

I very rarely clean eyepieces or scopes unless selling them. there's not much point as it makes no perceptible difference most of the time. when it does that's when I clean them.

[Vapouriser]

Thank you. Dont know how I ve done it but my eyepieces are in a state. I ll have to use a cloth on the little ones and be more careful! Jonathon

[Astrobits]

I clean my lens cloths by putting them in the normal weekly wash. Never had a problem with my specs and I am very fussy about my specs being clean. If you don't like that idea then just go to your local opticians or camera shop and buy a new micro-fibre cloth. Never heard of any being impregnated with silicone, that would leave a smeared lens and no specs wearer or camera user would put up with that.

I'm with Shane on this, I don't clean my telescope optics or eyepieces unless it is really necessary. Unfortunately, the eye lens of short eye relief eyepieces get greased-up easily by eyelashes and need cleaning more often than anything else.

Nigel

[scarp15]

IM in the process of cleaning one or two eyepieces currently due to a build up of greese. This does receive a lot of reference, It is always worth bringing up again though in new threads www.televue.com/engine/TV3b_page.asp?id=103

[alan potts]

I tend to agree with Moonshane on this one. We clean things far too often, I clean the front of my LX about every 18 months and after I do I see no difference. That part of the scope is expossed to everything, flys the lot.

I was using it one night earlier this year and I thought I had terrible ghosting in the eyepiece I was using, 20mm Nagler if I remember. It was a firefly looking at himself in the mirror, thought he had found himself a big mate, its happened a few time since.

Alan.

[scarp15]

I have just finished cleaning some eyepeices - due to a bit of concern of greese build up and finger print smudge (not mine) on my 20mm Nag and all the above comments make valid points such as

• Question if you really need to clean the eyepiece in the first place if it does not affect the view
  
• Ensure that you have all the appriopriate tools and a clean dust free working environment
  
• Are informed on the most suitable methods
  
• Short eye relief EPs perhaps experience more contamination built up from natural oils excreted by your eye and lashes - which could in the longer term create bacteria to have a detrirmental effect on the coatings.
  

I think I would like to add that personally I have a preference for cleaning eyepieces in day light, as the natural light enables me to see blemishes easier. You can then hold the eyepiece up to the light or towards a white screen background. Artificial light for me does not work so well in this respect. I also though used a magnifying glass (plus backlight the ep with my small petzl e-lite) when inspecting, possibly not recommended as this might reveal too much . I am though by no means experienced in this task (two years ago I scratched the coatings, cleaning an eyepiece too impulsively). I finished this task with a mixed sense of relief and a feeling of ought I to have started in the the first place. I quess if you have more experience, then it might be as straight forward as brushing your teeth .

H.N.Y

[MARK3835]

Hi I'm really bored so i am going to clean my eyepieces untill MOTD comes on, just realized i have not got my 'Wonder fluid', lent it out. The only thing I've got is Boots Lens cleaner. Active ingredient is 'sodium alkyl sulfonate' and 'Potassium lauryl phosphate' would it be ok to use? Tnanks

[Dave In Vermont]

Being bored isn't a very good reason to clean an eyepiece. Cleaning, even with the best lens cleaning solutions - Baader makes an excellent one - can diminish the coatings on the lens and an accident can spell a catastrophe. Usually just a gentle brushing - with a soft brush made exclusively for this purpose - and a blast from a rocket-blower is all you need, unless you touched the lens.

For removing fingerprints and the like, I recommend the Lenspen. This small gadget contains a soft, retractable brush and a carbon-based cleaning-head that is used in a circular motion gently. They come in two sizes for eyepieces, the regular and the mini. There is also one made with an angled head for cleaning the CCD in cameras and video-cams. Sold in many photographic and telescope shops, they are also available on-line:

http://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=lenspen+original&tag=googhydr-20&index=aps&hvadid=36243443558&hvpos=1t1&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=12907212102023251563&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&ref=pd_sl_2os3qtpfo0_b

"If it t'aint broke, don't fix it!"

Dave

[laservet]

Everyone has their own pet method. I'm an obsessive eyepiece cleaner, both in the field and after each observing session. I find the smallest amount of eyelash oil or dirt has a dramatic deleterious effect on the image contrast. I've been carefully following this procedure for many years and the coatings on my eyepieces are pristine, no scratches or signs of wear. I always use the following:

1) Blow off any particulates with a large ear bulb syringe.

2) Lightly brush off any stubborn particles with a sable artist's brush.

3) Blow off again to remove anything released by the brush.

4) My cleaning solution depends on what I'm trying to remove. My main cleaner is Kodak lens cleaning solution. It's a known entity with a long track record of safety on very expensive coated camera lenses. I use the Zeiss cleaning solution if the Kodak doesn't do it, followed by (in no particular order) Baader wonder fluid, acetone, methanol, ethanol, methyl ethyl ketone. You may find that one solution may be more effective than the other on certain contaminants. For organic stuff that won't come off, particularly the shiny spots left when tree sap hits the glass, I use saliva on a clean thumb; it's a digestive liquid and a clean finger is very soft and can't harm the coatings.

4) Use surgical roll cotton, extremely soft with no particulates. Very inexpensive, available from drug stores or medical supply stores.

5) Avoid using too much cleaning solution. You want to prevent any solution wicking around the edge of the eye lens into the innards of the eyepiece, particularly if you are using acetone or MEK. An old photog taught me a trick -- shake the Kodak cleaning solution so it has a head of suds, then hold the bottle _upright_ and dispense a dab of foam onto the cotton. It is the perfect amount of fluid.

6) Roll the cotton against the direction of movement across the glass so the leading edge lifts any particles off the glass and doesn't rub them across the glass surface. Replace the cotton after one complete rotation. Use zero pressure, only the weight of the cotton.

7) I make my own q-tips by twirling a wooden applicator stick (can be purchased at medical supply stores, same place as surgical roll cotton) while dipping the tip lightly into the surgical roll cotton. Once you have picked up a dab of cotton with the tip, roll it between your fingers to shape it. With a little practice you can make them look like they came out of a factory and can customize the size to whatever is appropriate for that particular eyepiece. You can make one the size of a fist for corrector plates or objective lenses if you wish. For those tiny eye lenses in short fl orthos, you can snap an applicator stick in half and use the fine point to twirl up a dab of cotton to make a q-tip as small as 1 mm.

8) Final puff of air to remove any lint left by the surgical cotton.

Roland Christen had the following to say about dirt on eyepieces in the Yahoo AstroPhysics users group:

"Eyepieces are mega-mucho far more affected by tiny sleeks and surface contaminations than telescope mirrors or objective lens surfaces. The images are highly concentrated and pass through only the tiniest fraction of the eyepiece lens element. A tiny defect on that surface will be very large compared to the image. A dust grain will be a mountain on Mars. Anyone who has seen the effect of a mote of dust on a CCD chip cover plate will know instantly what I'm talking about. That same dust mote or sleek will have zero effect at the front objective."

I can't bring myself to use one of those lens pens, just can't see rubbing anything across the coatings. All it would take is just one tiny particle..