r/oddlysatisfying • u/Cesalv • 5d ago
Cutting the lenses to fit the shape of the glasses
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u/meatywood 5d ago
I'm so glad the price of glasses is so much lower than it used to be. I remember as a kid wanting to die when I broke a pair of glasses because they were several hundred dollars (like a house payment) in the 70's. The improvement in plastics has also helped with the weight. No more glasses weighing half a pound sliding down your nose.
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u/OstentatiousSock 5d ago
Uh, yeah, glasses are still pretty darn expensive. I can’t use online companies because the higher your prescription, the more you notice the lower quality. My glasses always run me at least $350 and I don’t get expensive frames.
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u/Refute1650 5d ago
350 is still pretty reasonable considering they cost that much or more back in the 70s.
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u/TeamEdward2020 5d ago
I'm lucky enough to only have astigmatism, my glasses are like 65 bucks on the frames I like with all the fancy shit on em.
Zenni for the win
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u/vfrost89 5d ago
Zenni has made my glasses so affordable. I'm pretty near sighted and I also have some astigmatism so my lenses are pricey. I used to pay $100+ even after insurance and picking the cheapest frames. Now I can get a pair for $75 out of pocket with Zenni 😁
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u/Azuras_Star8 5d ago
Exactly. I'd get the 150 $ cheapest, now i get one pair from zenni for under 30, sometimes under 15. I have spares in my travel bags.
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u/I2iSTUDIOS 5d ago
What's Zenni? I need new glasses.
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u/JAnonymous5150 2d ago
From a Google search I'd guess they're talking about zennioptical.com as it's the only truly related page that comes up when I Googled "zenni glasses."
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u/jabeith 5d ago
You mean some speciality glasses are expensive. Just like some TVs are expensive, but most aren't. I paid $39 for my glasses online for a moderate prescription and they look perfect to me.
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u/Adventurous_Pen2723 5d ago
What is your Rx?
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u/jabeith 5d ago
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u/Adventurous_Pen2723 5d ago
Any astigmatism?
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u/jabeith 5d ago
-1.25
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u/PhthaloVonLangborste 5d ago
When yall started wearing them did you have issues with it being wonky when you looked around? Like disorienting and giving you headaches?
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u/is_anybody_in_there 4d ago
I had this even with glasses bought directly from my eye ophthalmologist’s office. Raised my concern when trying on the glasses for the first time, and would told it’s the astigmatism correction and that I just needed to have some time to get used to it. Sure enough after a week or so everything is normal! YMMV but if you have this issue it might be worth giving them an extended try.
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u/ebony-the-dragon 3d ago
That’s what happened to me with my new glasses a few weeks ago.
Prescription changed a little, with the astigmatism changing a bit more. Took a few days for things not to look off. All is normal now.
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u/Eggonioni 4d ago
I've had decent vision insurance that pays for both lens fully and a large amount of the frames' cost and extra lens additions. Ends up being much more manageable by monthly costs, but I only fear that could be going away in the future tho.
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u/Crystal_Lily 5d ago
My current glasses cost me $200 and it still needs the UV filter because I hate getting flashbanged whenever I step out of the house.
I could have gone to cheaper store but their frame selections always sucked. So I went to a more expensive store and found a slightly more pricey frame that suited my needs. The lenses though... they cost me ~$150. My old pair that had the UV filter and the frames cost me ~$120. If I got the UV option at new store, it would have all cost $300 and it felt I was getting ripped off at that price point.
I still love my current frames as they never got bent out of shape or have that gross green eye pad/feet thing.
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u/Frenzeski 5d ago
My kid had to get glasses recently, to prevent his eye sight degenerating quickly it was recommended he get special honeycomb lenses that cost $800.
He’s already broken the frames, but at least the lenses aren’t scratched and we managed to glue them back together
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u/jabeith 5d ago
What condition does your child have that lenses would prevent degeneration?
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u/Frenzeski 5d ago
He won’t go blind just end up like me unable to see my own hand clearly more than 20cm from my face
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u/Primary_Complex 5d ago
Former glasses lab tech here. If you bought the glasses locally, you can go back and order just the frames. Once they come in, pop the lenses back in (plastic frame) or use a screwdriver from a jeweler's kit to place them (metal frame).
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u/laughitup2 5d ago
How do they determine the size to cut the lenses for rimless glasses?
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u/Primary_Complex 4d ago
Frames come with demo lenses in them. In this video, the first machine is a tracer and outlines the inside of the frame for the lens dimensions. When a new frame model comes in, the same tracer can do an outline of the frames and the blanks as a reference.
If rimless glasses are ordered, the frames are traced for the bridge and temple connections, and the lenses are cut according to the demos on file.
Here's 's a video showing a half-rim trace.
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u/Frenzeski 5d ago
Yep, he probably needs new glasses anyway as his eyes have gotten worse but that’s covered by the warranty
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u/margot_sophia 5d ago
when i first got my glasses (like 8 years ago) my mom bought glasses from the eye doctor and they were like $300, and we just thought that was how much they cost. imagine my surprise when later on i found out i could get glasses for like 50 bucks or less
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u/Sandriell 4d ago
What happens when one company (Luxottica) is allowed to own everything to do with glasses, vision, and insurance.
And they still own most of it, but thankfully have new players coming into the market in recent years.
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u/achilliesFriend 5d ago
Noob question, no glue at the end?
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u/biteableniles 5d ago
They heat the frame and it expands a bit allowing the lens to click into a groove. Then the frame shrinks back down and it'll hold it securely. No glue needed.
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u/Adventurous_Pen2723 5d ago
No there's a ridge along the edge of the lens and it fits into a little valley on the inside of the frame. No glue and you can pop your lenses in and out, but don't unless you have to because you usually have to do it a certain way and your optician has better things to do.
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u/henriquebrisola 5d ago
With glue you wouldn't be able to use the same lenses on another frame or the same frame with another lenses
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u/charliesk9unit 4d ago
Tagging my question here: when are the coating applied? Is that part of the material selection process?
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u/carahafer 4d ago
Hi! Optician here! This is what’s called a Finishing Lab (I work in one of these). The lenses come from a different lab with the script and coating already in them. They show up in the finishing lab about the diameter of a hockey puck. Then there’s a process called decentration (essentially an equation to put the center of the lens exactly where your eye sits in the frame) and then they’re cut on a machine and mounted in the frame! Happy to answer any more questions you might have!
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u/little_grey_mare 4d ago
Do they measure the lens shape for each pair of glasses or do big brands (say warby parker) have a CAD file for their frames?
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u/pamacdon 5d ago
I don’t see them measuring to fit the optical center of the lens to the inter-pupillary distance. Are these just shitty opticians or it done some other way?
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u/PaulinoTheMagician 5d ago
Optician Here. From the way The pre-cut lense looked, those lenses don't have any dioptric values. Something manufactures send frames with Out lenses. So we make some cheap lense so The glasses look better in the store.
But The frame in The Video also looks cheap tbh.
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u/have12manyquestions 5d ago
Are there any glues that would work on the flexible rubber / silicone frames like miraflex and tomato that special needs kids wear? Our lenses keep popping out because the frame is so flexible and our kid can’t wear stiff breakable frames.
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u/PaulinoTheMagician 4d ago
Normally we don't way gluey where i work, unless we really screwed Up. If the lenses falling Out all the time, they were probably cut too smart. There are other Options like those plastic Strips you Push between The lense and frame (i don't know The english Name for it) but a would Not recommend glue, it make IT hard to reuse The frame or lenses If you only need to swap out one.
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u/twignition 4d ago
These look to be dummy lenses. However, most blockers are now intelligent, and will detect the decentration based on a photo it takes of the lens-plane and the PD the user inputs. This is also the same way it detects and blocks axis on cylindrical lenses.
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u/Moraz_iel 5d ago
might be the moment when they stick the red holder thingy on the glass ? if they didn't care about the position, they could just put it roughly in the center.
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u/stevedore2024 5d ago
Dunno why you're downvoted. For demo lenses, the placement of the red adhesive mount is arbitrary. For actual lenses, yes, they measure the patient's IPD and probe the frame profile from that position. Then they're much more careful about adhering the red mount to the actual optical center of the lens wafer.
This whole service was done for me in-house while-you-wait at a shopping mall JINS store in Japan. I asked lots of questions.
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u/Psych0matt 5d ago
So glad they cut out 15% of the traveling around the inside of the frames, my attention span wouldn’t have been able to take the whole thing
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u/Waluigithefake1 5d ago
Had an internship at a glasses shop for a while, 1 pane of glass costs like 60€ here, gets cut down by machine and then sanded and broken down some more by hand. The frame gets heated up so its bendable, the glass gets put in then you let it cool down, from what i remember
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u/CanucksKickAzz 5d ago
I'm glad they cut out the extra 2 seconds of the measuring device going all the way around.
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u/bjchu92 5d ago
Man, this brought back memories of me standing there watching my dad's lens cutting machine go. Instead of it being measured by a computer, each frame had a plastic blank that was measured to fit and would be used to cut the lens. You'd put the blank on one of the spindle (or whatever it was called) and the uncut lens on the other.
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u/Ok_Tear4915 4d ago
This was the method... a long time ago.
Thirty-five years ago, my company manufactured digital automatic lens-machining machines like the one in the video, which enabled opticians to make a pair of glasses in less than two minutes, whatever the shape of the frame.
However, the machines still left open the possibility of using plastic templates supplied by the frame manufacturers or cut out by the optician.
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u/delpy1971 5d ago
I need new pair of intermediate glasses and I'm paying £180 plus for the last two, My problem is I have asbergers syndrome and tend to clean my lenses maybe more than I should :(, Is there still a way to get glass lenses or lenses that are very scratch resistant?
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u/Adventurous_Pen2723 5d ago
Hello, I used to be an Optician for 8 years in a very busy optical. Most of the time when people are getting scratches from cleaning it's because there are small bits of debris on the lens and you're just pushing and dragging it over your lens when you wipe them. I strongly recommend rinsing them under a cold faucet (not hot because I know y'all sometimes have a faucet for each temp, hot can damage the coatings on your lens), and gently use your fingers to get any junk off. Then dry and wipe.
You likely have scratch resistant already and remember it is scratch resistant, not scratch impossible.
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u/magnificentfoxes 5d ago
Ask ASDA opticians about this. Their upgraded lens prices are really good.
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u/Hank_Dad 5d ago
I'm so glad I got LASIK and don't need to pay for this any more
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u/schlongbottom3 5d ago
Eyes so fucked they said LASIK wouldn't do shit for me 😭 I almost couldn't get the frames I wanted because they weren't sure they were thick enough to hold the lenses, lmao
To be fair, the LASIK opinion was like years and years ago and may have been more in regards to my lazy eye (which has mostly corrected itself now) than my vision problems, I havent looked into it recently.
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u/fullautophx 5d ago
Best money I ever spent was for LASIK. I do wear glasses 20+ years later, mainly because I need readers now.
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u/colorful-9841 5d ago
90% of the microplastics in my brain are from working with a blade machine instead of a stone one.
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u/anonymous_bites 4d ago
Didn't realise it's all automatic now. The last time I made glasses I still saw the guy manually grinding the wheel at the sink under a running tap
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u/MrSquigglyPub3s 5d ago
That be $1500
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u/tennablequill 4d ago
Yeah, and what's more of a trip is I have glasses that are from 20 years ago and they have a scratch or two but my glasses from a year ago are blurs of Protective coating falling off. Gotta turn in your glasses to get that warranty before the year ends. To get a free replacement for your lenses. They are not built to last. Might just be me.
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u/5352563424 4d ago
Oddlyunsatisfying.
You cut out the one part I actually wanted to see: the actual cutting/separating of the glass.
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u/pizzasage 4d ago
What's up with all the cuts in the video? Is there a longer version without them?
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u/twignition 4d ago
Mmmm Nidek
Have you considered fitting outside edge, then brow-nasal? Helps the shallowest curve slip in without cleaving the frame.
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u/iiioioiii 4d ago
Very satisfying, but it's a bit weird that you have to pee on the lense during the process of making it, but eh, I'm not an engineer so who am I to judge !
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u/Outside-Childhood-20 2d ago
I love that it makes sci-fi machine sounds that I’d always dismissed as unrealistic
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u/javlarm8 5d ago
I don’t like that the only part that was out of frame was the actual cutting of the lense.