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Dan
12-18-2009, 07:41 AM
Being a horse owner, we tend to visit the local Coastal farm store on a weekly basis, which since they stock Hobart and Forney welding supplies has made it a more convenient place to purchase certain welding related items; such as contact tips, gloves, lenses, and possibly even wire, over making a special trip into the big city;) to Airgas.

Now that I am 40+ years old, in certain cases with TIG, I continue to have issues with my eyes. Due to this, I decided I wanted to give a gold lens a try. So, when we stopped at the farm store for our weekly visit I headed off to the welding section, and was disappointed when I discovered that Hobart only offers a gold lens in a shade 10, and I was wanting a shade 9.:mad: Granted Hobart primarly sells wire feed or stick units , so this makes some sense.

Anyway, deteremined that I wanted to give the gold lens a try, I made the special trip into the big city. I ended up having to order the shade 9 lens, Airgas had shades 10 and 11 in stock. The peg on the wall for shade 9 was empty. At $10 a piece, for a plastic lens, I wasn't pleased with price; however, after using the lens this past week I am pleased with the improved puddle visiblity. This is the first time I've used a lens that had a reddish tint to it, so maybe this has something to do with better puddle visiblity?

Zrexxer
12-18-2009, 08:38 AM
Not sure about the effect of reds on visibility, but I have a gold lens in a fixed helmet I use for TIG also, and I like it. At nearly 50, I can definitely empathize about the eyes... mine are a constant source of problems when welding.

ptsideshow
12-18-2009, 12:01 PM
What the gold coating does is reflect a lot more of the light of most wave lengths back to the direction you are looking. As with the gold coated face shields for hot glass working glass. As to the cost. it is a vacuumed deposited layer of real gold on the lens and it probably won't get much cheaper :eek:

Zrexxer
12-18-2009, 12:04 PM
As to the cost. it is a vacuumed deposited layer of real gold on the lens and it probably won't get much cheaper :eek:Right, and gold is running over $1100/oz right now, and was recently at $1200, higher than it's ever been in history.

ptsideshow
12-18-2009, 02:01 PM
Here is a site with a live metals update ticker
Page with live ticker ribbon (http://www.monex.com/monex/controller?pageid=prices)
:D