Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Dish soap vs lens coating

Has anyone ever damaged a lens by washing it with dish soap like Dawn? As in caused some lens coating to lift off? What about damaging hydrophobic properties of some lens coatings?

Why would you do that? They make lens cleaning towels

I don’t think there is a problem. I clean my eyeglasses that way and the plastic lenses remain scratch free for years and years. Dry with a microfiber towel. I clean all my binos that way.

Make sure the optic is waterproof however. I cleaned my Leica 1200 with dishsoap and rinsed under the faucet. Didn’t realize Leica LRFs aren’t waterproof. Oooops.

Have always used dish soap for my binos and scope. Rinse the dust with hot water, soap lightly and rinse. Gets them cleaner than any lens cloth and never an issue with lens coatings whatsoever (Swaro, Leupold, Bushnell, Nikon)

Exactly what I have always done...use an old silk shirt to dry.

Never mind. I don't want to give out bad advice.

You may be right, but might test it on something else, first.

As a kid, dumb prank, used canned shaving cream to “decorate” friends car. Eyes, eyebrows on hood, etc. Oxidized green paint. What happened was, it ate the oxidized paint off down to slick smooth green wherever there was cream, but nowhere else....

Turned out was his mothers car. The punishment was, together we hand polished out that entire car to make the whole thing fresh. Actually looked pretty good upon completion, but lesson learned. A few lessons.

So, am not a chemical or optics engineer, and realize this didn’t bother your visor’s material itself, but i wonder if coatings will hold up to it?

Add:

Fwiw, have used dilute dawn as first step to clean horridly neglected lenses before, no problem that can tell or foresee. Just a little surfactant. Maybe a good question for cameralandny Doug?

I've only used it on my helmet face shield. I have optics defogging wipes provided to me via the U.S. Army. Perhaps I should not have posted the above without having confirmed elsewhere other than my helmet. I went back and changed my post so as to not lead someone astray with their high-dollar optics. If you go back and edit my quote from your post, we may avoid a problem CAUSED BY ME.

I use distilled water to flush off dust. Then dawn to wipe off finger prints, flushed with more distilled water. Finally I dry with a microfiber towel. Your money, your choice. I just spent less than $1.00

It must be remembered that scope lenses, being the most fragile objects in the universe, will be damaged by anything and everything. Just leaving them sitting in the open within the house will subject them to the relentless abrasion of air circulating around them.

I toilet paper wiped mine a couple times today during a snow storm...Didn't have a lens cloth, brush, distilled water, or professional cleaner....Should I send it back for new glass?????

Forgot to add it was unused TP.....

I certainly wouldn't attempt to shoot an animal with it.

Ahhh...To hell with it....if I get a chance I'm going to just that....Anyway, it was Charmin....

Thinking on it....I hunted in the rain the other day and now snow today....That acid rain that got on it most likely ruined it right off....in addition to voiding the warranty...Then again it started off looking really sharp.....

I start with a water rinse then a diluted Dawn and water mix in a spray bottle and hit it with a lens brush. Rinse again and dry with a lens cloth. Only do this when it really needs it.

I figured you were astute enough to use some Blue tape to cover those lens before the shot

The answer to most things on here is: WWJD. J=John=Mule Deer.

I do have a touch of OCD, but thankfully not so much that I’ve ever found it necessary to actually wash lenses on any of my scopes or binoculars.

Just giving the lens one or two ‘“breaths” and wiping with a lens cloth (or cotton t-shirt if I’m in the woods) has always worked for me. Then again the only scopes I own are $250.00 - $350.00 Leupolds.

Has no one else here bought a rifle with the past owner’s scope still on it, having stood upright in some smoke filled closet followed by long stint in the shop’s gunrack. Having a layer of fudge, sand, and smegma accumulated on the lens that dwarfs that of one’s truck dashboard?

Huh.

Aside: favorite firearm honey hole is a good sized place that is mostly estate items of antique vintage, and the proprietor leaves the past owner’s scopes in place, then prices the item indifferent to what the value of what the attached optic is. Just how he does it. Makes for an added twist in the buying adventure, and have accrued some nice glass over the years that way. Suffice to say, a lot of it was remarkably full of, not “puff, puff” a little dust, but frank sludge, at the start.