Thread: headband magnifier - which is best

Originally Posted by IanW

..... I also recommend Optivisor, for two reasons, one being the optics are about as good as you'll get in something like this, the other is that you can order it with a lens that suits your eyesight a bit more (check out the prices, they vary a lot, depending on who's selling them!)..........

Agree with Ian and Heavensabove.

I got an Optivisor on the recommendation of a friend, a manufacturing jeweller who wears one for several hours a day. Good recommendation!

At first I got the 3.5X lens and this was overkill and a failure. Great magnification but every tiny movement of my head was magnified, and I felt like I was getting travel sickness. About 1.75 or 2.5X magnification seems best, in my opinion. I now use the 1.75X and it works well.

Like Ian I wear it over multifocus spectacles.

My source was :
http://jewellerssupplies.com.au/head...5x-p-1306.html


Fair Winds

Graeme

I agree with the poster whose optician made them up a set of glasses for woodwork.
I wear progressive lens glasses for my normal day but a few years ago, my optometrist suggested that he make up a set of single focus lens glasses for woodworking that were half-way between reading glasses and medium focus (1 metre) glasses. He put them into an old set of spectacle frames that I had spare to save money.
With advancing age, it got to where these glasses were no good for closeup work.

So I went and bought some clip-on flipup/down magnifying lenses from the optometrist to clip onto the front of the woodworking glasses.
Combined with good workshop lighting, including 2 quality swivel lamps for focusing light, the combo of woodworking glasses + clipon magnifiers have worked out well. They are light to wear and I can easily flip from closeup to normal focus.

The other benefit is for maintenance work around the house as its like wearing a standard set of glasses.
Paul

That's a good solution, Paul, seems like a less bulky arrangement. How does the cost compare with an Optivisor (which isn't cheap, with local retailers asking close to $150 for the stronger models)? And rather than take a guess at what lens you need, the optometrist could help you choose the best lens for what you need. If you already wear specs, it's a good idea to be able to use them & add extra magnification so that your specs can keep doing whatever corrective work they are doing for you. However, the more bits of glass/plastic, the more surfaces there are to collect dust & scratches..

As always, there are no perfect solutions to declining senses. I was recently lamenting with an old friend over our lost visual acuity. We used to have no problem working on wiring up behind a car dash, in dim light, in positions that would tax a contortionist. These days, a headband would get in the way, so it would be very hard to see what I was doing, but worse, if I tried to force my body into the positions it once managed with ease, I'd need help to get out, & several days to straighten up again! As he likes to say, youth is wasted on the young.....

Cheers,

Yes. My vision in dim light is far and away worse than it was even 20 years ago.

Fortunately, there are LED lights. Several 8W or 12W, focussed on the project, is a relief.
I confess that I have 2 x 45W LED lamps with 44 devices in each one.
I have considered a headband magnifier for some wood carving details, sharpening inspection and so forth.
Light intensity was much of the puzzle. Good to address that issue as well.

I have a "cheap" headband magnifier. It does not even have a brand marked on it, but it is not bad.

I had bought a couple of cheap eyeglasses type magnifiers on ebay prior to buying this device and both were so bad I contacted the sellers and got a refund without even returning the items. this means they knew their $12 glasses were trash but were selling them in the hope that most people would not complain as they were so cheap, so I had a poor opinion of the cheap optics scene.

One day I was attending a quilting show with Jools and there was someone selling magnifying headbands. They were cheap. I had seen them but decided not to look closer as they were probably bad quality. Jools pointed them out to me, saying that I had been looking for something like that. I told her that they would not be good enough. The lady running the store then offered to let me try one on and see.

I tried one on, handed it back and said no thanks. She said that they were of variable quality and said to try a few and see if I found one I liked. Well number five was not too bad so I bought it for $19.95.

It's not something a surgeon or a jeweler would wear but as a cheap solution for occasional use I am happy with it.

I would imagine that a lot of these would be sold at quilting shows and the poor quality of most would not be discovered until too late to go back and swap them.

Cheers

Doug

I was at the docs getting a flu shot yesterday and while waiting for my shot in the nurses area I found I could read the lowest row on the eye chart from the back of the room ~6m away. I haven't bee able to do that for about 50 years. At the other end of the scale I find it's slowly getting worse and realise I need new glasses.

Originally Posted by paul.cleary

..... my optometrist suggested that he make up a set of single focus lens glasses for woodworking that were half-way between reading glasses and medium focus (1 metre) glasses. He put them into an old set of spectacle frames that I had spare.....

Hi Paul

Even without the clip-on magifiers, this seems like a great idea, but a couple of questions:

• Why did your optometrist recommend the single "half-way" focal length, rather than your usual multifocals? Was it purely a cost issue?
• Did you consider armoured lenses, so that you would then have safety glasses?

I routinely wear multifocals, and if I wear safety glasses over them I frequently have issues with fogging.


Fair Winds

Graeme

One of the world's biggest optical houses is B&H in New York. I searched for "headband magnifier"and got 2 hits.
The first has several different mags supplied for $27+ USD.

I've bought some big glass from them in the past. Good people.

Hi,
to answer the questions addressed to me that I have seen so far:
I don't know why the optician recommended single-focus lens but it seemed to work. He had done this for his dad who also did woodwork, so I guess he was working from what his dad reported back to him about the effectiveness. For me it worked quite well for about 5 years for nearly all work at 1/2 arms length, and then for closeup work I started having problems.

The clipon eyeglass magnifiers cost about $35 NZ = $30 AUS. I bought them from an optician as I figured they would have good quality lenses with no distortion and this proved to be true. I could trial out the various strengths using the optician's eye chart and other visual charts so I got the most suitable and comfortable strength (1.5).

I use the clipon eyeglass magnifiers attached to my single focus woodworking spectacles and together they cover most of my needs when woodworking. For general work like assembly of larger things like fence frames, I go back to the progressive spectacles as I am moving around a lot, going close and then far quickly, and needing to standback and check for straightness & squareness.

I didn't worry about hardened safety lenses as I mainly use handtools and don't have high speed grinders and similar machines.

It took a lot of shopping until I found these as when I said "clip on flip up/down eyeglass magnifiers I got offered lots of different types - I have attached an image to show an example of my clip-on flipup/down eyeglass magnifiers. They don't steamup like my Jaycar magnifier does.

As an aside, I work in the computer industry on screens all day, and my life saviour has been a set of bifocal computer glasses where the bottom 1/4 is reading glasses and the top 3/4 are optimised for reading screens 800mm away. I got SpecSavers to make these up from my progressive prescription and they thought the proportions were very non-standard but they took my $ and did as I asked.

Hi Everyone,
Yes I have 2 pair, & both the same make?
Steel 1/2in. headband & flop up or down Lenses.
Paid $4 for each at our Sunday Market a few years ago now. You can be lucky.
Years ago I has glass glasses coke bottle thickness, but at least I could see.
2014 had both Cataracts done, wonderful. My eyesight is even better now.
I use my Magnifiers mainly when Sharpening my Band Saw Blade, on my Saw.
Yes, I have 2 Incandescent Lights 1 on either side of the blade. Works for me

Thanks for your well considered response, Paul.

Graeme

Originally Posted by GraemeCook

Why did your optometrist recommend the single "half-way" focal length, rather than your usual multifocals? Was it purely a cost issue?

Obviously I can't speak for Paul or his optometrist, but my personal experience with multifocals is pushing me in that same direction. They're great for everyday use, and mean that I can go about my daily business without needing a couple of pairs of glasses, but when it come to close up work, you need to get your head in exactly the right position to be able to get the area of the lense which is focussed covering what you're looking at, and sometimes this isn't practical. I think I'd be happier with a pair of single focus with a distance so that the entire field of vision is in focus at the same time.

After considering all the advice I got here, I ordered on Amazon a skyzonal headband magnifier and a Quaser Led light for Optivisor. I ordered on the 8th May and it arrived on the 18th.
It comes with 4 different glass lenses, each with its own focal length, pretty much like the other optivisor system as far as I can see. The Led lights fit quite nicely. I still need to get used to using it before making any comments.

Thanks, Colin

That is exactly what prompted my post. I was aware that my multifocals were not ideal for some close up work - have to get my head in some weird positions so that I am looking through the right part of the lens for it to focus properly. Never suspected that the solution might be single focus lenses until Paul's post. Now I just have to consider the ideal focal length for the way I work.

Thanks again


Graeme