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I received a PM from a fellow LPM member who had purchased some of these goggles on Amazon...
Amazon.com: Bynovel Laser Eye Protection Safety Glasses Goggles Goggle Glass Shield for Green Blue Laser Pointer: Home Improvement
The member asked me to test a pair to see if they would be ok for his 50mW green laser pointer. The goggles arrived in the mail today and I ran a couple of tests. Unfortunately, I fried my high power 405nm laser by putting the batteries in the laser incorrectly, so I was unable to effectively test that wavelength.
I was able to test 445-450 and 532.
For those of you who have been following the "cheap safety goggles" threads here on LPF, you may know that I have a bunch of Honeywell/UVEX SCT-Orange goggles that I have tested and found them to be very good for my needs in supplying eye protection for up to 1.5 watts of 445nm laser light.
http://laserpointerforums.com/f44/cheap-safety-glasses-tested-71621.html
Immediately upon opening the Bynovel laser safety glasses I noticed a couple of things.
First, these are RED, not Orange as I am accustomed to using.
Second, they appear much thinner and more cheaply made than the UVEX goggles that I have been using.
I found this surprising since these are being sold as laser protection goggles.
Next, I got out my Laser Bee A laser power meter and zeroed it in, and fired up my RPL-165 Optotronics 532nm green laser and tested it. I actually got a peak of 200mW (a personal best) but snapped this shot at 196mW.
RPL-165 by tsteele93, on Flickr
Then, I put the Bynovel laser safety goggles down and after the Laser Bee A had cooled back down to zero, I tested again.
Bynovel Laser Safety Goggles by tsteele93, on Flickr
They let 4 mW through the glasses, and this may be infra-red. I'm not sure. Either way, not a bad result for a green laser at 200mW.
BUT there WAS a problem. I had noticed a huge amount of glare through my UVEX safety glasses when I was doing the test. This was because my RPL-165 laser was etching the glasses and smoking the plastic during the test.
This did NOT happen when I tested the UVEX glasses earlier.
I don't have an easy way to mark the picture as I am posting this from my iPad, but if you look at the lens, you will see what looks kind of like a backslash made from white dots. That is the etching/melting that was taking place.
Damage by tsteele93, on Flickr
Next I tested my Survival Laser 1.25 watt LPF bundle laser.
Survival Lasers 445nm 1.25 watt laser by tsteele93, on Flickr
A bit overspec with the added 405G1 lens.
Then I tested with the Bynovel laser safety glasses. I knew to be careful from the previous test, so I defocused the Survival Laser quite a bit.
Glasses on fire! by tsteele93, on Flickr
In spite of my attempts to defocus the lens, I immediately noticed smoke, so I shut it off and defocused more. I also re-zeroed the LPM at this point as it has drifted slightly.
Zero mW but the glasses are melting by tsteele93, on Flickr
As you can see, the goggles are stoping nearly 1.4 watts of 445 nm laser light, but they are also starting to fail catastrophically.
Here is a picture of some of the damage done. The bottom marks are from the first two green and blue tests, and the larger wavy damage up higher on the lens is from the following blue test with the goggles defocused - they were melting even with the lens very defocused. I did not test with a precise beam because I did not want to set off the smoke alarms in my house.
More Damage by tsteele93, on Flickr
I suspect that I can burn a hole right through these in short order with a focused beam. The UVEX goggles will fail with extended exposure to a 1.3+ watt focused beam, but I believe it will take them MUCH longer to fail than these thin Bynovel laser glasses.
I will test for failure time with both goggles another day when I can do it in the workshop.
Finally, I did a longer blue test with my RHD single mode 450nm blue laser rated at 150mW. I have since added one of Jayrob's G1 lenses to this build and am getting 200 mW from this laser.
RHD single mode 150mW 450nm blue by tsteele93, on Flickr
I did this so I could do a longer test without burning through the goggles the way the 1.4 watt Survival laser does.
200mW of 450nm blue by tsteele93, on Flickr
Again, the Bynovel laser safety goggles stop the blue light from getting through. But even at 200mW there was some damage and light smoking from the glasses.
In summary, these glasses cost about the same as the UVEX goggles. The UVEX goggles are thicker, better made and do not begin to smoke and catch on fire at ALL in the 200mW range, and only begin to show some waviness in the plastic at levels above 1.2 watts.
There really is no contest, of you are looking for a CHEAP set of goggles, the UVEX goggles are a much better choice than the Bynovel "laser safety" goggles.
I personally would not recommend the Bynovel goggles at all. *However, for the member that asked me to test them who has a 50mW green laser, I believe that they will be sufficient.*
One thing I would caution is that without testing your green laser for infra red, there is no way of knowing if the laser is putting out significant quantities of ir. these glasses are very unlikely to block ANY infra-red and that could potentially be dangerous.
Amazon.com: Bynovel Laser Eye Protection Safety Glasses Goggles Goggle Glass Shield for Green Blue Laser Pointer: Home Improvement
The member asked me to test a pair to see if they would be ok for his 50mW green laser pointer. The goggles arrived in the mail today and I ran a couple of tests. Unfortunately, I fried my high power 405nm laser by putting the batteries in the laser incorrectly, so I was unable to effectively test that wavelength.
I was able to test 445-450 and 532.
For those of you who have been following the "cheap safety goggles" threads here on LPF, you may know that I have a bunch of Honeywell/UVEX SCT-Orange goggles that I have tested and found them to be very good for my needs in supplying eye protection for up to 1.5 watts of 445nm laser light.
http://laserpointerforums.com/f44/cheap-safety-glasses-tested-71621.html
Immediately upon opening the Bynovel laser safety glasses I noticed a couple of things.
First, these are RED, not Orange as I am accustomed to using.
Second, they appear much thinner and more cheaply made than the UVEX goggles that I have been using.
I found this surprising since these are being sold as laser protection goggles.
Next, I got out my Laser Bee A laser power meter and zeroed it in, and fired up my RPL-165 Optotronics 532nm green laser and tested it. I actually got a peak of 200mW (a personal best) but snapped this shot at 196mW.
RPL-165 by tsteele93, on Flickr
Then, I put the Bynovel laser safety goggles down and after the Laser Bee A had cooled back down to zero, I tested again.
Bynovel Laser Safety Goggles by tsteele93, on Flickr
They let 4 mW through the glasses, and this may be infra-red. I'm not sure. Either way, not a bad result for a green laser at 200mW.
BUT there WAS a problem. I had noticed a huge amount of glare through my UVEX safety glasses when I was doing the test. This was because my RPL-165 laser was etching the glasses and smoking the plastic during the test.
This did NOT happen when I tested the UVEX glasses earlier.
I don't have an easy way to mark the picture as I am posting this from my iPad, but if you look at the lens, you will see what looks kind of like a backslash made from white dots. That is the etching/melting that was taking place.
Damage by tsteele93, on Flickr
Next I tested my Survival Laser 1.25 watt LPF bundle laser.
Survival Lasers 445nm 1.25 watt laser by tsteele93, on Flickr
A bit overspec with the added 405G1 lens.
Then I tested with the Bynovel laser safety glasses. I knew to be careful from the previous test, so I defocused the Survival Laser quite a bit.
Glasses on fire! by tsteele93, on Flickr
In spite of my attempts to defocus the lens, I immediately noticed smoke, so I shut it off and defocused more. I also re-zeroed the LPM at this point as it has drifted slightly.
Zero mW but the glasses are melting by tsteele93, on Flickr
As you can see, the goggles are stoping nearly 1.4 watts of 445 nm laser light, but they are also starting to fail catastrophically.
Here is a picture of some of the damage done. The bottom marks are from the first two green and blue tests, and the larger wavy damage up higher on the lens is from the following blue test with the goggles defocused - they were melting even with the lens very defocused. I did not test with a precise beam because I did not want to set off the smoke alarms in my house.
More Damage by tsteele93, on Flickr
I suspect that I can burn a hole right through these in short order with a focused beam. The UVEX goggles will fail with extended exposure to a 1.3+ watt focused beam, but I believe it will take them MUCH longer to fail than these thin Bynovel laser glasses.
I will test for failure time with both goggles another day when I can do it in the workshop.
Finally, I did a longer blue test with my RHD single mode 450nm blue laser rated at 150mW. I have since added one of Jayrob's G1 lenses to this build and am getting 200 mW from this laser.
RHD single mode 150mW 450nm blue by tsteele93, on Flickr
I did this so I could do a longer test without burning through the goggles the way the 1.4 watt Survival laser does.
200mW of 450nm blue by tsteele93, on Flickr
Again, the Bynovel laser safety goggles stop the blue light from getting through. But even at 200mW there was some damage and light smoking from the glasses.
In summary, these glasses cost about the same as the UVEX goggles. The UVEX goggles are thicker, better made and do not begin to smoke and catch on fire at ALL in the 200mW range, and only begin to show some waviness in the plastic at levels above 1.2 watts.
There really is no contest, of you are looking for a CHEAP set of goggles, the UVEX goggles are a much better choice than the Bynovel "laser safety" goggles.
I personally would not recommend the Bynovel goggles at all. *However, for the member that asked me to test them who has a 50mW green laser, I believe that they will be sufficient.*
One thing I would caution is that without testing your green laser for infra red, there is no way of knowing if the laser is putting out significant quantities of ir. these glasses are very unlikely to block ANY infra-red and that could potentially be dangerous.
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