While many types of safety gear use plastic for critical components, this is not true of welding glasses, goggles, and hoods. That’s because welding produces hot sparks that would create melt marks in plastic lenses and render them unusable. In fact, if something hot enough hits a plastic lens, it’ll melt all the way through. Therefore, glass is the preferred lens material in this field of work.The biggest functional downside to glass is that it is breakable. This causes an ongoing need for high-quality replacement glass welding lenses. The upside is that it also gives you a chance to upgrade your lenses instead of just getting direct replacements. When you choose our lenses, you can expect higher visual clarity and better overall quality. You also gain color options that may not be readily available at other outlets. Here’s some information about the most popular choices:

Gold-Coated Lenses

These allow excellent visual acuity thanks to their gold color. It doesn’t distort the overall color of the view as much as standard colors like green and blue, yet protect your eyes well. One of the reviews on our site notes the massive difference between standard-issue green goggles and a hood that uses these lenses, with the reviewer stating that he’d never go back to the typical kind.

Green Lenses

This color is the most well-associated with welding. We offer these lenses in large and small rectangular and circular pieces. Take note that we can also do other shapes and sizes if you contact us directly, so you’re still in luck if your eyewear doesn’t match our pre-made choices.We also offer two types of green lenses: Athermal and AlloWeld. AlloWeld lenses are used when welding aluminum, stainless steel, and cast iron. They’re also good for brazing aluminum. Rare earth elements in their coatings provide excellent clarity for determining the temperature and puddling of welds. AlloWeld also makes lenses with gold coatings.Athermal lenses are basic green welding lenses. Like our other lenses, they are available in a wide range of opacities so you can match them to your specific needs.

Super Blue Drop-In Lenses

Green lenses block the IR and UV light produced by welding, but don’t stop all visible light. In fact, with some projects, enough visible light gets through them to be painful. The yellow light from welding flare also interferes with your view of your work.This is where blue lenses come in. They’re made to be combined with green-lens eyewear to give you protection against all of the light spectrums involved in welding. Importantly, you must still use your green lenses along with them! Otherwise, UV and IR light will get through and damage your eyes.Our blue drop-in lenses are made with polycarbonate instead of glass, and this means that they’ll get pitted if they contact spatter. Therefore, they’re made to be dropped in behind your standard green glass lenses. This protects the blue lenses – and your eyes – from danger.Super Magenta Drop-In LensesThese lenses do the same sort of work as our blue ones but are even better at stopping the yellow end of the visible light spectrum. If you need to increase your control of visible flare, these are the lenses to get. Like our blue ones, they work with your standard green shades – never alone.

Clear Glass Cover Plates

If you have polycarbonate or other plastic welding lenses, you’ll need to protect them from pitting by putting glass in front of them. If you don’t want to put them behind green glass, the easiest solution is to just get some clear glass cover plates to go in front of them. These have no tint of their own, so they must be used with shaded lenses.

Plastic Welding Magnifiers

Have you ever worked on a project where one of the most difficult things was simply seeing a small piece you were working on? Add these clear plastic welding magnifiers to your stack of shaded lenses to make things big enough to see clearly. The rectangular style works great with standard welding hoods. Install them behind glass to keep them clear and free of pits.This overview of options for welding eyewear should help you find the perfect solutions for your needs. Whether you just need new green shades to replace your old ones, want to upgrade with gold lenses, or need to add extra protection against visible light, we’ve got you covered.

About Phillips Safety

Phillips Safety has been in the eyewear business for over 100 years, with the last several having a focus on safety equipment in particular. You can rest assured that when you order from us, you’ll be getting high-quality welding lenses and other equipment. We also offer extra options like gold, blue, and magenta lenses that aren’t available just anywhere.If you have a need for a type of lens that isn’t on our site, don’t worry. We make custom lenses in a wide variety of shapes, colors, and opacities to meet your every need.We’re also glad to help you if you aren’t sure exactly what type of lens your application requires. We know about the specifications for the various types of welding, specific wavelength-blocking requirements for other applications, and more. This makes it easy for you to get the perfect eye protection for your job. Just contact us to discuss your requirements, any needed custom options, or to ask questions. We’re always happy to help.