I scratched the window with WHAT?!

[jzmtl]

So I finally bit the bullet and bought an apex and had it open within the hour for u2svoh transplant. There were some dirty stuff on inside of the plastic window, so I grabbed a cotton swab, dipped some ethanol and wiped it down. After dried, the window is full of tiny scratch marks! :sick2:

I know plastic is soft, but scratched by COTTON SWAB? You gotta be friggin kidding me... I've wiped plastic window for my maglite, novatac etc. there was never this problem. Come on Princeton Tec, what kind of crappy plastic do you use? Get some better stuff that doesn't crack/scratch will ya?

 

[hopkins]

sorry about the scratches. Maybe use some of the stuff for fixing scratches on CD's?

Got to wonder if the APEX window plastic was chosen because it has outstanding optical qualities or an outstanding low price?

I can tell a difference in the windows of my various lights when tapped with a fingernail. Some sound/feel much more solid than others, although all are plastic.

 

[jzmtl]

I think I'll leave it alone now, it's not bad enough to affect anything, just annoying to know my 5 hours old apex is all scratched up.

U2SVOH works great with the stock optic, decently balance between flood/throw and great color. 5mm LEDs are very blue thou, feels worse than nichia GS. I'll have to see if I can get my hands on some nichia DS for more transplants.

I feel if this headlight is made of better material like FRN, and quality polycarbonate window like those in novatac, it'll be the best on the market.

 

[Illum]

try toothpaste, no I'm not crazy, yes you simply rub it in and the silica from diatom skeletons will close small scratches, no it won't work for those big scratches, yes which flavor does not matter, no your not going to need the whole tube, and yes it works great fixing glasses:thumbsup:

 

[Woods Walker]

I have tiny scratch marks on my Apex window. But they don't seem to affect the beam so I pay them no mind. I did read in a backpacker mag of someone that polished the window on an PT Aurora headlamp with toothpaste. There is no bezel and the window get scraped up kinda fast in field use like bushwacking etc. But don't do this based on the report as I have no clue what will happen. I don't know if the ethanol worked against you. Often all I do is use my gloves to clear off snow or mud. Some very small scratch marks but again this does not bother me with a headlamp. I would not worry about it. But that is just me and often gear that is brand new gets looked over more than stuff that has been used for years.

 

[1dash1]

Ditto. :mecry:

Scratched my M20 lens with a cotton swab. (Cleaned an oil smudge off, but left a whole bunch of microscratches.)

I was lucky. BatteryJunction sent me a free replacement lens.

 

[Illum]

considering that the average bag of "cotton" you buy in any store now a days have no biodegradability even in water and don't burn very well leads me to think they are a synthetic lining of some sort that may be abrasive down in the microscopic level:green:

 

[IsaacHayes]

Cotton balls are not clean soft cotton. Many have wood pulp and impurities. A soft cotton t-shirt would be softer.

 

[DocD]

I think the ethanol has damage the surface causing tiny little scratches does it look like a crazy effect a random pattern? watch makers milk will buff out somebut not all of them :shakehead
can you post a pic?
DocD

 

[Lynx_Arc]

I use 3M microfiber cloths for cleaning glasses on all plastics including DVD movies it has pockets that will capture specks instead of dragging them across the surface.

 

[hopkins]

The 4 5mm leds on the Apex with the blue tint. Has anyone tried coating them with some transparent red felt pen ink to adjust the color.?

 

[JohnR66]

Don't use alcohol on plastics as it can cause crazing (micro cracks) on the surface. As stated you can polish with toothpaste or car wax, but if crazed, it won't polish out.

 

[Woods Walker]

The 4 5mm leds on the Apex with the blue tint. Has anyone tried coating them with some transparent red felt pen ink to adjust the color.?

I would leave them alone. Sure they are a bit on the blue side and for the whitewall hunters there are a few artifacts (maybe from the plastic cover) however I just roll with it.

 

[uk_caver]

U2SVOH works great with the stock optic, decently balance between flood/throw and great color. 5mm LEDs are very blue thou, feels worse than nichia GS. I'll have to see if I can get my hands on some nichia DS for more transplants.

Wouldn't most 5mms look blue compared to an SVO Seoul?

 

[jzmtl]

Wouldn't most 5mms look blue compared to an SVO Seoul?

I was comparing them with other 5mm lights. Maybe now I'm used to it, they look more on part with nichia DS.

 

[NigelBond]

I once buffed scratches out of a cell phone screen with jewlers rouge buffing compound and finished with brasso brass polish. I think the brasso alone would work very well in your case. Search around on google and you'll find others have used it for this kind of thing. You can get brasso at walmart or a grocery store with the cleaning products.

 

[uk_caver]

I did almost wreck a [very] cheap MP3 player by leaving it in my car in an open-fronted dashboard pocket next to a fairly exhausted car air freshener (one of the tree-shaped cardboard things).

I don't think there was any physical contact, but whatever solvent the freshener used 'developed' a huge number of fine latent scratches on the MP3 case, making the display completely unreadable.

Since the front of the MP3 was a flat surface, and I wasn't bothered about cosmetics, it was actually fairly easy to fix by a quick-and-dirty method, once I'd done a trial run on part of the case to check the method worked.
All I had to do was cut a piece of clear plastic (the kind of stuff that makes the welded-shut packaging for many small electrical goods), and glue it down over the display area with some superglue - the glue filled in the fine cracks and made them invisible, and the plastic sheet on top gave a durable finish, leaving the display readable again.

 

[NoFair]

So I finally bit the bullet and bought an apex and had it open within the hour for u2svoh transplant. There were some dirty stuff on inside of the plastic window, so I grabbed a cotton swab, dipped some ethanol and wiped it down. After dried, the window is full of tiny scratch marks! :sick2:

I know plastic is soft, but scratched by COTTON SWAB? You gotta be friggin kidding me... I've wiped plastic window for my maglite, novatac etc. there was never this problem. Come on Princeton Tec, what kind of crappy plastic do you use? Get some better stuff that doesn't crack/scratch will ya?

If there is hard dirt (sand etc.) on the lens you are actually sanding it even though the cotton swab is clean..

The small scratches are almost purely cosmetic and won't affect the beam in a noticeable way.

I think both my Apex lights have held up ok. Don't wipe them much though
I have rinsed them under running water and wiped them with a towel when they have gotten really dirty

Sverre