Anyone wear Photochromic glasses?

[MacJeepster]

I plan to get new bifocals soon and am toying with the idea of photochromic lenses.
It would be my sole pair of glasses.
Good idea?
If so, what brand is good? I like to clean them often and don't want to wear off the coating.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

-mj

[Fred_Also]

I wear them and am on my 2nd pair. I got them at WalMart - about $350 for bifocals. (Exam was extra) I like the way they change and I almost forget they are working till I take them off outdoors.

I let them get pretty dirty and wash them under the faucet and then use soap and a soft towel. My first pair lasted about a year and a half before the tint started turning along the bottom. It just got kind of cloudy looking.

I have a pair of non-prescription reading glasses that I use when I'm on the computer for a long time. The bifocals give me a pain in the neck from tilting my head back after a while.

Fred Also

[Lux Interior]

My only complaint is that they take a while to lighten after you come out of the sun. I often have to take them off if I walk into a dark place after being outside.

[Carm]

I've had them before lasik surgery. Working in a cold building would keep the the lenses dark for a longer period of time after entering. Also, most car windshields have a UV coating that prevents the lenses from getting dark. I would have to take them off and hold them up to the side window to get them to darken. I used to have two pairs of glasses. Regular clear prescription and prescription sunglasses.

Joe

[Robert M]

Mac,

I have them and they've fantastic. Never experienced any of the problems described by the other posters. Then again, not all glasses are created equal. I've heard similar complaints who bought their glasses from providers like Lenscrafters and other "quickiemart" type places. This is not to say the other members got their glasses from quickemart type providers. It's just a correlation I noticed when it comes to these type of glasses.

Robert

[OWC Jamie]

I had troubles with snow blinding when I used to ski and to a small extent out on the water , so I've worn the darker ones that don't quite clear completely and also the lighter ones that do clear.
Some lenses have the silver halide disperesd through the lens material.
Some get 'soaked' and it gets absorbed into the outer layer.
Some are coated.

Wouldn't surprise me if they've also figured out how to get it mixed in with the hard coat protection layer.

My last pair had the outer hard coat (scratch resistant coating) fail after a chem flash at a construction site. With the coating gone, the lens manufacturer name became visible across the lens. The tinting still worked, so it wasn't a film.

The photochromic gets darker in the Winter (my current ones are much noticebly darker) and can take quite a while to go clear when going back inside. They change happens quicker in the Summer and I'm convinced they don't get quite so dark when warm.

[Kate]

On a similar note, I get my eyeglasses online. I was REALLY skeptical as I wear progressive lenses, but I've purchased two pair and they're both perfect. I haven't gotten Photochromic, but they are available.

My last pair of domestic glasses (from Kaiser with my "member" discount) cost over $400. Online, I got a great pair of progressives for $56.00 delivered. Then I ordered sunglasses, and they were just as fine.

I wrote them up on my blog and have had responses from about a doxen people who have all also had positive results.

I'm sold.

Kate

[Lee3]

Kate - thanks for the heads up.
How's the view from Elephant Butt (I mean Butte)?

[MikeF]

I had them a while back and I concur with some of the other complaints -- take too long to readjust when you go inside and they don't darken enough in a car. I went with a set that has magnetic clip-on sunglasses -- got the darkest possible sunglasses...

[AlphaDog]

You also want to take into consideration how long it normally takes your eyes to adjust to changes in light. Mine happen to change rather slowly, so I often had to take off my glasses when going indoors, just so I could see where I was going while the lenses readjusted. My husband's eyes adapted to light changes much more quickly, and he didn't have any trouble with them at all.