Bulletproof sunglasses?

Can they stop projectiles?

  • Stops .22lr

    Votes: 9 10.2%

  • Stops birdshot

    Votes: 50 56.8%

  • Stops nothing

    Votes: 32 36.4%
  • Total voters
    88
  • Poll closed .
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After having a friend get hit on his regular glasses and the bullet shattered the glass I switched to Polycargonites. Never a problem and they hold up very well. I don't want to be shot in the eye with anything but when you shoot at steel targets there are pieced of lead or jacket coming back at you.

Glasses are a must and Poly glasses are the best. Oakley makes the best lenses out there and have shot their lenses with bird shot. Destoyed the lens but the shot did not go through.
 
old lady new shooter said:
So if a person had overlenses made from polycarbonate the same thickness as the riot shields, how much vision impairment would that translate to?
Click to expand...
Most labs would not manufacture them, and most opticians wouldn't sell them. If extra thick polycarbonate lenses were that much better, I'd have made myself some. Adding thickness beyond the normal parameters (1.0-3.0mm) alters the perscrption, which must be adjusted for, plus it would increase the effects of chromatic abberation, the 'ghost image' sometimes seen next to text.

+1 on the Oakleys. Wiley X are excellent, also.
 
I've had lenses made,of polycarbonate and though it's impact resistant it scratches very easily. Years ago on a consumerism show called "Fight Back with David Horowitz" they tested a set of "bullet proff" shooting glasses. I don't remember the brand but they did not fair well after having been hit with a 12 GA birdshot round.
Haven't read all the post but Federal law requires eyeglass lenses survive the impact of a 3/4" steel ball from a height of 50".
 
AzShooter1 said:
After having a friend get hit on his regular glasses and the bullet shattered the glass I switched to Polycargonites. Never a problem and they hold up very well. I don't want to be shot in the eye with anything but when you shoot at steel targets there are pieced of lead or jacket coming back at you.

Glasses are a must and Poly glasses are the best. Oakley makes the best lenses out there and have shot their lenses with bird shot. Destoyed the lens but the shot did not go through.
Click to expand...
Good to know, I wear Oakley radarlock wrap around, great lens and I keep peripheral vision under the Arizona sun. :)
 
If I was getting shot in the face I dont think I am going to tell the someone to wait let me go get my glasses incase you want to shot me in the eyes lol
 
entropy said:
Most labs would not manufacture them, and most opticians wouldn't sell them. If extra thick polycarbonate lenses were that much better, I'd have made myself some. Adding thickness beyond the normal parameters (1.0-3.0mm) alters the perscrption, which must be adjusted for, plus it would increase the effects of chromatic abberation, the 'ghost image' sometimes seen next to text.

+1 on the Oakleys. Wiley X are excellent, also.
Click to expand...
Very interesting information, thanks. :)

I was thinking of OVERLENSES, i.e. the user would wear his or her regular glasses and the polycarbonate ones on top. Like a mini-shield. Would that still distort vision?
 
Are you asking about

A) individual polycarbonate lenses that clip on over your existing glasses

or

B) polycarbonate over the glasses safety glasses with the MIL standard rating?
 
Maybe 20 years ago (in the name of names of both science and Boredom) I salvaged a bunch of ANSI-spec safety glasses from work and shot them with everything I could find, including a crossbow pistol. I even made up a 10-lb "head" to put them on. I found that most standard velocity .22 LR wouldn't penetrate any of the lenses, but hyper velocity rounds generally would. Birdshot would be stopped, but anything on a real head that wasn't protected by the glasses would be a bleeding mess. Anything bigger than #1 buck was able to penetrate the lens and disjoint the frame. A few pointed .177 pellets at 1000-1100 fps came close to poking through, but not quite. A .54 round ball at 1250 fps destroyed the glasses and the "head." The crossbow pistol didn't quite do the job, but I had a tough time getting a square hit. My conpund bow pinned the glasses to the "head." Anything that would bust through the lenses would most likely result in the wearer being DRT, but I wouldn't like to take a temple shot with a .177 air rifle, to be honest.

Safety glasses- and I don't care if you grabbed them from the bin at work, or ordered then from Oakley- are great for deflecting casual, non-directed flying debris. If someone is capable of making head shots on you, you have bigger worries than whether your Wiley Xs will get scratched.
 
It'd almost certainly still kill you. The impact alone would drive it into your face hard enough to wreck your day. But at least you'd still be be a pretty corpse.

A better bet would be a paintball mask. Some of them are rated to stop a shotgun blast (particularly the older JT Spectra-style). They're the same lenses used in rally car goggles. And they'd offer far better full-face protection against birdshot.
 
Yes, eye protection is important... Not getting shot at all, probably even more important... The state of the art in eye protection continues to improve but it might be a good idea to remember that your entire facial area is vulnerable to anything from low velocity impact on up... to shot, bullet, or shrapnel.
Next thing, we'll be hearing about a "Moe Green" model of eyeglasses...
 
it's possible, i have a polycarbonate face shield that is iiia. i'd imagine two glasses sized pieces of that would stop iiia threats as well assuming it was sufficiently anchored to avoid pushing the material back far enough to hit your eyes.


http://kapexbodyarmor.com/ballistic-face-mask-level-iiia/

one of those with a couple pieces of the aforementioned inch thick polycarbonate adequately attached ought to do the trick.
 
I have been using Wiley X since early 2010 as shooting glasses and sports goggles for playing roller derby.

I have been hit in the face with elbows, fists, helmets and even a skate once. They have prevented many a black eye.
 
A friend of mine that owns his own small optical place offered to make me a set of RX glasses out of polycarbonate lenses. He told me as much as I shoot I might want to try them out because they would stop a 22 bullet. I kind of grinned in disbelief so I guess he took it as a challenge. He took an old lens he had laying around and placed it on a vise and hit it as hard as he could with a small ball peen hammer....scuffed it but it survived.
Now picture that on your face when getting hit with the same ball peen hammer.
Even if you had the lens placed in a perfect spot and the impact angle was perfect you are going to have some kind of trauma to your eye.
 
Folks,

The standards are for the lenses holding up and stopping penetration preventing damage to the eye under very specific conditions, not to stopping a bullet or other unscientific tests.

Right now the highest standard is the military standard followed by the Z87.1 standard. If a company is willing to say they exceed either then you want to see what their testing was.
 
I've got thick polycarbonate prescription shooting glasses. I figure they will be good for the likely issues I would face.
 
IIRC the brand of sunglasses was Oakley.
When hunting public dove fields, might be a good choice.
 
I have American Optical prescription safety glasses with tempered glass lenses. They are tempered and impact resistant. I feel quite safe as I pretty much wear them unless sleeping. If I get hit by a bullet in the eye I will be having bigger problems as another poster has already said. Shooting/reloading without some form of eye protection is just plain dumb IMHO, especially when you should already know the risks and choose to ignore it. If you CCW and have to use it then the eye and hearing protection are moot points though.
 
That is why I am happy with Z87+ rated glasses. Yeah some goggles may stop a .22LR but I'm not wearing a helmet and my head won't. The Z87+ rating will cover most anything I'm likely to encounter.

It is worth reinforcing that UV exposure (normal use) will degrade the impact rating of most eye protection. They do have a limited lifetime even if protected from scratches.
 
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