Prescription Masks

[ruthpenaluna]

Hi,
I will soon be spending 6 months on a boat while I train to instructor level. My main concern is vision. I am shortsighted, and normally wear glasses rather than contacts. Went diving last year and lost a lense as soon as i got some water in my mask, which is a concern to me vision wise and cost wise as at that rate I will have to take endless supplies of lenses with me.
I have been toying with the idea of a prescription mask, but have been reading up on it, and from what I gather only a small part of the mask is made prescriptive. How much does this affect your dive? Anyone have any advice on the pro's and cons?
I need to move quickly on this as we leave in about 5 weeks, from the UK.
Thanks

 

[Quarrior]

First, I'm jealous of you that you get to spend 6 months on a boat diving.

Now, as for the prescription mask, I use the sea vision. In fact I have two of them, one with yellow lenses strictly for fresh water and quarry diving, the other has the snap on color covers that are for different water types.

Anyway, the whole lens is prescription, not just a small part of it. Mine are bi-focal.

Here's a link that may be helpful. http://www.seavisionusa.com/lenses.asp One thing though, whichever mask you get, go with the black skirted mask. For some strange reason it seals better.

 

[spectrum]

There are 2 options in prescription masks.

Some masks have stock single focal lenses available. Some dive shops keep an assortment in stock and they just swap them into the mask to suit the wearers needs.

The other avenue is overlays. In this method a stock mask (almost any mask of your liking) is sent an optical house and they prepare prescription overlays that are then bondied to the inside of your mask. They cover nearly the entire inside area of the lense. I have this sort of correction and I can't even see the lense edges when I'm wearing it. My prescription is bi-focal and it works out great. This can be done to a new or old mask. I chose to buy a brand new but identical mask for the investment. The optical work was $160. (2005/US$) and that included shipping from and back to the LDS. Turnaround was less than 2 weeks. I found this to be an excellent solution. In my case I needed the near correction to see my instruments. My far vision was OK but with full correction my eyes feel much better when I get out of the water.

There are also a number of direct to use mailorder providers where you just send a mask and script.

Pete

 

[herman]

Welcome to the board.

I use a mask similar to Pete and did the same thing, new mask exactly like my old mask with my bifocal prescription put in. If you are going to be diving every day and must have your mask I would suggest you get 2, just in case of a problem. Here is a link to a company I have used with good success and they have a quick turnaround time. They will use your mask or sell you one.
http://www.prescriptiondivemasks.com/

 

[SubMariner]

Hi,
I will soon be spending 6 months on a boat while I train to instructor level. My main concern is vision. I am shortsighted, and normally wear glasses rather than contacts. Went diving last year and lost a lense as soon as i got some water in my mask, which is a concern to me vision wise and cost wise as at that rate I will have to take endless supplies of lenses with me.
I have been toying with the idea of a prescription mask, but have been reading up on it, and from what I gather only a small part of the mask is made prescriptive. How much does this affect your dive? Anyone have any advice on the pro's and cons?
I need to move quickly on this as we leave in about 5 weeks, from the UK.
Thanks

Seavision will grind the lenses to fit a mask just like you'd get lenses to fit frames of a pair of glasses: the WHOLE lens is prescription, not just a portion of it. Also, they do bifocal lenses.

I understand they'll do masks that are not their own, but the best bet is to use one of theirs; there's a wide range of styles & colours to choose from.

Bonne chance,

 

[Andrew Richardson]

I have a Tusa Liberator with stock prescription lens. I am not thrilled because the lens jump in 1/2 diopter increments. Fine underwater but above one eye is out of focus. (-3/-3.25). I am considering getting either a ground mask from Prescriptiondivemask or the Hydoptix mask. The latter sounds too gimicky though.

 

[tridacna]

Call Linda at www.prescriptiondivemasks.com. She will custom-grind lenses for your mask. Forget the stock garbage. This is WAY better . They do an UNBELIEVABLE job. I have four masks that they did for me. Their service is incredible and quality superb.

 

[mccabe]

Some opticians provide a prescriptive dive mask, D&A for example. Extremely good quality lenses in a relatively decent mask.

 

[7millimeter]

I have overlays in my ScubaPro mask and I'm very happy with this situation. It requires no extra fuss or consideration. I see well and I don't think about vision at all during the dive.

This morning I read the short article on vision correction in the current Sport Diver. I thought that they downplayed the prescription mask in favor of contacts or surgery. As I recall (I don't have it in front of me now), the negative factor cited for the prescription mask was that the author found it necessary to wear his mask pre and post dive in order to see. Why not wear your glasses, take them off at the last minute and put them back on at the first opportunity? How difficult is that? Even the most crowded six pack boat won't begrudge you a pair of eyeglasses as part of your onboard stuff!

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Have heard the same from others regarding having to wear the mask in and out of the water.:06: Big Deal! I have a hard case for my mask and right before I go in my glasses go in it and come out right after. For boat diving I have a spare pair of glasses with the clip on sunglasses. I take these if I'm worried about losing my new ones. Heck I even have a pair of my old prescription safety glasses from work that if I wanted to be a dork about it I could put them in my bc pocket, slip my mask onto my forehead :14: , and just put em on in the water.