Ernie Leimkuhler wrote:

In article rs.com,
Jon Elson wrote:



Hello, all,

I got an autodarkening welding hood on eBay when I got my TIG welder
(Lincoln Square Wave TIG 300) and am still learning my way around the
process.

This is a cheapie Chinese autodark hood with a very green filter.
I went down to Cee-Kay for more Argon and looked at the hoods
they recommend for TIG. Gasp, $450 is a BIT high for my budget.

But, I noticed the filters were much closer to neutral density, and
I could see the red on a US flag with them. With my hood (I took it
with me) the red in the flag was TOTALLY black.

I took the autodark filter module apart and there is a dichroic filter
that looks very reddish-purple in reflection, and very green in
transmission. (It has a piece of clear glass next to it that I'm
assuming is an IR or UV blocking filter.) SO, the question is, can
I swap out this green filter for something closer to neutral density
in color? The LCD unit seems to be a pretty good ND (colorless)
filter by itself.




DO NOT DO THIS.
That lens may suck, but it can't be harmful or they couldn't sell it in
the US.


I have absolutely no intention of just taking the filter OUT, or putting
some random
piece of material in there. I was wondering if there were filters of
this type
available in different color shades, etc. The auto-dark component of
the filter
seems to work fine, and is a pretty neutral color. I just want to get a
more
neutral color to the safety lens, and it seems that $450 is a bit high
just to get
this one piece replaced. I know you can get standard welding filters in a
variety of shades to fit welding hoods of the non-automatic type. Or,
at least,
you USED to be able to buy them.

Jon