Pressure testing of ophthalmic safety lenses: the effects on different materials

The procedure of applying pressure to a lens until fracture occurs and the use of the fracture pressure as a measure of lens strength has been proposed as a quantitative alternative to the drop ball test. The fracture pressure or pressure resistance of untempered, thermally tempered, and chemically tempered glass lenses and CR39 lenses were compared. The results for the glass lenses were consistent with workplace experience and previous studies using the drop ball test. The results for glass and CR39 lenses showed the reverse to what was expected. In order to investigate the basis of this difference, a second procedure was followed in which the annulus supporting the lens and the steel ball applying the pressure to the lens were systematically changed. Glass lenses showed a highly statistically significant change in fracture pressure with decreasing ball size and a small but statistically significant change with annulus size. CR39 lenses showed no statistically significant change in fracture pressure with changing ball size but a highly statistically significant increase in fracture pressure with increasing annulus size. The mechanism of fracture is known to differ in the glass and plastics materials and it is concluded that this method should not be used to compare the performance of different materials.