Is it OK to clean lenses with isopropanol?

[g4lab]

If you have to resort to mechanical abrasion of course the coating will be gone. However it still might be worth doing. I would leave the Moto Tool alone and just use your hands (unless the glass is so deeply etched it would take forever. Then you are regrinding the lens figure and need to make a tool out of pitch or hard wax to hold the abrasive and the curvature)
I would recommend Cerium Oxide polish for that purpose.
If I were doing the job I would probably apply it to a finger tip.

[descall]

Many, many thanks for all of your responses. I shall never clean a lens again with mindless neglect to the chemistry at hand! Best wishes, Des

[lothman]

A while ago Olympus reccomended using a (VERY FLAMMABLE) 1:1 mixture of Diethyl ether and absolute ethanol. I believe that they added the ether just to make the mixture evaporate faster.

An Olympus technican told me that the ether solves grease and dirt and the alcohol keeps it in solution in order to be wiped off. Works fine but might also solve plastic and could result in glossy spots an matte plastic surfaces what got in contact with ether.

[macrochemistry]

Longer chain alcohols have a higher tendency to solve most plastics due their lower polarity.
So methanol should be the best choice, if available.
The difference between ethanol and ipa is insignificant.

Don't use acetone on "plastic-lenses"!!!

Diethylether is a very good solvent for cleaning, but very hard to get and expensive.
I think the reason to use a mixture of ether and alcohol is that the pure ether everporates to fast.

[Peter De Smidt]

In my experience, many people clean lenses way more than is needed. When you do clean, make sure you get all of the particles off of a lens first. Dragging those across the surface can easily scratch the lens even if you are using a "soft" cloth. I either blow of the lens first, or I use a Dslr cleaning brush to lift particles off. I then clean with ROR if needed. Microfiber cloths do a great job, but they have to be clean! Whenever you wipe a lens, use a rolling motion so that a new part of the wipe is constantly being brought in contact with the glass. In other words, don't drag one part of the cloth against the glass, since if a particle gets stuck on it, you will scratch the lens.

[Pau]

I have some bottles of lens cleaner that came with microscopes and its composition is:
Ether 60%
Ethanol absolute 30%
Acetone 10%

It's good for clean microscope objectives and yes, it dissolves some plastics like the used in the eyepieces of the same microscopes

But usually I just use absolute ethanol

[DQE]

Below is a link on cleaning optics that I just came across:

http://www.thorlabs.com/tutorials.cfm?tabID=26066

A quick skim-read suggested to me that this web page contains some useful information and tips.