Crummy rotten fogged up mask...

[G.I.B.]

I've tried lots of different things to keep my mask clear. So far the only thing that consistently works is keeping the bottom 1/4 full of salt water to 'erase' the fog.

Baby shampoo seems to work better than commercial drops. My daughter had some stuff today that was like a blue gel. Wipe it on, let dry, rinse off and dive. Foggy ~sigh~ Didn't seem to work any better.

Spit, tobacco, drops, tried 'em all. My world is still foggy. Anyone use anything that actually works?

 

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[rjnail]

i used "SOFT SCRUB" worked for me but not all the time, like you i raise the mask and let water in to clean while under, found nothing that works 100% over the last 34 years, haha

 

[erikk]

I vote for spit- works for me too

 

[makahaman]

Try toothpaste but make sure you rinse it out good before you use it. Also, try buying a top of the line mask, some low budget masks work horrible! Aloha

 

[Sandman]

You fog up the mask because when you breath out thru the reg. some air comes out the nose to condense inside. Either wear a nose plug too or don't breathe.

I've had this trouble too till I started using drops called Gorilla Snot, from Groilla Snot Inc, Largo, FL. 1-800-530-1618.

I didn't check if they had a website and I took the address off the 2 oz. bottle.

Good luck.

 

[G.I.B.]

My mask fits fine. It's high quality, tho I don't understand what the price of a mask has to do with fog or no fog?

Some days are not as foggy as others. The Gorilla Snot sounds tasty. What is the main ingredient?

I'll pay attention to not exhaling out my nose at all. Might try the nose plug and see if that helps.

The Johnson's baby shampoo wash and rinse has worked a little better that some other stuff. Maybe I'll spit Gorilla Snot on the inside of a very expensive mask while wearing a nose plug... I'm ready to try something that works!

 

[hollowpointred]

spit sounds nasty but it works.

 

[outlaws]

The first thing you should do when you get a mask is clean it! The mask has a film on it from manufacturing. They make a mask cleaner. You can use soft scrub or tooth paste but be sure it doesn't have any bleach or whiteners in them. They are not good for the skirt. When you scrub the mask do this 5-6 times (scrub, rinse). When you think you have it clean clean it again. After that you can use a mask defog. Spit will work but if you have any kind of cold sore this will infect your eyes. I dive and also work in a dive shop and this will work even on a inexpensive mask.

Butch

 

[re-tek]

i went all over the web looking this up as i had the same issue. first use white toothpaste like regular ole colgate, rub inside of lens all over with fingertip and toothpaste for about 10 min, rinse thoroughly, put some baby shampoo in mask and fill with water, rub thoroughly inside mask with fingertip, let sit for 15 min or so, rinse thoroughly. mask should be ready for use now.

spit works but first you need to get rid of any oils on the lens from manufacturing.

 

[paddy.mick]

Clean it with something like softscrub initially. Once the mask is clean, your problem stems from either breathing back into the mask through nose OR from temperature--if your face is hot from being in the sun and your mask is cool, it will condensate/fog until they stabilize which won't happen for half an hour while the mask is on.
Get in the water first and let your face cool down a bit, then put on the mask.

OR, sometimes you get a good dose of that residue on a mask from the factory. Expensive or cheap, sometimes it just never cleans off. I have one mask that just won't clean. My other two, cleaned same way, and no issues.
Good luck,
Paddy

 

[spez401]

Guyinblack
I've found that some of the cheaper masks I owned fogged a lot more than the expensive ones... I don't know why, but I would probably say it is the differnece in materials.

I still use the spit-n-swish method. Always worked well for me

steve

 

[ClonedSIM]

This may not apply here, but I've heard that hacking a potatoe in two and rubbing the cut side against the mask would help. Something about the starch?

 

[karib2517]

Yep nose plug.

 

[bell47]

I have the fogging problem to! The best thing I've found is to clean the mask regularly with toothpaste( I'm a crest man) and either stuff called gold drops or Johnson's baby shampoo. Johnsons is cheaper and actually seems to work a little better. I don't know if something builds up on the mask but it seems to work better if I scrub the glass with toothpaste every few(5-6 days of diving 3-4 tanks a day) dives. I have also noticed that diving in freshwater that the mask fogs a lot more than in salt water. It fogs non-stop lake diving in the summer(70 degree water temp) and doesn't really fog that much diving for scallops on the coast of Maine in the winter time(30-40 degree water temp).

 

[G.I.B.]

I read everything and took all the advice to heart. Thanks to everyone who had a suggestion.

My last mask was 12 years old and a good 'ol friend, who is now semi-retired.

I bought a new Cressi 'Big Eye' that fits great. It doesn't leak around my mustache either. I cleaned it with toothpaste, then with soft scrub, then a couple of rounds of Dawn dish soap, cleaned again with my Bausch and Laumb lens wipes and finally applied a drop of anit-fog on both lenses. (tomorrow is spit and baby shampoo)

Went sharks tooth diving this morning and boy-O-boy, what a difference. It worked great. I did pay more attention to exhaling little puffs out of my nose. With two hours of bottom time I had an opportunity to play with exhaling and the fog issue, and yup, it was causing excess fog.

New stuff to try, and most of it was working great. Thanks for the suggestions, they work great!