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Lens keeping

Ralph Honsbeek

New member
Hi there ,

I am concerned about mold forming on the inside of my beautiful lenses .
I have seen those glass lens holding cabinets for about 500 to 600 UDS.
They are suppose to keep your lenses in the perfect condition. I am just wondering what I can do
to achieve a similar optimal condition. I thought about putting the lenses individually in ziplock bags and punching in hole through the bag and keeping them like that. My room (house) is pretty well isolated but the conditions here in (South Korea) can get pretty grim , ranging from drier than dry winters and humid wet summers. and anything in between. Will it be safe to keep the lenses in plastic bag for the moment , or do you recommend against it ?

Thank you for now

Ralph
 

Will Thompson

Well-known member
Hi Ralph!

Good subject!

You need to keep them in low humidity. So in a ziplock bag is a good idea but absolutely no holes and put bags of silica beads in with them to absorb what ever humidity is in the air when you open and close the bag. I have some small vented boxes of silica beads that I got from my local camera store that can be reused by way of instructions on how to use a microwave oven once the beads turn brown from there new state of clear/milky. I have had them for several years and have not yet needed to microwave them back to new.

If you ever opened a new long L lens from Canon or other electronics you would have found small white packets that say do not eat on them, These are the (same) stuff that manufactures ship with to remove humidity from packaging to prevent just what you mention.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Hi there ,

I am concerned about mold forming on the inside of my beautiful lenses .

Will is absolutely right! You need to keep lenses in plastic bags with silica gel in cotton sacks to absorb the moisture. Every so often just heat the sacks in the oven overnight to dry them.

In places of high humidity fungus tries to reclaim everything. There's a fungus for eating up most things.Is there any sign of mould right now?

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
I would recommend against the bags, but if you use them do not puncture a hole in them and do make sure you use desiccant.

Your biggest problem, actually, is air conditioning. If you take a lens outside from a cooled home, you will get condensation on the cold lens. That is bad for fungus.

Is you climate so humid that you get fungus on books or clothing put on storage? If no, just leave your lenses in a normal book cabinet, no bag and do not worry.

I live in a temperate climate, but I have lenses which are over 20 years old. No fungus.
 

Will Thompson

Well-known member
Sorry, desiccant was the word I was looking for and a sealed bag is exactly what you want short of a airtight case such as a pelican!

In addition follow canon's instructions in keeping equipment sealed until it has adjusted to the shooting temperature when there is a large difference!
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Bringing camera in from the cold or taking out film from freezer

I would recommend against the bags, but if you use them do not puncture a hole in them and do make sure you use desiccant.

Your biggest problem, actually, is air conditioning. If you take a lens outside from a cooled home, you will get condensation on the cold lens. That is bad for fungus.

Is you climate so humid that you get fungus on books or clothing put on storage? If no, just leave your lenses in a normal book cabinet, no bag and do not worry.

Jerome,

Anything that goes from cold to humid must always be in an airtight plastic bag so that condensation is on the outside not on the lens brought in from the cold (or film taken out of the refrigerator, to keep the box dry). So always carry ziplock bags. No silica gel is needed for these two purposes. For storage, adding a dry silica gel sachet is always a good practice.

Lastly, carry a clean paint brush and blower to get rid of sand or dust from anything with joints.

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
I am not exactly sure what we are talking about. If we are talking long-term storage, then keeping lenses in a reasonably well ventilated cabinet is usually sufficient. Keeping them in bags increases the risk of molds, because humidity is trapped in the bag. Using desiccant decreases the problem, but not as much as one could think because the amount of desiccant needed is usually bigger than the little bag you find in the manufacturer's package. The manufacturer packs the lens in a dry room, and the desiccant is just for a little amount of trapped humidity. If you pack a lens coming from a humid place into a plastic bag, the little package of desiccant will be used up very quickly and may actually be insufficient. If one lives in a very humid area (one where molds would actually grow on most things), a cabinet or trunk with a large, built-in reserve of desiccant is the only reliable solution if you intend to use your equipment regularly.

If we are talking protecting lenses when going from a cold room into outside where it is warm and humid, bags would help for the transition. But, frankly, so does a normal photo bag if you keep it closed for the time the equipment heats up to outside temperature.

Sand is indeed another danger to photographic equipment and a little brush quite useful.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Whenever a sealed plastic bag is used with desiccant, one should expel all the air. That limits the amount of moist air that can be trapped. Also add a few sachets of desiccant. They are cheap!

Skiing, one comes in from the cold with one's camera, condensation can get into the lens. So there the lens should be in a plastic bag. The cloth bag, to some extent helps, but is not as perfect a solution. Similarly in humid climates such as Florida, going from air conditioning to the outside one can get a film of moisture condensing inside the lens. If it occurs, it will usually disappear as the lens is heated up. Still, one should make sure that when packing away the lens, it has been allowed to dry out at a sustained higher temp and should be stored with desiccant if available. Once water has appeared in the lens, fungus is at increased risk down the road.

Asher
 

Ruben Alfu

New member
Here in Panama humidity and heat are very high most of the time, as far as I can tell, it works for me to keep lenses in an air conditioned room, inside an air sealed translucent plastic storage box. During the night or whenever the room is dark, I turn on a lamp on top of the box, I'm not sure if this actually helps but I've read that darkness favor fungal growth... and it's cool to watch the lenses with that overhead light!
 
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