That is one of the things I was speculating here:

http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?s...indpost&p=98158

But what bothered me about oztang's results is he claimed the whole thing completely dissolved (not just strings), and did not indicate if the anti-glare was removed in those areas. I posted for him to supply some more details, but he has not responded. I am pretty sure it is just due to the circumstances he provided (a bucket of water, extended exposure, exposure from both sides, no rag so more active volume).

Personally, I feel ragging has even high PVA solubility beat, for the reasons you and I have mentioned. I just want people to know there are still risks.Whoa! That is great news . That should make it a very compatible method. I think when water works it wins on simplicity and invasiveness and labour, but stripper will clearly be the compatability winner based on what we have seen so far. Ignoring PEEK (poor PEEK ).

Mark.

What?

Haven't I given y'all enough to PEEK at!? hehe



I agree with this thoroughly. In fact, if I WERE to make a recommendation at this point (which I am not but you're all big boys and girls ...), I would say that the following would be a great approach to take when trying to strip a/g:

1) Rag soak - check at 6 hour intervals. If the a/g doesn't lift with very little resistance, try option 2.

2) Mask electronics carefully. Sand a/g with 400 grit sandpaper (250 seems a bit agressive to me - but hey, taht's just ME). Apply stripper and let soak for 45 minutes. Clean dissolved a/g and TAC. Repeat as necessary.

IMHO, if #1 works for you, you will be laughing at how easy it is. If you go to #2, a little bit more complexity is involved, but it works just as well - and may be as close as we have right now to a universal bullet ...

There are a few things that I would like to see to help with the quantification of what has happened here just for fun.

1. Someone who has done the water technique, and thus has a solid sheet of anti-glare. If you place a section of that flat against the other side of your panel, or find a safe way of butting it against your vulnerable PVA. It would be a pretty accurate (but for reflections) comparison if you could get it to sit right up against the panel.

2. Create an extreme of this effect. Try adding one of your diffuser sheets pressed against the panel.

Something I should remind is you could find that moving your polarizer away from the panel will result in over 55% decrease in panel temperature. Adding another separate polarizer to the system will have the same effect, but with a loss of transmittance. This need not be a high extinction polarizer, just high single transmittance.

Mark.

hmmmmmm nearly 2000 posts ago i said temp was down quite a bit..

LOL, and believe it or not, I've read all 2000+.

I'm wondering now if my temps are down due to the increased volume of air between the LCD and the rear fresnel. Regardless of the why, I'm just pleased with the result since I should now be able to turn the fan speed down quite a bit.

Greg

OK.....14 hours later and the antiglare is still there!!! :angry:

I have noticed there are what appears to be 2 elongated slight bumps on the surface of the LCD. I think they are air pockets under the antiglare.

I would like to peel up the antiglare at this point, but can't seem to get it started at a corner with a razor blade.
I don't know if I am trying to scrape up too thin a layer of the antigalre, or the antigalre is just stubborn. I am afraid I will start peeling up the PVA without knowing it. Any close up pictures detailing the corner of an LCD so I know exactly what to look for?

Also please tell me to STOP! if you think I am about to do something harmfull....this is my working LCD for the projector, not an extra.

I really wish I had a digital camera.

Hmmm ... titanium antiglare strikes again! The bumps are most probably areas where the stripper has attacked the TAC laer under the a/g layer - this is what we want.

A couple of questions, in between stripper applications, how are you removing the stripper? Are you apply any type of force,, or simply wiping the stripper away? You might find that MINIMAL force is required to abraid the a/g surface away - DO NOT OVERDO IT AND SCRATCH THE PVA.

I would not peel the a/g away because it is still bonded to the PVA where it hasn't bubbled. This is NOT the rag method and the a/g will not peel up - DONT try it; it will most probably bring up the PVA with it.

Your best bets at this point are:

1) Try JASCO
2) Leave the stripper on for even more time. I know this sounds ridiculous, but I left it on for over 50 hours on bare PVA with no damage. It took me a good 24 hours or so for it to attack my unsanded a/g. Have patience, and I am confident it will come up. It may take multiple applications - you have already seen it starting to work with the bubbling areas.

For others reading this, this is why we say that we are still in the experimental phaze with these processes. They remain untested with a large number of panels. Chad, keep at it, becuase your monitor is useless for projection with a marred a/g in any case. In the worst case scenario, you can spend an extra $30 and do a complete polarizer replacement on one side; BUT I would not give up as yet; the bubbling is very promising

Mark posted a pic of prying up the antiglare at the corner a couple of pages back. http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?s...indpost&p=98482

My conscern is that solvents have penetrated the antiglare without dissolving it and your TAC may be melted by now. If left on too long it might dissolve the TAC behind the PVA and you will need to go full strip.

I don't think anyone wants to give you any advice that migh destroy your panel and hopefully you have read the thread and knew the risks going into this. That being said you are obviously beyond the point of no return and if you have a bubble it is beginning to release. Is there any way that you could attempt to do a peel from the center? I don't believe anyone has released an edge with stripper. If it were me I would see if I could just pull it up slightly with the corner of a razor blade[edit] at the bubble and this is risky. If you were careful you could just hang the blade in the antiglare without cutting through it and tug it up enough so that you could get it started from the center.

This has never been done as far as I know and it is absolutely your risk to take. I would wait to get some more feedback from others before doing anything. At the very worst you will have to go full peel.

[edit] This post is not a response to Sonicwonder, it was posted simultaneous with his. He has plenty of experience and his advice should superscede mine. I just wonder if that antiglare layer is loose and ready to pull up.

Death, I would be very surprised if this happens. Both theoretically and experimentally, it is going to take Methylene Chloride a very long time to permeate the PVA and attack the rear TAC (provided it doesn't drip over the corner). I really would not be concerned about this right now because, as you say, his panel is already toast unless he can get the a/g off.

What you say about the TAC dissolving under the a/g is right on the money though. That's why I asked him to minimally abrade away the stripper. The a/g layer is only about 6 microns deep, but it is made of a silicon dioxide (micro sand particles) suspension that will not be attacked by the stripper. That's why we sand to get below this layer into the TAC which the stripper can attack. It may be that Chad's a/g layer is a bit thicker, and he didn't fully sand into the TAC and it is taking a bit longer for the stripper to attack the TAC. But once the TAC support if fully melted, it should come off like a piece of wet tissue paper.

I've been somewhat following this post with anticipation of eventually applying this technique (remvoving ag)to my Liquid Video 15". I've been waiting for the dust to settle with regards to best technique. I happened to do a search today on liquidvideo in this topic, and found that someone found the tape on the ag didn't make an improvement. I too found the same thing when I tried. Does this essentially mean that removing the ag from my Liquidvideo will result in NO (or very little) improvement? I hope not, because I've been itching to try this technique out myself... Sorry if this has already been posted, the topic has grown quite large, and I did some skimming.

Thanks,
the_big_show

I though that had happened to someone already but I can't be certain.

I am removing the stripper with a 6" wide plastic putty knife. I didn't use any force at first. Then, I pushed down harder and left 3 marks. I really hope it din't dig into the PVA. Neither method got any AG up.


Yeah, I have been keeping up with the posts and know the risks involved. The dimness of the projector was an extreme letdown, and I am desperate to get things brighter, so after 6 months I can finally start to use the thing. Also, I am afraid I missed/forgot some things in the 118 page post, and want to be extremely carefull.

My next plan of action may be to buy some Jasco, and leave it on for 27 hours. I'll check back in a few hours and see what has been posted.

That was me and I expect to not have as great of an improvement as some if I eventually do it. However that would mean that our panels are pretty good already. Maybe one reason they were so popular. Now that the pro lens is out I might get a 17" panel and keep the Liquidvideo intact as I'm typing on it now. Fixed my iMac problem by bypassing the CRT and connecting the LCD panel.

Chad, I just re-read this post and something struck me. You said you sanded for 30 minutes - that is a very long time. What grit did you use? Are you sure you didn't eat into the polarizer?

After Death's comments, I just want to make sure the bubbling you are seeing is not the rear TAC dissolving due to you having cut into it sanding. It is highly doubtful, but I just wanted to cover all the bases.

I used 220 grit and barely used any pressure. I sanded with a 2"x2" piece, didn't fold it, and just applied enough pressure to get the job done. It took me 30 minutes because each stroke only left a few "scratches" and I wanted to get really good coverage.

When you apply the Jasco, check it after and hour initially to see if it is acting. No need to wait longer than necessary. When cleaning the surface of stripper, make sure that there is not any residual cleaner left on the surface before you re-apply the stripper (actually there is is no need to clean the surface in between stripper applications). The moisture will cause the Methylene Chloride to flash (evaporate) at the interface, making the stripper less effective.

You are correct that I left the stripper on for 50 hours with no degredation to the PVA. Please keep us updated.

So, let me try to summarize for the cmv owners out there.

We have had 2 people fail with the stripper method so far on cmv 520s and one person succeed with the rag method so far on a cmv 529. While Chad will be trying Jasco to see if it makes a difference.

Have I missed anybody? Has anybody else tried stripping the a/g off a cmv model lcd? What method and what results?

Dunking worked with GadgetSmith's anti-glare (CMV-520D). I figure ragging likely would have too:

http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?s...indpost&p=98734

What he wished was that he had given both the water attempt, and the stipper attempt a longer chance. He did a full polarizer removal, and then found out after that stripper was going to work, and likely water as well.

The water worked very quickly, but that was a full dunk, and we don't know how ragging would have done.

I think if I were Chad, I would switch to ragging anyway. That is just me. It could be risky?

Mark.

Are you applying tape to a monitor in a projector, or just a desktop monitor? The difference is most evident on projection.

If this is a desktop, you can see the difference by viewing the monitor at an extreme angle of incidence. 85 degrees or so (basically looking across your screen).

As long as you see any dimpling or roughness to the surface, you can expect a change. And tape doesn't seem to do everything that full removal does.

These LiquidVideo's aren't anti-reflective are they? That would mean they have a pretty shiny smooth surface with no dimpling. If they are, I wouldn't do anything. That coating is useful in a projector as well, and without dimples you don't have the problems we are trying to fix with removal.

edit if you have the panel out in the open, and shining a light through causes diffusion and internal reflection (a big dull blob of light) then there is an improvement to be had.

Mark.

Well I emailed Polarization.com and they said they accept money order. Yay! Now I'd just like some advice on which one to get.

Without adhesive.

Figure out if you have 45 or 0 degree polarizers to establish what length you need.

Mark.

Forgive me but how do I do that?

On my panel with the "titanium antiglare" 3 different strippers didn't work.

Only the Jasco brand stripper worked and it worked in 30-45 minutes.

Give it a try Death and see what happens. It may have more Methylene than the others, or it may be that the others hav some other stripping chemicals that don't work as well.

I'd just like to add here that when I strippered the Kogi 14" then my Cornea pj's, the antiglare came off rather easily like melted glass/plastic. It was the TAC that was left in areas or sections that I called 'Stragglers' or as someone said earlier 'Islands' of it not to mentioned that as I scraped along the panel the melted TAC was being smeard and drying up rather quickly across the exposed PVA. That is why additional stripper was used until most of the TAC was removed and particularly thined out which allowed me to use denatured alcohol to wipe the rest off. And yes as Sonic reminded you all, there is a little finger force that should be applied when 'scraping' the surface after waiting the amount of time for the stripper to act on both the antiglare and TAC. It might seem like your actually digging into the PVA but trust me as long as your weapon of scraper is not extremely indented you will find that your efforts are just trying to have the TAC release it's hold on the PVA.
sim

Get a piece of your polarizer that you removed, and orient it in the same way that it came off the panel.

If when you flip that sample left side for right side (not vertically) and the polarizer transmittance changes, you have a 45 degree polarizer.

If you can flip it left for right and there is no change in polarizer transmittance, you have a 0 degree polarizer.

My projection panel is a 0, my iMac is a 0 and my test panel is a 45. It really varies. There are also panels that can be somewhere in between.

Mark.

In otherwords, put the polarizer on backwards, but not upside down. Right?

By no change in transmitance, do you mean the light will be just as bright? Or the colors won't change?

Yes.As long as each RGB sub pixel is equal, you will never be able to change the colors with a polarizer regardless of axis orientation.

The panel doesn't need to be on, so every sub-pixel should be equal.

By change in transmittance, I mean the polarizer will not get lighter or darker. Honestly, just try it. You will see what I must mean fairly quickly. You can even pretend to have another angle of polarizer in your hand by rotating it 90 degrees and performing the test again. One way will yield a change in transmittance, but the only result that matters is the one you got form placing the polarizer exactly as it was removed and performing the flip.

The test works because when you flip something straight over that has an axis at 45 degrees, the axis will go perpendicular to it's previous orientation. But if you flip something over that had axis going left to right or top to bottom, the axis remains the same. Polarizers have higher transmittance the more parallel their axis are. So by flipping it over, we know that in a 0 degree polarizer there will be no change, and in a 45 there will be a full change.

It will be a bit more complicated to establish which corners the axis connects in the case of a 45, or which edges the axis connects in the case of a 0. That information may not even be necessary with polarization.com, as the polarizers are quite large from them.

Mark.

I just made a pretty funny discovery. My Samsung seems to have some form of DRPF . Not sure if it is 3M or not. I thought it was just a diffuser sheet .

Unfortunately it seems to be of an embossed variety. So I added some tape to the surface . Worked pretty good.

The sheet still takes on a white milky appearance. I'm not sure if plain DRPF would exhibit this. It's hard to say. I can't tell if the milkiness is caused by diffusion or internal reflection. I will play with it tonight.

The crossed transmittance of this model is not acceptable for a primary polarizer, but it is still really impressive. You almost can't believe that something that looks like this (it isn't a grey color like a normal polarizer) can polarize so efficiently.

I'm not sure, but I may even have a prismatic filter .

Mark.

Chad,
well... I did have problems with the stripper... I had to push pretty hard with the plastic scraper to get it started... I had more luck with both water and stripper after I'd done a complete strip, but I was pretty rough with the polarizer at that point.... plus I had "spots" where I had gotten through the a/g to the PVA layer... this made stripper and water application better.... I believe if I had to do it again, i'd be sure to try the Jasco branded stripper... that and i'd be more patient... once you get through the a/g in one spot, it will go quicker. The *really* important thing to remember is not to jepordize the panel itself (like pushing so hard to make it crack) and be sure to control where the stripper goes (you only want it on the a/g, not the sides or near any cables) If you damage the polarizer itself, not a big loss, as you can replace this relatively easily.... so long as you don't go hog wild and do any damage to the functionality of the LCD. Good Luck !


Mikau,
If you are doing a 15" panel, you will need to order 2 ft of polarizer (they only sell in 1ft increments). Most likely you will need 45° transmittance as most LCD's use this type of polarizer. I cut mine roughly the size of my collimating fresnel (250x320). Here is a picture showing how I made the cut for a 250x320mm polarizer from a 17" x 24" sheet of polarizer with transmittance parallel to the roll width (17").

Click to view attachment

Thanks Gadget. Which particular polarizer did you order?

I'm not so sure about that. 2 out of the 3 LCD's I have are 0 degree.

Mikau: There is only one polarizer from polarization.com that is not adhesive.

Mark.

Update:
I went to the store to buy the Jasco stripper - Home Depot did not have it, but they did have a more potent Klean Strip stripper - it says 5 min on the front. I apparently used a lesser Klean Strip I bought from Lowes.

I went to Lowes and bought the "Jasco Premium Paint & Epoxy Remover". I applied this over the LCD and let it sit. Well, 2 hours later the antiglare started to come off!!! However, probably 15% of it is still too stuborn to remove safely. Also, I noticed the 2 air pockets I talked of earlier are still there after AG removal over them! My theory is the stripper attacked a top layer of the AG, but not all of it, or it removed the AG, but not its TAC, and I am seeing an air bubble under the TAC.

Either way, the CMV 520D antiglare is some tough stuff. The Jasco left on for 2 hours is still not enough. I cleaned it up the best I could, and applied another coat of Jasco stripper. I will have to leave it on for 24 hours, because I will be sleeping + away from home until then.

As a side note I have found using a smaller 3" plastic putty knife is safer than a 6" wide one. The wider ones risk more pressure being applied to one side, and scraping into the PAV.

Gotcha. Thanks.

Hey if you get any new idea's for scratch removers, post it on my thread, I'd appreciate it.

Congrats for the time being - a mountain has shifted (if only a few inches ). Remember (and I'm sure you don't need to be reminded of this), PATIENCE is a virtue with this method and titanium antiglare. Slow and steady wins the race.

I am glad that the JASCO is attacking the a/g though. It's just a matter of time now ...

PS: I am a little unclear about your "air bubbles". Are you saying that the a/g has come off over the bubbled areas and the bubbles remain under the PVA?? I saw this "air bubble" phenomenon with my test sample. In my case, it was where the TAC had dissolved under the a/g layer. Eventually, the a/g above the bubble weakened to the point where I was able to remove it and see bare PVA. Is this what is happening with your panel??

I used a 2" putty knife. You're right the larger ones bend a little and you get uneven pressure causing one side or the other to dig in.

And congrats on getting it to work. I don't think anybody has got it to strip with one coat though. Everyone usually has to do 2-3 coats of stripper. And then some kind of cleaner for final cleanup .

"Do not underestimate the dark side of the antiglare my fellow jedi's. Wield your light putty knife no matter how small they are. Use the finger 'Force'"
sim

Well I tried turning the polarizer around and whites turned to a light aquamarine. I guess mine's a 45 degree polarizer.

Is it possible when the polarizer is flipped over to dial the polarizer into black? At what angle does that take?

If it isn't possible to get black that way around, how about the correct way around?

Mark.

how does your AG look? when you look at a light bulb thru it is the bulb pretty well defined? is the other side of your lcd shiny?

There is definately some antiglare because when the screen is dark reflections from a window are fuzzy. The panel is still not stripped so any test I do on the antiglare is probably not totally valid, but the tape showed little improvement except at a very extreme angle. There should be some benefit with anti-glare removal however I fear that the improvement will not be as great as some panels.

Mikau... you're omniscient congrats!

(don't know when the promotion happened... just noticed your status bar)

yeah, it would (help) explain why some people have always been satisfied(well, relatively) with their picture and others have had a hard time.... one thing I think People may emphasize on this thread is to TRY THE TAPE TEST FIRST!! hey DR64... whats the viewing angle on your LCD supposed to be? wondering if it has a fairly narrow viewing angle specified ...

There is another recent finding that shows one more thing that removing the anti-glare will do. DAZZLA seems to have found that arc size adversely effects resolution:

http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?s...indpost&p=97612

I gather the reason is unknown.

Anti-gare diffuses light in a manner as to partially simulate having a wider arc because the main thing that happens with a wider arc is less collimation.I think Lexan with a UV coating (not the sheet) is the best. If the UV is a separate sheet, then you will loose an estimated 4 - 5% at the outer surface and another 4 - 5% at the inner surface due to reflection. 8% minimum total. That is close to what Elken found at 12%. If the Lexan is coated there should be zero loss to reflection. The coating itself should be completely transparent to RGB, and dichroic to UV.

Lexan is said to reflect less and have a higher transmittance than glass, so I would stick with the Lexan.

I have a question: Isn't both glass and Lexan a UV blocker? Why would you need UV coated Lexan or the UV shield in the first place? For that matter isn't basically everything that the light passes through a UV blocker to some degree? For instance: The polarizer is said to block out more than 99% of UV. That is why they have to make polarizers specifically for UV. It is also why a polarizer in photography is a perfect substitute for a UV filter. The glass substrate should also block the UV.

The whole UV thing is weird to me. Isn't basically every component a UV blocker to some degree? Has anyone actually tested for UV at the various layers? Or are we worried that while Lexan blocks UV, it deteriorates in doing so, whereas a coating will stand up to the job much better?

Mark.

The whole UV thing is a bit strange to me also. But I did some digging.

Lexan XL10(UV filtering) has a 88% light transmission value. The Tuffak XL brand is identical.

Acrylite OP-2 is a brand of PolyMethyl Methacrylate, aka PMMA, commonly known as Plexiglas.
The OP-2 version is UV blocking with a better light transmission value, 92%.

Plain old float window glass is 88% transmissive.

Edit: Typo

http://www.boedeker.com/acryl_p.htm

Says that Plexiglas has a melting temperature of 130-140 C (265-285 F) and a maximum operating temperature of 65-93 C (150-200 F). That doesn't seem high enough. I'm not sure exactly what they mean by operating temperature.

Lexan:

http://www.boedeker.com/polyc_p.htm

Has a maximum operating temperature of 121 C (250 F).

Lexan, being a polycarbonate, has very poor UV resistance (especially if not UV stabilized). This is why we need the UV Film/Coating first.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polycarbonate

A sheet of Lexan XL10 is said to have a 25% increase in thermal insulation over glass. 88% transmittance as you say:

http://www.markken.net/pdf/XL10.pdf

They claim that one side is UV resistant. Sorry to get a bit off topic, but do we know for sure that UV causes yellowing of the whole depth of the Lexan, and not just at the surface? I ask because otherwise this could just be a thin layer of UV stabilized Lexan. Or do we know for sure this must be a UV dichroic or reflective coating?

A quote from:

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:zYbz4kX...carbonate&hl=en

"UV rays attack only the very top surface"

But I am not sure if they were talking specifically about surface degradation (cracks, and powdering).

Mark.

I just thought I should add one more piece of data to all this. I have the CMV-520D and the stripper method didn't work well for me at all either. I have to confess I completely screwed up on everyone's suggestions though, so that might have something to do with it. I had previously polished my panel with the mother's mag and aluminum, so in my stupidity I thought that would be similar to sanding the panel (quite the opposite, as I now realize!) so I didn't bother sanding at all. I had to leave the stripper for a very long time (approx 15 hours!!) before the majority of the anti-glare came up. I still had some tough spots at the edges, though. I'm really worried for Chad N., though, because I too had the bubbles he was talking about, and they ended up being very regular (perfectly straight, all perfectly parallel) lines along the entire panel where something (don't know what) was bubbling up and peeling away from the lines.

Unfortunately I had an (unrelated) accident with my (primary projection !!) panel, and have been too depressed to bother checking into those lines I was telling you about. When I get a chance to check it out better, I'll let you guys know.

edit: Oops, sorry, I meant to ask: Chad N., could the bubbles you're talking about be the same as the lines I mentioned? (perfectly straight, and parallel) You probably won't be able to tell until most of the a/g is off, though.

2nd edit: Man, I'm forgetful today! I should have mentioned that I used "Jasco Premium Paint and Epoxy Remover." Let's see if anything else occurs to me after this!

Oh dear. It sounds to me like what you are saying is you had what we have been referring to as "grain" form over the entire length of the panel. That is pretty contradictory to our tests with stripper. And our tests were done with Jasco. Oh bother.

This post shows how grain becomes highly visible with off axis light:

http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?s...indpost&p=97810

Mark.

It sounds like the PVA was damaged from your post, which is contradictory to what I experienced with extended exposure to the Jasco (50 hours on bare PVA). Your description has me a little confused as to weather this is what Mark and I have traditionally referred to as "grain". A few questions:

1) Did all the a/g finally come off?

2) Did the remaining PVA show any imperfections on the surface?

3) Are the imperfections undulations in the surface, or do they seem to be inside the PVA itself?

4) Are they visible from all different angles of incidence, or is there a sweet-spot angle where light hits it such that you can see the imperfections?

If you have pictures, they would be VERY helpful. By your description, it seems like PVA grain has been induced, but I just want to see if some other phenomenon could be occurring. Given the composition of Jasco, I find this quite baffling. Did you use anything else other than stripper in the process of cleaning the surface? The CMV line is proving to be a universally difficult line of LCD's to deal with...if it were my panel, I would TRY THE RAG METHOD BEFORE GOING THE WHOLE HOG WITH STRIPPER.

Chad, where are you?? Please have some good news for us

Just a quick interjection: I'd like to say THANKS! to all of you experimenters and trail-blazers.

I stripped my panel using the Jasco paint stripper method and it looks FANTASTIC. Though pleased overall with my projector, I'd always been a little disappointed in the brightness of the picture and the ease with which it became washed out with ambient light. It is MUCH better now and I am thrilled. WOO-HOO!

You're more than welcome! I'm glad it worked out for you. Be sure to put a good word in to "the boss" for me - maybe I'll make it to a 25% raise this year ...

How 'bout it Sim??

PS: be sure to post your results on the related "results" thread in this forum here:

http://www.lumenlab.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=8283