Glasses repair

Jul 25, 2025 Last reply: 11 months ago 9 Replies

I'm trying to rejuvenate an old pair of rimless glasses, which are an unusual design, and were customised by the optician who supplied them, who was a very accommodating bloke.



The nose piece is fitted to the lenses by a threaded 1.3mm pin and a thick wire which go through a drilled 1.5mm hole and a dremelled slot respectively.



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The arms 'wedge' over the thick wires and tiny nuts hold them onto the threaded pin (the arms connect to the nose-side of the lenses instead of the ears-side, which is the unusual feature that I like about them).



The wires must have been bent around the slot after the pins inserted through the holes, so I had to slightly bend them to take the nose piece apart, that's why they look slightly mangled, but I can put that right when re-assembling them.



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I seem to remember he called it a grommet which held the pin in the hole, years of nose-grease has rotted these grommets/pins/tubes away, I can see various grommets etc on optician suppliers, but most are for "normal" rimless frames, e.g. these double pins



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I think what I need is like a bushing 1.5mm od, 1.3mm id maybe 2-3mmm long, clear plastic ... any suggestions?



Preferably without having to buy hundreds of the things from the USA.


I would say that you *might* get away with some PTFE tubing

But that;s a fearfully thin wall thickness for clear plastic

You might get that in metal tubing.

China, more likely

!%$**£! Aha, Would clear heat shrink tubing do the job?

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Clear heat shrink tubing? eg eBay 404149308232. You'd probably need to try different sizes.

Or you can get (eBay) clear silicone tubing in small diameters. As far as I can see, not as small as you need, but of course it will thin out when stretched.

I might even have some, perhaps not small enough. When you buy it, presumably the diameter specified is non-shrunk?

I believe so. Yup. I have a box of several hundred assorted ones here. Its the unshrunk dimension

Hint. Dropping unsorts an open box of sorted assorted heat shrinks.

I tend to keep my semi-sorted odds and ends in clear plastic bags within the boxes ... stops them getting tangled or unsorted.

So far I've found the huge heat shrink, some pre-cut red/black pieces, but not the rest ...

I wonder if the grommet was there to provide a bit of "give".

If so, could you use latex solution when you reassemble the specs?

Not sure I fully understand what's required, but I wondered if, rather than use a tube, you could wrap a length of thin polythene or clingfilm round the pin. If left a bit long, when screwed down it would get compressed and grip the lens.

I doubt it would make any practical difference, but you could wrap the plastic round the pin until it was /just/ to wide to go through the hole in the lens, then put the frame in the freezer for a while to get it to contract a fraction of a mm and try to get it through.

I don't think so ... one side had gone a bit waggly, the nut on the other side was tightened firmly, the waggly side wouldn't tighten properly. The way the arm connect, there's plenty of "spring" in them.

from the remnants that were squished under the nut, more or less an 'O' ring with od 2mm, id 1.4mm, cs about 0.75mm

Would be rather fiddly for my mitts, I'll keep playing hunt the heatshrink tube, even if I have to test it with a coloured piece before buying some clear if it works.

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