Safety Glasses for 445nm Laser

I'm probably posting too much here but this is such a great resource!

I'm getting my setup going and right now I've got the gantry set up but I just have a 5mW red diode hooked up while I'm learning the finer points of G-CODE generation and making sure the mechanics are all happy. I will eventually build an enclosure around the cutter but for now I'm planning to leave it open and use glasses at all times.

I'm assuming that it's a bad idea to trust my eyesight to the 'complimentary' green safety glasses that Banggood shipped with my gantry. Looking around online there are just a plethora of 'laser safety glasses' options for a huge range of prices.

Does anybody have a resource for learning about proper laser eye protection and what qualifies as a good set of glasses? The options out there are all over the map in construction, color and price. I'm willing to spend whatever the cost is for a quality, safe pair of glasses but I'm not sure if the cheaper pairs I've seen online are really inferior or if they're just a better bargain.

What are some of the criteria that a person should look for when shopping for laser safety glasses for a 445nm diode?

Cheers,

Roger

For my 2W blue LD I bought myself orange light filter foil made for stage-lighting. I doubled it up to build a shield that eliminates the small laser dot at lowest PWM.
I have to focus the lens without shield ( use black anodized aluminum sheet for focussing ). But with the shield, I can safely watch the engraving/cutting.
For a more powerful Diode, you just add another layer of foil.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/30/2017 03:29AM by o_lampe.

Thanks o_lampe!

I ordered up a sheet of laser shielding material from Jtech Photonics and I'm going to build that into the lid of my box....I'd been going back and forth about building an enclosure right away or trying to get things going and saving the enclosure for later, but in the name of safety and keeping everything contained/together I started my box yesterday. With a few 1x10 and some pocket-hole screws it was ridiculously easy to make a frame, and today I'll add some fans for exhaust/RAMPS cooling.