Amazing what you can see with polarized sunglasses!

[masterofreality]

It's amazing how much more different my car looks when I'm wearing my polarized sunglasses! I noticed that I put my wax, polish, etc. on a left/right manner (with the grain, so to speak). And I also know that polarized sunglasses are made of extremely small horizontal lines... left/right. Which is why you can see so well when looking into a body of water, such as a lake, or the ocean, because the light is reflecting in this same manner, perpendicular to the sun. So when I put my sunglasses on (yes, they must be polarized) it's like night and day! I see much more detail, the paint just pops, and I can pick out small imperfections much more easily as well, such as hidden bad areas I couldn't see all to well previously.

Okay, well as you can see I think I've lost my mind if I'm finding things like this. Has anyone else noticed this.. or is it just me? I feel like the kid who just found that ad for the amazing x-ray glasses in the back of a comic book, and I just had to go and share it with the whole neighborhood... LOL!

Colin

[MiataPaul]

funny thing is I have a few pairs and they make the glass on all my German cars (Mercedes, BMW and VW) look hazed with these strange white puffs, in a very consistent pattern. On my Mercedes you can start to see them without the glasses. Not sure what it is, I have noticed this on most German cars I pass but it does not show on my Miata.

[Taxlady]

I don't own any polarized glasses at the moment, but I did back in the 70s. I remember seeing patterns of dark in the windshields of almost all cars. I also saw it on many shop windows.

The polarisation in glass goes in a direction. It will let light through that is at the same angle or close. The dark patterns that I used to see, were because the polarization was done in two different directions. This was done when polarized sunglasses were very popular. It meant that you would be able to see through the windshield in the none dark areas. Which areas were dark depended on the direction of polarization in your sunglasses.

I imagine that the white puffs are some new way of doing something similar. Try taking off your polarized glasses and looking at the puffs through the glasses. Turn the glasses and see what happens to the pattern. Let us know what happens.

[Idrops]

The checkerboard pattern on the windows are stress fringes. Also note some LED displays on your dash or on the gas pump will disappear with polarized sunglasses.

Polarized sunglasses are vertically polarized so horizontal reflected light is blocked.