How to clean the zoom rubber

Alcohol can destroy LCDs on contact, and displace lubrication... just not needed.
It's not a good choice for synthetic rubbers unless nothing else works.
I have lens the have been in many nasty places and look, but more importantly function like new.
The manual says clean with water for a reason.

I used a rubber cleaner.

Even weather sealed lens aren't 100% sealed.
I like WD-40 for cleaning rubber, but on a $1800 lense that water cleans up fine...
be concerned about dragging dirt and anything else, especially chemicals into the lense, or cam.

The only way to get a lense as filthy as these posters seem to be doing is to not regularly wipe it down with a damp terry rag.
It's that simple.
I always carry one in a plastic bag when out too...

A friend who's a camera tech simply eases the rubber off and washes them with soap and water.

I've seen it done and it's easy, but if the idea seems scary, I've also heard of others using car/upholstry/shoe cleaner/protectants/de​tailers or good ole silicon or furniture wax - the very light spray on kind - with an old toothbrush.

Dream Merchant wrote in post #9851997
A friend who's a camera tech simply eases the rubber off and washes them with soap and water.

I've seen it done and it's easy, but if the idea seems scary, I've also heard of others using car/upholstry/shoe cleaner/protectants/de​tailers or good ole silicon or furniture wax - the very light spray on kind - with an old toothbrush.

Does your friend have any good techniques on 'easing' the rubber off? I would like to clean one of my lens that has a bit of a whitish haze on the rubber zoom & focus rings.

Wow...i think some of you are totally over analyzing this...

Water and a rag\brush really does work just fine...

I put mine in the dishwasher LOL but seriously I found a great product from another forum that really makes the gear look like new. I use the 303 aerospace protectant

I clean the exteriors (plastic, rubber, etc - not glass) of my gear with Clorox wipes. I have never had an issue and all of my grips look pristine and dark.

What I do is use the wipe over the outside, in one motion, then flip it over and use the other side to lightly brush at the grip. I dont like to use the same side or same wipe more than once, that way Im not scratching the dust/dirt around.

I follow up by wiping away any excess moisture that was left with a "blue dust free" paper towel. If left to dry, the moisture sometimes leaves water marks. The same would be said for real water not wiped away. Just like when you wash your car and if you dont dry it, you get spots.

Using the wipes is important to me because I am a pretty big germ freak and I like to take my camera with me everywhere. So not only is it cleaning my gear, but its disinfecting too. Ill note that Ive tried the Lysol brand wipes but they tend to leave some dust from the cloth the wipe is made out of. So I stick to Clorox.

I dont use the wipes on any glass parts. For that I use a blue paper towel wetted with bottled water. Then lightly dry with a clean blue paper towel.

Here are pics of one of my lenses, it is a few years old and has been cleaned since day1 how I described above. Sorry the pics arent that great, but you get the idea.

oh i got the idea for sure looks really nice. I used water and it worked great but I am going to try wipes as well.

Lavender or rain scented wipes?
Keep it simple... no need for the extra chemicals including the 1-5% alcohol!

There is also reports of skin reactions to Benzalkonium chloride, and don't get it in your eyes...

http://translate.googl​e.com …Dpage%253D1&sl=​auto&tl=en

and this is the one they're refering to:

http://meguiarsdirect.​com/detail/MEG+G10810

I tried the baby wipes and they worked great

alpha_1976 wrote in post #9955869
I tried the baby wipes and they worked great

Do you really want your glass to be soft?

I used armor all on my minolta lenses and it worked great!

blackhawk wrote in post #9959963
Do you really want your glass to be soft?

what do you mean? Is there anything wrong? I used them very carefully and very lightly on the outside of the lens barrel of one of my cheapo to test.