Patent ID: 8002406

Claim:
A method for manufacturing a prescription surface on a lens blank to produce a lens for use in eyeglasses, the method comprising: receiving a lens blank having a front surface radius of curvature on a front surface of the lens blank, wherein the front surface radius of curvature is associated with a certain prescription for a user; removing lens blank material from at least a central portion of a back surface of the lens blank to create a back surface radius of curvature at the central portion, wherein the back surface radius of curvature is based on the prescription; automatically determining whether a first thickness of a peripheral section of the lens blank will be less than a predetermined thickness threshold if the back surface of the lens blank is manufactured to have the back surface radius of curvature at the peripheral section; if the determination is that the first thickness of the peripheral section of the lens blank with the back surface radius of curvature will be less than the predetermined thickness threshold, removing less than all the lens blank material needed to create the back surface radius of curvature from the peripheral section of the back surface, wherein a resulting peripheral section has a second thickness equal to or greater than the predetermined thickness threshold to prevent the resulting peripheral section from breaking during processing of the lens blank or from damaging lens processing equipment; and removing at least a portion of the resulting peripheral section from the lens blank after processing the lens to fit an eyeglass frame.