Service (porros) or replace?

[Talisker]

Please help me spend my money .... wisely.

I have 3 pairs of older inexpensive porroprism binoculars. They each have various degrees of haziness and therefore exhibit low-ish contrast, etc: collimation may be border-line too. Otherwise, all are in good overall condition, having never been subjected to hard use or punishment, and remain useable as spares. Performance of each is 'fair' to 'good', though as they stand they are probably no better optically than my general-purpose Nikon 7x35 Action Extremes. They are all around 25 years old, or more.

The cost of a good service is around 40GBP each, so having two or three pairs cleaned is as much as a 'down-payment' on a more modern, general purpose (8x40) replacement. The tricky bit is that I don't know if any of them are really worth servicing. They are:

Swift Blue Band Newport II 10x50 Extra Wide (Ha!) - nice solid bridge, but very, very short eye relief, low chromatics though ... I like 10x bins, but Swifts never struck me as critically sharp(?)

Asahi Pentax 10x50 (5.5deg. field) 'coated' - very solid bridge, 'average' chromatics, cold colour cast. Door-stop sized muscle-toners, but not unlikeable.

Pentax 7x35 Model 562 (6.5deg. field) - def. coated, v. solid bridge. Nice and small 'classic' field glasses - cute!

I'm thinking about sending them to OptRep (Selsey, W. Sussex, UK) - Tony Kay there reckons they are all worth cleaning and adjusting, but that adds up to c. 140GBP incl shipping ..... I'd probably spend around 250GBP on a single pair of 8x40 as general purpose replacements - Nikon EII if I can find any (ha, ha, ah!).

Any thoughts please?

OK, I know I'll owe you all a drink, so nip round later - the Leffe & Westmalle are great, the Lapsang & hot-choc too!.

Al

[Steve Jones]

Hi Al,
I can understand your dilemma. I've had a pair of Opticron 8x32 porro's for round 15 years which I still really like, but porro's seem to be so easy to knock out of alignment, as I've had these repaired twice over the years (total cost over £100) and there's now such good bins at low prices around that it becomes a waste of money to carry on fixing them.
If it was me I'd forget the 'big heavies' and just get the small one's done, or/and buy new, which is what I did eventually. Those E2's would just blow away your old bins, or if you cant get those try some Opticron SRGA 8x32 porro's (still available under £150) which are also very good and with a much wider FOV than any of your old one's.

[etudiant]

Steve is right on the money, in my view.
Surely one good set of glasses would be much more useful than three (or many more in some more extreme cases) binoculars of middling performance. Sell the old ones on Ebay and use the proceeds to help get one good glass, which will give you pleasure every time you use it.
Of course, by the evidence, the collector gene is alive and well among birders on this forum, so this may not be useful advice.

[Talisker]

Thanks, your comments are not unexpected, but definately appreciated.

My main area of doubt lay with the Swifts which I know have a 'following', whether that's collectors(!) or users I don't know. They look good - sleek and American - but the short E.R. is a pain. All of these bins are solidly built - heavy and rigid - but optically unremarkable - the haze obviously robs contrast and thereby some apparent sharpness too.

I'll probably donate the 10x50s to not-too-fussy friends, but bank the 110 GBP 'saving' on the servicing. The baby 7x35 is actually a decent little glass (of its type), and a CLA for c.30GBP won't bankrupt me (OptRep will return them if they feel it ain't worthwhile).

So it's a pair of decent non-budget 8x40s .... I'll start writing the begging letters to rich relatives ("as if ...").

Cheers, Al