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[johnhub]

Hi everyone, my first post!

I have a love of neat, compact things, so I have a pair of Leica 8x20 Trinovid BCAs, which I have with me all the time. I'm thinking of getting a bigger pair of bins to keep in the camper van, but can neither afford nor justify anything very expensive. I remember my dad enthusing about Zeiss Jena bins, and there are quite a lot of them on eBay at the moment, apparently going for around the £80 - £100 mark.

Would these be a good choice for occasional use? I wear glasses, so eye relief is an issue. They're obviously affordable and of high quality, but are there any drawbacks/caveats? Is Deltrintem better than Jenoptem? Deltrintem IQ better than Deltrintem?

As I won't have to lug them around, would the relatively ungainly 10x50 confer any significant advantage over the very neat looking 8x30?

Any wisdom/advice gratefully received!

Cheers,
John

[henry link]

There is excellent infomation on the Holger Merlitz website, including a 1985 CZJ catalogue in English, here: http://www.holgermerlitz.de/czj_85/czj_85.html

The designation "1Q" has been discussed here with general agreement that it means absolutely nothing. Both the 8x30 and 10x50 have short eye relief. Neither was classed as a B type binocular for eyeglass wearers. Both the Deltrintems and the Dekarems were in production for about 60 years. Multi-coating and fold down rubber eyecups were only adopted in the mid 80's. Earlier samples will have hard eyecups and single layer coating, or no coating at all if pre-WWII.

BTW these were not expensive binoculars in the UK when they were new. I'm looking at a London Camera Exchange price list from 1991. The 8x30 Deltrintem is 55 pounds and the 10x50 Dekarem is 95 pounds. The Jenoptem versions would have been about 20 pounds less.

[IanF]

I still have my 8x30 Zeiss Jenas bought 40 yrs ago and they still give a very good bright and crisp view. My wife uses them in preference to other newer ones.

I wear spectacles nowadays and I find the short eye relief of the Jenas a problem. They're okay if you don't mind lifting your spectacles but the view is pretty narrow when viewing through them.

[xenophobe]

Your 8x20 Trinovids are going to be better than almost any of the new binoculars you'd find in the $200-300 price range, IMO. Sorry, I can't comment on older Zeiss Jena binoculars. I know many of them are real nice, but it's been some time since I've looked through any.

For what it's worth, I have a pair of the 10x25 BCA Trinovids and they're absolutely amazing, and give my Zeiss 10x40b Classics a run for their money during normal daylight hours...

[johnhub]

Thanks very much, guys. The eye relief issue means that I'm probably going to take a raincheck and reconsider. I'll stick with the compacts until I've got some more dosh!

Cheers,
John :clap: