What are these? (1 Viewer)

Bought today for peanuts!!

They're actually quite good with a sharp crisp image with a wide field of view and a pleasing 3d view, looks like they've had a knock or two but the optics are still fine and perfectly columnated. Looking down the objectives spots of fungi can be seen though I expect this could easily be dealt with? Doesn't seem to effect the view though.

The bridge and focus action is very solid and tight, the focus wheel glides effortlessly with no backlash or horrible squelching noises from excessive lubricants!!

They read as featherlight magnesium (they're not!!!) 10x50

Finally..

If anything, what would these sell at or pos part exchange?

Matt

Well they are Japanese - circa 1970's to 1990's. I had a pair of 'Limers' that were similar - 'B' body style, Bak-4 Prisms and deep blue M.C. coatings. Mine are 6.5 degree FOV. The focuser was not as long as your model. Build and optical qualties are good with the Limers. I believe 'Baush and Lomb', 'Bisley' and 'Scope' produced a similar design bino to yours as well.

Chris

They look like the Bushnell Featherlight II from the 60's, as shown on Fan Tao's website here:

http://fantao.home.att.net/feather2.htm

As the website says, these are the forerunners of the 'Custom' models, the 10x50 of which I have. Like Fan I think they are very good, and personally, I love their ergonomics.
These later Customs were one of the best sold by Bushnell, and in fact in a very early Consumer Reports that I have from the early 80s, they are shown as being sold for $295?, which was a lot of money back then. They should be worth $100-$200 depending on condition.

brentwood said:

As the website says, these are the forerunners of the 'Custom' models, the 10x50 of which I have. Like Fan I think they are very good, and personally, I love their ergonomics.
These later Customs were one of the best sold by Bushnell, and in fact in a very early Consumer Reports that I have from the early 80s, they are shown as being sold for $295?, which was a lot of money back then. They should be worth $100-$200 depending on condition.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the replies!!

I found the above posted link during a quick search last night, I took them out and used them on the local patch tonight watching plovers in the fields...I'd always been under the impression that old/vintage bins would be terrible to use and pittied birders of old but not now!!

As someone who has been using 7x42's for the last few years it has been interesting using the larger 10x bins, my next bins are still going to be 8x30 something roofs but can see the advantages of using something more powerful, especialy for mid to long range viewing!!

I've now placed the above bins in the classifieds..

Matt