Swaro 8.5ELs vs Zeiss FL 8x42 vs leica Ultravid 10x42 (1 Viewer)

Hello to all, this is my first post on birdforum, but I have been lurking over the last few weeks and enjoying immensely the discussion on top end bins, which I have been interested in over the last few years.

I recently traded in my 8.5x42 ELs for the new Zeiss 8x42 FL - a small but worthwhile improvement and the Zeiss were undoubtedly brighter and ultimately showing finer detail. All relative of course, the Swaros are still wonderful bins . I think I just found the Zeiss image more inviting, I couldn't get enough of the view, whereas the Swaro was colder but possibly optically more even over the entire FOV ( I'm no expert, so apologies if I'm not very clear when describing)

Anyway, today, in a fit of recklessness, I went out and bought the Ultravid 10x42. I have owned several leicas before, 8x32BA, 10x42BA and 8x42BN and there is something about them that I love, notably their seemingly bomb-proof construction. Conversely, my ELs suffered from bashed hinges (revealing bare metal) and a focus ring that started to dry up, requiring a 5 week visit to Austria (for the bins, not me!) which was annoying, although Swarowski UK kindly loaned me a replacement pair. I sold my 10x42 BA Trinovids a few years ago, they were great, but the eye relief was not so good and my glasses then were bulky and cumbersome. The Ultravids appear to have more eye relief and I can easily see the entire FOV, in fact they are identical to the Zeiss in that respect. Smaller glasses have helped enormously here, which may be of interest to those who have on-going problems with eye relief.

The Zeiss do have a smallish sweet spot...but its fantastic! The Leicas although 10x, are nearly as bright, but really draw me into whatever I'm viewing with incredible clarity - yes, you do seem to 'see' more detail with 10x. Looking into the shadows in my garden this evening at 9.30pm, the Zeiss were incredible, almost self illuminating and as one would expect, the Leicas were struggling to see much detail at all. As for CA, it depends on the light conditions I think. At times I thought I could see a little using the Zeiss, the Leicas showing definately more - I must stress however, that I was never bothered at all by what the leica showed and it was certainly not as much CA as I saw with the (then) new Zeiss Victorys 10x40, back in 2000. Mostly, I can never detect CA with the Zeiss. The Zeiss do seem to 'bend' vertical subjects (chimneys, pylons etc) a little more than the Leica (sorry, cannot remember the technical term for this), but it hasn't been a problem so far...

I know that I have not been comparing like for like and so far nothing new has been revealed, but its been fascinating to compare the two bins and I hope to get out over the next week or so and road test the leicas some more.

Incidental items: the rain guard on the Zeiss is not good, its too loose and slips off. The Leica rain guard is much tighter bit the objective guards are very stiff and sometimes spring back into the closed position...I fear probably just as that rare wader zips by! This might be merely a question of the new rubber needing to expand a little, I hope so. The Zeiss appear every bit as well built and solid as the leicas although in comparison, they are a little big and more of a 'handful'. Weight wise they are both virtually identical (755-765g), although strangely, the lecias feel heavier - probably my brain seeing and imagining the larger bulkier Zeiss as lighter than it really is!
Now I wish I hadn't traded in the swarovski ELs, i would love to compare them properly alongside these two!

Anyway, apologies for the long post and I hope to follow up these very early comments soon.

Regards

Laurence

Hi Laurence, and a warm "Welcome to Birdforum!" to you from all of us here on the Staff.

Sounds like you're hooked already !

Cheers,

Andy.

Laurence,

No need for apologies, you'll find that most "binocuholics" on this forum tend toward the "longish" post length!

Excellent observations on the Ultravid vs. FL - late last year I made the same evaluations when comparing 7x42 models from Leica and Zeiss. My conclusion was that the Zeiss is THE binocular to buy if CA bothers you, or if you do much evening birding, while the Leica Ultravid seems to excel in most other areas (including build quality). The focus of the Zeiss seems smoother to me, but the older Leica Trinovid models seem to be the smoothest focusing of them all - at least the models I looked at. I also felt that the Leica Ultravids just seemed "heavier", although I'm certain at this point that it is the ruggedness of construction that kind of fools the brain into thinking that it is heavier than it really is. The Trinovids, on the otherhand, really ARE bricks - bulletproof, run-it-over-with-your-car, drop-it-off-a-cliff, neck straining bricks. I absolutely LOVE the rock-solid Trinovid construction and ergonomics, too bad they also weigh as much as a rock!

Anyway, the FL and Ultravid are both marvelous, I'd be happy to own either - almost as much as the Trinovid 7x42 BN that I ended up buying at the end of it all.

Best wishes,
Bawko

Welcome aboard Laurence!

It sounds like the bin bug has struck again. You will find that the rest of us suffer from the same affliction. I wish I could provide exact feedback to you regarding the 10x Ultravids and the 8x FLs, but I have not had a chance to view the world through either pair of glasses.

I can say that I do own a pair of 8.5 ELs and I couldn't be happier with them. I do have a problem here and there with blackouts, but that seems to be the case for me for all bins with longer eye relief. The ER on the EL (18mm) causes me slight problems when panning, but otherwise, they are just outstanding. In my opinion, Swaro, Zeiss and Leica glass are all top-notch. It's when you combine top-notch optics with the EL's ergonomics, you have a bin that is tough to beat.

On the subject of FLs vs. Ultravids, I have done some research into the 7x42 line, as one of the two will be my next pair of bins. So far, I like attributes of both (isn't that always the way?). I appreciate the compact size of the Ultravids, along with the slower focus, eye cup design and build quality. I also like the brighter image of the FLs. I did not really detect a smaller sweet spot on the FLs or increased CA on the Ultravid.

I'm embarrassed to say that I was able to induce a bit of blackout on both bins so I quickly sent them back to Eagle Optics before thoroughly evaluating them. I have since learned to tolerate a bit of blackout if I move abruptly and I am once again interested in the 7x's. That figures. I will have to order both again for a second round of tests. Look for an updated post one of these days.

Congratulations on your recent purchases. They are both wonderful glasses that will provide decades of outstanding service.

Best regards,

Steffan

Steffan,

Not intending to hijack this thread or anything, but I have a suggestion for you regarding the blackout problem you are experiencing with long eye-relief binoculars. Many years ago, when I started buying better binoculars than $19 Tasco special fog-tubes, I found that I would occasionally experience the same blackout phenomenon that you are describing. I finally figured out what it was - and the answer might surprise you. In normal non-binoculared life, we are acustomed to moving our eyes before we move our head, in order to more quickly acquire the new visual target. We do this almost unconsciously. This works great when our entire optical system (the eyeball) moves at once, keeping everything in alignment.

However, with binoculars you have 2 separate optical systems interfacing - the eyeball and the pile-o-lenses in front of it. If we do our normal visual habit of moving our eyeball first then moving our head, the pupil of the eye will shift away from the "cone" of light that is coming in from the binoculars. Result: Blackouts.

The solution is very simple - just get into the habit of always looking straight ahead when viewing the world through binoculars, and moving your head and binoculars to shift the view. After your new view has been acquired, panning around to the edges of the binocular field of vision should be fine and not induce blackouts, but when shifting the entire view just look at the center of the field of view and shift your head and binoculars to the new area of interest. Training myself to do this is what cured my own case of the "blackouts", and has worked ever since.

Hope this helps!
Bawko