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Hawke "Endurance" Close-Focus PC 8x32 (1 Viewer)

Sancho

Well-known member
Europe
Just wondering if anyone has tried these. They look lik cheap-and-cheerful 8x32 that might suit kids or beginners. 19oz seems pretty light. Any thoughts?
 
I'm considering them myself for use in the kayak or as car bins. The Endurance is not phase coated. The older Frontier is and it is still available for a few dollars more on that there auction site. Same body style. I may give them a try.
 
I just bought a pair of 10x32 Frontier untried, velly cheap new (sub £80) thanks to Clifton Camera on that auction site.
I saw they had a velly cheap (I think all these chinese bins are affecting my accent?) 8x42. I had to resist.

Anyhow the Frontier is velly nice for the money. Nice little package. Smaller than my Leica 10x32. No major problems, so far. Goes off a bit in very dull light otherwise the transmission does seem pretty good.

Certainly a great kitchen bin. Don't know about the endurance but I did see a short review which said the Frontier was a bit sharper and I wouldn't note it for being particularly sharp once you wobble your way to the correct focus but its certainly not bad and a defo keeper for me.
 
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Bit late coming to this thread but I own the Endurance 8x32 CF and they are good for the money (around £100 or maybe cheaper on Ebay)

I am after some Endurance 10x42 CF now as I need some bigger bins on a budget.

Edit: I found that you can get the Hawke Frontier Phase Corrected 8x32 for around the same price as the Endurance and the 10x32 for about £79 which is around half-price. Presume it's because they are a discontinued model.


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Hi

Late too, but have just returned Hawke Endurance PC 8x32 which was bought for nearly £100 with several similarly priced pairs, intended as part of a collection of gifts for family abroad.

They weren't a patch on the best so far, Nikon 7x35 Action porro at £50, or even the Bushnell 7x36 Excursion/Birder EX roof prism at £115, which is very similar to the Hawke in size and outside design.

The Hawke which I received may well have been a poor example but, in the comparison above, the view was markedly darker and less sharp.

Regards
Chris
 
Bit of stray light around the eyepiece edges.

Before buying the Frontier 10x32 I had been pondering these 9x36 but they come in 7.5 I think also. Probably very similar to the Frontier.

http://www.bristolcameras.co.uk/pro...=visionary-inara-9x36-binocular#Specification

Wow! I thought the Leicas were small for their size, but the Hawke is even smaller, practically a compact.

I went back to the store last week and tried the 8x36 Frontier ED. It appears to have the same body as the ZR ED3. Very comfortable, smooth focuser wheel (in both directions!), comfortable eyecups and wide field of view.

Images are crisp and clean, but there is noticeable pincushion across the field. Next time I will take my 8x EII with me and compare the level of pincushion.

The fall off at the edges is pretty far out, man. I don't find it disturbing, but it was a sunny day, so I'm less likely to notice field curvature than if it were overcast. So I will go back on a cloudy day and do the A/B.

The price is $299, which seems pretty good. I don't have the 7x36 ED2 to compare, though from memory, the ZR appeared brighter and perhaps sharper at the center, but worse off axis with aberrations.

I'm spoiled rotten with my Nikons (SE and EII). Hard to please me with a roof until you get to the second tier, at least. But if the focuser keeps on rollin in the cold when my porro focusers freeze up, it might be worth it. Haven't seen anything better for the price except perhaps the Vortex 8x42 Fury, which was brighter, though not as wide FOV.

As much as I like the 8.1* FOV in the 8x36 ED, I wish they would have pulled back to 7.5 so they could have reduced the pincushion. I know from the 8x32 EL, you can do 8* without excessive pincushion, but considering the VAST difference in price, perhaps it's not so easy to achieve that balance at the $300 price point. A 60* AFOV might be the limit @ $300.

<B>
 
Just wondering if anyone has tried these. They look lik cheap-and-cheerful 8x32 that might suit kids or beginners. 19oz seems pretty light. Any thoughts?
Hi again Sancho

I also tried Leupold 6x30 and Kowa 6x30 porros too but they were not up to the Nikon 7x35 EX either.

I even got the more expensive Bushnell 8x42 Legend Ultra-HDs which are a tad brighter but still prefer Nikon 7x35 EX for its steadier (= apparently clearer) view and greater depth of view, which makes it so easy to use. The shape of Nikon EX just sits in the hand and does not need to be grasped.

I still really want a smaller neater lighter roof prism around 7x32 but Vortex Fury 6.5x36 was not up to 7x35 EX either, and Viper/Viper ED seemed too much to spend. It bears out the dictum, here, that porros are better value and, also based upon opinions here, have just ordered both Nikon Travelite V 9x25 and a Travelite EX/Prostaff 8x25 to compare with it, and perhaps they may be in the kids or beginner category. The EX/Prostaff has 110m field vs. 296ft for V, and twist-up instead of rubber eye cups - will report....

Regards
Chris
 
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Just got a pair of of Hawke endurance 8x32 cf pc { New phase corrected model } great little pair of bins clear bright nice wide field and compact. Not tried in the field yet but been great garden bird window sill bins keepers for me. Chris
 
I wanted something compact and WP that would be inexpensive and good to carry on holidays when my heavier HRWP 8x42 wouldn't be the choice, (starting with a wintery week on the Isle of Mull soon).
I was checking out some 8x32 Opticron Travellers and a Viking MD 8x32 at a local Ebay seller's warehouse. They also had the Endurance PC 8x32 in stock (at ~£70). It turned out that the MD's are pretty big and Travellers didn't have the "pop" that the Endurance PC's have for me.

I bought two pairs (one for wife too). They are much better than I expected them to be. A good sized sweet spot of more than 50%, nice AFOV, a little warm colouration, slightly less bright than my 7x36 Excursions but good for day work. The killer for me in bins at this level has turned out to be CA but this is fairly well controlled and better than the Excursion 7x36.

A good buy, These will replace my Excursion EX 8x28 which don't get used much (since I acquired a few nice porros that raised my expectation of bins, significantly).

I'll be able to comment a little more after a week's use.

Dave
 
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Hawke Edurance PC 8x32

We had a week on a cold and windy Isle of Mull looking for wildlife, particularly Sea Eagles and Golden Eagles (Got pretty good views several times).
We carried these bins each day for a week whilst we walked and whilst we waited and watched from recommended vantage points. Nearly all the time, we wore gloves, that wind gave a real chill!
I am quite pleased with their performance. A yellow tint, not enough to spoil our view and really only noticeable when comparing directly between other bins (Monarch & HRWP). They have a fairly wide FOV, ~130/1000 and a surprisingly good sized sweet-spot of more than 50%, the loss of detail degrading quite gently out of this area.
I thought that CA is well controlled within the sweet-spot (significantly better than our Monarch 8x42) and the view is bright enough, quite comparable to the Monarch although perhaps giving the perception of slightly lower contrast, due (I believe) to the warmer cast.

I did note on more than one occasion that, as I panned from around 50degrees from the Sun (yes, we had sun!) nearer to the Sun, my view was flashed as the bins "flared", two or three times as the angle of view to the sun deceased. I can't compare this to any of my other bins (I didn't have others on the day), so can't suggest if this is typical or not, but is just one of those things that are so difficult to quantify or compare.

Now we've been at home for a while, I've had more opportunity to play with them. I had a small difficulty in getting used to the focussing of my bins, not too unusual for me and possibly a lot to do with wearing gloves. When checking very carefully, I found that the focus knob has some play. Not a portion of rotation that is clearly slack or easy, but a fairly well damped 4mm during which nothing happens. I can just feel when the knob begins to engage the mechanism within. Had I noticed this when checking them at the place I bought them from, I would not have touched them, but in use it's less of a problem now that I understand what's happening.

My wife's pair has the same play, but have a slightly narrower sweet-spot.
Despite the focus play and slight yellow tint, they are keepers. These are likely (my wife tells me) to make her Nikon Monarch 8x42 bins redundant. For me , they don't compete with my SRGA8x32 poros, but then I needed a compact WP and inexpensive pair for winter and travel, so fit the bill.

Dave
 
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