Used the Maven customization process (1 Viewer)

I finally decided to get a new outfit for my B 2 and decided to order an 8x30 B 3. I was curious to see how that played out. I actually spent quite a bit of time on the site deciding what I was going to do.

For the big B 2 I went with a Kryptec Highlander camo finish. I'm not a big fan of Camo in general, but I have a Leupold Mojave Guide Pro HD with the black Kryptec Typhon finish that looks pretty nice, so Kryptec it was. SO I went with that armor and generally black accoutrements, except for a gray focus wheel and green objective rings. The green objective rings pretty well hide at the end of the camo finish and you have to look to see them. The are sort of hidden by the objective covers anyway.

The camo finish is applied to the rubber in a hydro dip process and it is claimed that the treated surface is a bit slicker than the regular gray or black armor of the stock finish. Well yes the finish is a bit slicker, but not enough to loose its nicely grippable surface. Overall I'm pretty pleased with the result.

I continue to marvel at how good this binocular is.

I went a different route with the B 3. I stayed with the stock black rubber armor. I finished it off with gray central focus knob and gray ocular rings. I added red accents to the top and bottom of the focus wheel and added red objective rings.

I am very well pleased with this binocular. I'm going to post more on it including comparisons to a bunch of other 30-32 mm compacts I have, or have had enough experience with to comment on. The short story is Frank got the B 3 right.

While I was at it I ordered the Maven clam shell cases and a nice cleaning kit.

You can see in the photos my customary tethering of the objective covers to the binocular. The snaps are for the Rick Young harness.

The Op-Tec Adaptits are included with the Maven binoculars.

The fuzzy B 3 is the result of using a different android camera app, I thought that one was better than it turned out to be.

This duo of binoculars is well capable of doing anything that needs done with handheld binoculars for terrestrial viewing.

Steve C said:

I finally decided to get a new outfit for my B 2 and decided to order an 8x30 B 3. I was curious to see how that played out. I actually spent quite a bit of time on the site deciding what I was going to do.

For the big B 2 I went with a Kryptec Highlander camo finish. I'm not a big fan of Camo in general, but I have a Leupold Mojave Guide Pro HD with the black Kryptec Typhon finish that looks pretty nice, so Kryptec it was. SO I went with that armor and generally black accoutrements, except for a gray focus wheel and green objective rings. The green objective rings pretty well hide at the end of the camo finish and you have to look to see them. The are sort of hidden by the objective covers anyway.

The camo finish is applied to the rubber in a hydro dip process and it is claimed that the treated surface is a bit slicker than the regular gray or black armor of the stock finish. Well yes the finish is a bit slicker, but not enough to loose its nicely grippable surface. Overall I'm pretty pleased with the result.

I continue to marvel at how good this binocular is.

I went a different route with the B 3. I stayed with the stock black rubber armor. I finished it off with gray central focus knob and gray ocular rings. I added red accents to the top and bottom of the focus wheel and added red objective rings.

I am very well pleased with this binocular. I'm going to post more on it including comparisons to a bunch of other 30-32 mm compacts I have, or have had enough experience with to comment on. The short story is Frank got the B 3 right.

While I was at it I ordered the Maven clam shell cases and a nice cleaning kit.

You can see in the photos my customary tethering of the objective covers to the binocular. The snaps are for the Rick Young harness.

The Op-Tec Adaptits are included with the Maven binoculars.

The fuzzy B 3 is the result of using a different android camera app, I thought that one was better than it turned out to be.

This duo of binoculars is well capable of doing anything that needs done with handheld binoculars for terrestrial viewing.

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I'm not normally a fan of camo finish either, Toyota Highlander or otherwise, but on the B2 with the black accents, it works. Looks like you're ready for the next Middle East deployment, though I suspect the saber rattling from the 101 elephants is merely for show.

I designed "my" B3 with red objective rings (like the Nikon Prostar, which has red objective rings that signify ED glass), but kept to a minimal gray accents on a black body since gray or black accents are free. The "M" label is red w/out charge.

Now that you've custom color accented your bins, you need to design your custom color ccented Nissan Juke.

Juke Color Studio

<B>

The B2 is one of those things, like some people I suppose, who aren't real photogenic. It just plain looks different in hand than it does from either the Maven site build or from a photo. I was somewhat leery of a camo finish myself, but now I would not change it.

It came down to the two basic approaches I used. I debated about a B3 wardrobe to match the B2, or a B2 to match the B3. I ultimately decided that the B3 looked better in black and the B2 in camo.

Actually the Maven logo is orange. I think the red accents I got would look better as orange with that logo color. The only thing I might change is to use black objective rings on the B2 and maybe a black logo on the B3.

I takes a while to get the process done. Lander, Wyoming and Klamath Falls, Oregon are not places with fast mainstream delivery access. When one looks at sites with maps to compute delivery times, there is a hole in the Klamath Falls and east of here area in Oregon, California, and Nevada that shows the need to allow an extra day or two. It was interesting to watch the UPS tracking destinations as progress was updated. It went from Lander to Riverton to Rock Springs to Casper in WY. It then went to Billings MT. I figured it would go to the big UPS hub in Ontario CA from there. Nope, it went back out of MT, across WY into Commerce City CO. So I figured it would hit Ontario from there. Nope, it went to Lexington KY. Never did go to Ontario as it went to Portland OR from there. This was second day air, which wound up saving a whole day from standard ground shipping...which takes another totally different route.

One thing Maven did, which I appreciate, was they are keeping my original B2 as a demo unit and when they got my payment they sent the build details to San Diego so I got a brand new B2 unit. Since it takes 5-6 days to get it from here to there, that saved a bunch of time. My B2 flunked the initial pre-shipment inspection and it was sent back for a redo. Anyway be aware that it will take maybe two weeks extra to get a customized binocular.

That Nissan looks pretty cool, but I can't imagine feeding cows or pulling the stock trailer to deliver some bulls someplace with it. Now a little 4x4 pickup along those lines would get my attention. I can use the heavy pickups for heavy uses. Kind of like Motorola using a similar customization process on their smartphones. https://www.motorola.com/us/motomaker?pid=FLEXR2&action=designNew

Steve, I had the chance to use the B3 a week or so ago at the Biggest Week in American Birding in Toledo Ohio. They were very impressive, and I ordered a set when I returned home. You get an additional $50 off when you put in the code for this festival. As far as the custom colors go, I poured over the choices on the their site and still ended up with the stock orange,gray and black which some folks here have described as quite ugly, but I think are kind of cool. Jim

hawken 12 said:

Steve, I had the chance to use the B3 a week or so ago at the Biggest Week in American Birding in Toledo Ohio. They were very impressive, and I ordered a set when I returned home. You get an additional $50 off when you put in the code for this festival. As far as the custom colors go, I poured over the choices on the their site and still ended up with the stock orange,gray and black which some folks here have described as quite ugly, but I think are kind of cool. Jim

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I think one of the stock choices are fine really. I did this out of curiosity. I'm going to order a couple of more B3's. The B2 and B3 I have will be my primary two binocular combo, as they will accomplish anything needed from a handheld binocular. Both new B3's will be stock, one for general all around farm use in 8x30 and another in 10x30 for those times when I need to go light and 10x would be nice.

Steve C said:

The B2 and B3 I have will be my primary two binocular combo, as they will accomplish anything needed from a handheld binocular.

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Hi Steve C... You said in your Leupold McKinley review:

Steve C said:

There is really no point in spending more money. That is, unless you are driven by material things.

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The B2 is approximately twice as expensive as the McKinley, so does this mean your purchase of the Maven was driven by material things?

Sweet combo man. Very impressive.

Steve C said:

I finally decided to get a new outfit for my B 2 and decided to order an 8x30 B 3. I was curious to see how that played out. I actually spent quite a bit of time on the site deciding what I was going to do.

For the big B 2 I went with a Kryptec Highlander camo finish. I'm not a big fan of Camo in general, but I have a Leupold Mojave Guide Pro HD with the black Kryptec Typhon finish that looks pretty nice, so Kryptec it was. SO I went with that armor and generally black accoutrements, except for a gray focus wheel and green objective rings. The green objective rings pretty well hide at the end of the camo finish and you have to look to see them. The are sort of hidden by the objective covers anyway.

The camo finish is applied to the rubber in a hydro dip process and it is claimed that the treated surface is a bit slicker than the regular gray or black armor of the stock finish. Well yes the finish is a bit slicker, but not enough to loose its nicely grippable surface. Overall I'm pretty pleased with the result.

I continue to marvel at how good this binocular is.

I went a different route with the B 3. I stayed with the stock black rubber armor. I finished it off with gray central focus knob and gray ocular rings. I added red accents to the top and bottom of the focus wheel and added red objective rings.

I am very well pleased with this binocular. I'm going to post more on it including comparisons to a bunch of other 30-32 mm compacts I have, or have had enough experience with to comment on. The short story is Frank got the B 3 right.

While I was at it I ordered the Maven clam shell cases and a nice cleaning kit.

You can see in the photos my customary tethering of the objective covers to the binocular. The snaps are for the Rick Young harness.

The Op-Tec Adaptits are included with the Maven binoculars.

The fuzzy B 3 is the result of using a different android camera app, I thought that one was better than it turned out to be.

This duo of binoculars is well capable of doing anything that needs done with handheld binoculars for terrestrial viewing.

Click to expand...

I prefer plain old Swaro green in the form of the SV 8x32. I guess I like my binoculars plain jane. It is more important to me what I see with them than what the binoculars look like. Give me an old classic Nikon EII or Leica Trinovid in black and I am happy.