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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Brunton Epoch FXN85 Impressions (1 Viewer)

kankushok

Active member
I thought I'd make a new thread to discuss the Brunton Epoch 8.5x43. The discussion seems to be taking over the bargain thread a little bit. I managed to get a pair at 250 USD, and would like to share my impressions after about a week and half of playing with them. Since this is my first pair of binoculars, I don't have much to compare them to, so my impressions will mostly be based on what I remember from trying binoculars like the monarch 3/5, pentax dcf, leupold yosemite/mojave, and REI brand binoculars in store. In addition, I have experience with optics from photography.

Build and ergonomics:

These binoculars are the best built of the binoculars I have seen so far. It's a nice grippy rubber over a magnesium frame.

The eyecups twist out in three steps which are labeled 12,15, and 18. The twist out mechanism is quite loose. It's easy to pull them out on accident. Unfortunately, the eyecups don't seem to pull far out enough form me. Without glasses, I'm unable to brace my face against the eyecups without obscuring the image even with the eyecups pulled all the way out. Without bracing against my face, I find it more difficult to hold the binoculars steady. With glasses, I find myself using it with the 15 mm setting.

There are little rubber dots on the diopter and focus knob. These help with grip, and imo they look good. The diopter adjustement has an arrow and indices to indicate the current setting. The diopter can be unlocked and adjusted by pulling out. This adjustment is pretty stiff, so that the diopter adjustment doesn't get moved accidentally. Not a quality issue perhaps, but a bit of an aesthetic annoyance for me is that the diopter adjustment leaves a bit of a gap between it and the eyecup when in the locked position in order to leave space for the unlocked position. The diopter adjustment range must be a little bit limited. It takes a lot of adjustment to make a difference for me. This is in contrast with my experience with the pentax dcf.

While others have reported stiff focusing knobs, mine seems to be well damped without feeling stiff. The focus knob has about 315 degrees of travel. The travel is very smooth when focusing from infinity to mfd, but going the other way there are two or three slight bumps along the way.

Accessories:
The brunton's came with a nice leather case. So nice, that I probably will never use it. It looks like the kind of soft leather that accumulates scratches if you look at it wrong. Also, the placement of the rivets in the case is a bit odd. Some of them left little indents in the rubber armor of my binoculars. Instead of lens caps, brunton has supplied two neoprene sleeves that slide over the binoculars. They are easy to slide on and off, and probably provide a decent bit of protection. They are designed with holes so that the neck strap threads through them. The drawback is that it is a bit annoying to have them flopping about when using the binoculars.

Optics:
There were two things I noticed straight away. First was that the eye placement is a bit tricky with these binoculars. It's a bit difficult to get a full view. Second was that the viewing is very easy on the eyes. With binoculars I tried at the store, I always ended up with a mild headache. I've had no headache/eyestrain problems with the brunton. The view is extremely bright. Playing around after dark in my apartment, the view seems brighter than the naked eye (yeah that's impossible). Details jump out at you even at extremely low light levels. The view was definitely better than any of the binoculars I tried in store. At this point I was quite impressed.

However, the story was quite different when I took it outside. My pair of brunton's suffered from excessive amounts of CA. In focus areas were good, but anything out of focus with direct sunlight looked like christmas. This occurred right into the center of the image. This is the red/green CA that the camera world calls Longitudinal CA rather than the purple fringing type. I tested the brunton's on the CA torture test against backlit blinds. If I get my eye placement just right, I can make basically all the CA go away, but shift focus slightly and it's Christmas again. It's great that in focus areas have essentially no CA, but looking into a backlit tree and having all the out of focus branches shimmering in red/green is not particularly pleasing. The same problem occurs when looking for a bird in a field of grass. All the out of focus grasses are fringed in red and green. I have no idea if this is normal performance in binoculars, but it certainly is more CA than I would accept in any of my camera optics.

I love the comfortable views and low-light performance of the brunton's, but the CA issue leaves me not entirely satisfied. If I had paid the 800-1300 dollar prices that brunton was asking before the clearance, I likely would have been very displeased. As it is, I think that these binoculars are just ok for the price. I'm thinking of trying to exchange them with botach for another pair. Hopefully, I get one with no CA and comfortable viewing. Hopefully, others looking at getting the brunton's on clearance will find this review helpful, since I've seen so few reports on the brunton epochs.
 
Last edited:
I thought I'd make a new thread to discuss the Brunton Epoch 8.5x43. The discussion seems to be taking over the bargain thread a little bit. I managed to get a pair at 250 USD, and would like to share my impressions after about a week and half of playing with them. Since this is my first pair of binoculars, I don't have much to compare them to, so my impressions will mostly be based on what I remember from trying binoculars like the monarch 3/5, pentax dcf, leupold yosemite/mojave, and REI brand binoculars in store. In addition, I have experience with optics from photography.

Build and ergonomics:

These binoculars are the best built of the binoculars I have seen so far. It's a nice grippy rubber over a magnesium frame.

The eyecups twist out in three steps which are labeled 12,15, and 18. The twist out mechanism is quite loose. It's easy to pull them out on accident. Unfortunately, the eyecups don't seem to pull far out enough form me. Without glasses, I'm unable to brace my face against the eyecups without obscuring the image even with the eyecups pulled all the way out. Without bracing against my face, I find it more difficult to hold the binoculars steady. With glasses, I find myself using it with the 15 mm setting.

There are little rubber dots on the diopter and focus knob. These help with grip, and imo they look good. The diopter adjustement has an arrow and indices to indicate the current setting. The diopter can be unlocked and adjusted by pulling out. This adjustment is pretty stiff, so that the diopter adjustment doesn't get moved accidentally. Not a quality issue perhaps, but a bit of an aesthetic annoyance for me is that the diopter adjustment leaves a bit of a gap between it and the eyecup when in the locked position in order to leave space for the unlocked position. The diopter adjustment range must be a little bit limited. It takes a lot of adjustment to make a difference for me. This is in contrast with my experience with the pentax dcf.

While others have reported stiff focusing knobs, mine seems to be well damped without feeling stiff. The focus knob has about 315 degrees of travel. The travel is very smooth when focusing from infinity to mfd, but going the other way there are two or three slight bumps along the way.

Accessories:
The brunton's came with a nice leather case. So nice, that I probably will never use it. It looks like the kind of soft leather that accumulates scratches if you look at it wrong. Also, the placement of the rivets in the case is a bit odd. Some of them left little indents in the rubber armor of my binoculars. Instead of lens caps, brunton has supplied two neoprene sleeves that slide over the binoculars. They are easy to slide on and off, and probably provide a decent bit of protection. They are designed with holes so that the neck strap threads through them. The drawback is that it is a bit annoying to have them flopping about when using the binoculars.

Optics:
There were two things I noticed straight away. First was that the eye placement is a bit tricky with these binoculars. It's a bit difficult to get a full view. Second was that the viewing is very easy on the eyes. With binoculars I tried at the store, I always ended up with a mild headache. I've had no headache/eyestrain problems with the brunton. The view is extremely bright. Playing around after dark in my apartment, the view seems brighter than the naked eye (yeah that's impossible). Details jump out at you even at extremely low light levels. The view was definitely better than any of the binoculars I tried in store. At this point I was quite impressed.

However, the story was quite different when I took it outside. My pair of brunton's suffered from excessive amounts of CA. In focus areas were good, but anything out of focus with direct sunlight looked like christmas. This occurred right into the center of the image. This is the red/green CA that the camera world calls Longitudinal CA rather than the purple fringing type. I tested the brunton's on the CA torture test against backlit blinds. If I get my eye placement just right, I can make basically all the CA go away, but shift focus slightly and it's Christmas again. It's great that in focus areas have essentially no CA, but looking into a backlit tree and having all the out of focus branches shimmering in red/green is not particularly pleasing. The same problem occurs when looking for a bird in a field of grass. All the out of focus grasses are fringed in red and green. I have no idea if this is normal performance in binoculars, but it certainly is more CA than I would accept in any of my camera optics.

I love the comfortable views and low-light performance of the brunton's, but the CA issue leaves me not entirely satisfied. If I had paid the 800-1300 dollar prices that brunton was asking before the clearance, I likely would have been very displeased. As it is, I think that these binoculars are just ok for the price. I'm thinking of trying to exchange them with botach for another pair. Hopefully, I get one with no CA and comfortable viewing. Hopefully, others looking at getting the brunton's on clearance will find this review helpful, since I've seen so few reports on the brunton epochs.
I warned you about the Brunton's. They never impressed me even for $250. I believe they use cheap glass that gives you all that CA. Expensive binoculars like Swarovski's and Zeiss even if the glass is not ED glass use way higher qualiity glass. Try the Nikon Monarch 5 or the Vanguard Endeavor ED for $250. You get what you pay for. Most of the time.
 
Yes, I wish I'd gone for the Cabelas deal on the Endeavor 8x32s in hindsight, but then again I wasn't impressed with Vanguard's QC in the past, and there are actually more reports of CA with the Endeavors (old version) than the brunton. Then again, there are probably a lot more endeavors in the wild than epochs.
 
Yes, I wish I'd gone for the Cabelas deal on the Endeavor 8x32s in hindsight, but then again I wasn't impressed with Vanguard's QC in the past, and there are actually more reports of CA with the Endeavors (old version) than the brunton. Then again, there are probably a lot more endeavors in the wild than epochs.
I had the 8x42 Endeavors HD's and the CA wasn't that bad. One of the better binoculars for CA is an older Zeiss 8x32 FL. They put some good ED glass in that one yes they do.
 
Might be yours is not a good sample. Mine, not purchased from Botach but with similar discounted price, is fairly good at controlling CA. The focuser is smooth with right resistant. I have the sv8.5x42 for direct comparsion. The Epoch is surely a sub-alpha class. Optically pretty much a Zeiss Conquest HD standard. Some more & some less.
 
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