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Requesting advice concerning bins (1 Viewer)

Earnest lad

Well-known member
Dear Forum
Please can I ask advice: I bought some binoculars for £4.00 second hand. they are an old pair the make is "Lieberman & Gortz". They are in good condition the lenses arent scratched or anything and there is no double vision. An acquaintance told me this make is a good make. Indeed they do look a solid set of binoculars. However when I look through them I am a little disappointed by what I see. The image is just a little dimmer than I would have hoped perhaps a little "misty" would perhaps be the best way to describe it.
I am therefore thinking it might be a good idea to have them refurbished. I am thinking perhaps these bins might have just got a little dust inside them and someone might be able to clean them inside for me.
On the other hand I am also thinking perhaps it would be a waste of money to pay for a refurb and there proved to be no resultant improvement. Can anyone help please - Ian
 
hi ian

i dont meen to be harsh but the bins you have are not as your friend says good quality, they were sold in department stores all over the place during the 70's and 80's for around £10 to £20 and are not worth refurbishing. i see them all the time at car boot sales for any thing from a pound up to £20!!! more than they cost new and the sellers are convinced that they are top quality!!!! i did find a vintage pair of nikon jb7 made japanese water proof 7x50's with individual focusing eye pieses of excelent quality for there day that would have cost over £100 back in the early 70's or two weeks avarage wages!... they were mint and i paid £15 for them

it could be they are cloudy because of mould or dust on the prisms/internal lenses but it's just as likely there not clear because of there poor quality, you dont say what magnification they are but if its around 15 or 20x with a 50mm objective that could be part of the reason there dim. most of the cheaper vintage boots, zenith, mark schefell, tasco(althogh a few old tascos are good) ranger and a load of others i cant recall now are pretty bad opticaly there were just as many bad bins back then as there are now unfortunatly, i think it would cost you at least £50 to get them cleaned

ps for £50 you could buy your self a pair of nikon action 7x35 porro's. i got some for my dad for his birthday to replace his cheap ruby coated orion optics 8x40's which were truly awfull, he bought them at a country fair also for £50... a shame because he thought they were good until i showed him what else he could have had for £50
the nikons were sharp, bright with a good wide fov and sharp centre image... he was very pleased with them and i must say i was impressed also for £50, which is why i bought them for him.

regards mark
 
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Hi - thank you so much for this information. It is good to find out the truth even though tis not pleasant .
The bins are 7 X50 incidentally when I look down the bins "the wrong way" I can see dust and spots inside them.
Please do you think if I were to personally unscrew the bins and give the lens/prisms a careful clean before reassembling the bins it would likely improve them or is it likely I would ruin them
Your kind advice would be appreciated
Yours sincerely
Ian
ps The Nikon bins you mentioned - they sound good. What model did you say they are called precisely please
 
I think disassembling them sounds like a fun experiment. You may not get a useful pair, but you will learn something. There are alignments to adjust, those you should not touch, as they will be hard to get back.
 
hi ian

its not such bad news, as you say they only cost £4.
about taking them apart... you will definatly have a big problem aligning them correctly when reasembling and end up with double images and prism lean. the alignment needs to be so precise with the prisms and lenses which is why its so expensive to have them cleaned or repaired. just unscrewing an objective lens bell will affect collimation/alignment as most older bins were partially collimated useing eccentric rings around the objective lenses.
if the glass is contaminated with mould theres a good chance that its etched into any coatings and you wont be able to remove all traces of it.

the nikon action 7x35's i was talking about are still cheap bins but there performance isn't bad they do have multi coated objective lenses though all other air glass surfaces are single coated and a very wide field of view i think over 10 degree's as appose to your 7x50's 7 degree's fov they are still very bright with 5mm exit pupils and good enough for use in any lighting conditions including very poor light. they do have a good sharp centre field although the edge is a little soft.
i used them for a little star gazing before wrapping them up for my dads birthday and they perform really well, stars snap into focus and are very sharp in the central 50% portion of the fov but it does drop off rapidly towards the edge, not quite as noticable in day time use though.
eye relief with the fold down eye cups isnt too good if you ware glasses but fine if you dont.
the eye piece bridges are noted on the action range as being a weak spot, not so much a case of them being easy to break but more to do with flex in the bridges allowing a see saw like rocking but this isnt to much of a problem providing you dont push them against your eyes to hard throwing out focus.
they can be found for around £50 most places on the net but some retial outlets will charge £79 - £100!!! dont pay that much for them. i got mine of a well known internet auction site for £47 plus £4.50 p+p.
they do look stunning and come with a nice soft case, lens caps, rain guard and wide neck strap... probably the best bins your going to get for this price new and a good starting point to get you going.

regards mark
 
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