Resisting after-holiday sales of already discounted Chinese equipment is not one of
my strengths. So when these binos appeared locally for $99 I couldn't resist trying them
out. This pair retails for $150 normally and they are not in Barska's bottom pricing
bracket. They are FMC, rubber coated, sport a center reinforcing bar and 3.3 degree
field. They are housed in a hard leather case.The clincher was my in-store test for
balance- they are remarkably lightweight and balance easily by holding the objective
cells. I surmise that the barrels are plastic or thin aluminum, suggesting poor durability
but I always take care of my equipment anyway- no drops. My in-store test against a
wall grid 50 feet away also suggested a fairly flat field with low edge distortion. Eye
relief was very comfortable using glasses. All optics do show the telltale blue-green tint
of FMC, so I was pleased with that feature.
After getting these babies home, I was immediately faced with mounting options.
While it is actually possible to handhold them for a few minutes, the 20x magnification
prohibits this for any extended time. I planned to use my Burgess Tiny Titan parallelogram
mount rated for 2.5 pounds. Since the 20x80s weigh 68 ounces (4.3 pounds), I was
forced to kluge a new counterweight setup and also to reinforce some obvious weak
joints in the mount. This partially worked, I continue to look for other reinforcing options.
First night out on stars revealed some miscollimation, but as I adjusted IPD from narrow
to wide, the collimation improved. More fiddling with focus improved this further. I did
determine that the housing contains prism adjustment screws but at the moment, it is not
really justified. I've spent three nights observing so far, mainly on the M42 region and
clusters in the general vicinity. In a word- optically good, mechanically good, wow
factor very good. The 20x magnification and decent eye relief create a "magnified
window on sky" effect which I find pleasing. Edge distortion is quite low. Color correction
is as good or better on bright objects than my Oberwerk 15x60s. Also, I was able to
show all the Orion belt stars (3 degrees) with maybe another 1/4 degree to spare.
Despite the fact that the prism housing seems sized roughly for a 60mm objective, I did
not notice strong vignetting (light dropoff at the edges). I looked for but did not find any
off-axis glare due to odd reflections inside the barrels. I will say that the optics do not
provide pinpoint sharpness which I have become accustomed to using my Fuji 10x70s.
One indication of this is how the milky way backgound is resolved, into a fuzzy haze or
into thousands of faint stars.The Barskas show a view in between, with partial resolution.
Still- a great result for 1/6 the price of Fujis.
My real surprise so far was a resolved view of M37, dense cluster in Auriga. While it
is bright and large, I have not seen a binocular view yet which resolved the mass of stars
it is composed of. In the Barskas this is accomplished nicely. Perhaps 15 stars are
resolved against a grainy background. It was this view that convinced me to keep the
binos and adapt to whatever quirks they offer. Just for reference, I do also use a pair
of 20x50s. However, they lack enough aperture to really pull M37's stars out of the
murk. So my M37 encounter is clearly the result of improved bino performance. The
nights these tests were performed also included a bright 5-7 day moon. Turning to
the moon itself revealed good resolution along the terminator as well as a faint star
about to be occulted along the unlit edge.
--------------------
My binos: Nikon 7x35/8x40, Fuji 10x70, Obie 15x60, Barska 20x80
My scopes: 5"f5 newt, 4"f5 TV Genesis, 4"f5 TV 101, 3"f9, 3"f5
ARCO OBSERVATORY 7200'
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