Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics My Yosemites make my eyes hurt

Any idea why this is? If I try to look through them for more than about 20 seconds at a stretch my eyes start hurting. I have an older set of Weaver Classic 8x42s that don't have this problem. When I took them to Yellowstone a couple years ago, I could glass with the Weavers for extended periods of time, and my eyes were fine. Do I just have them focused wrong, or should I just get a different binoc? I love the size and weight of the Yosemites, since they are light enough that I will actually lug them around the NH woods (call me a sissy if you want ). The Weavers are a bit too husky to comfortably lug around all day, and an 8x42 is more than I really need or want for the type of hunting I do.

Might be out of collimation. Eye strain is the symptom of this. Return and try another pair.


http://dictionary.babylon.com/colimation/

When my eyes hurt I look through my 6x Yo's and it makes everything feel better!

Send that pair back!!!

Make sure you are looking through the right end.....



+1 on the collimation, as I had an older set of Leupolds that had to go back. They were killing my eyes, as compared to the view through an "normal" example of the same binocular.

Give up on them immediately and use something else

- talk to your dealer or Leupold

and consider reading the now somewhat aging book on optics by John Barsness on Optics for the Hunter in which the suggestion is made repeatedly that one of things extra money buys is ruggedness - and porro designs are inherently less rugged and so more likely to go out of alignment that is lose collimation.

Consider the 6x32 Katmai - current production is phase coated and improved over first production - for a replacement.

Sounds like a focus problem.
Used my 8x this weekend and I really enjoy them.
Handy and light, but clear.

stumpy

That's a bit harsh. Sure roofs are inherently more rugged than porros, but porros aren't weak or flimsy by any means. I own lots of good binos including roofs (8x42 Pentax DCF & 8x42 Leica Ultravids and porros (6x30 Yosemite, 7x50 Fujinon MTRC, 8x32 Nikon SE and 10x42 Nikon SE). The only one I ever had to have recolimated were the Pentax DCF roofs. I don't take that as evidence that roofs are weaker, just that this pair got knocked out of alignment.

The 6x30 Yosemites are very well respected, they are tough, waterproof, have adjustable eyecups and optics way-way beyond what their price would indicate. I'm sure the OP wouldn't go wrong with 6x32 Katmai's, but the Katmai's are more expensive and I wouldn't presume to tell a stranger how much he can afford to spend. Leupold will certainly fix his Yosemites for free and they should give him years of good, trouble free use as mine have.

John

send them to Leupold - they are out of collimation. Leupold will fix them for free and return them to you for no charge.

drover

out of collimation. or the IPD is not adjusted to your eyes.

Thanks for the help guys! I don't have them in front of me now, but I will snag them later, play with the focus some more, and if that doesn't work I will send them back to Leupold.

I assume you already had the focus under control, so it's probably collimation. One way to test collimation is to move one tube way out of focus with your diopter, then focus on a star with one eye closed, open the other eye and you should see a sharp pinpoint, the in-focus star, within a larger blurred, out-of-focus star. If so the collimation is good, if the two are slightly offset, then the collimation is bad.

John

I played around with the focus some more today, and couldn't get the thing any better, so I am going to give Leupold a call and see what they want to do with them.

Go look at a power line with the binocular. Move the glass away from your eyes so you are looking through the exit pupils. If the line seperates in to two lines or a broken line, or if you can't get it to show a straight line at all, then the collimation is shot.

I'd test them as Steve suggests. The other thing is that the little Leupolds are a very light glass. With 8X magnification, any binocular that light will be tough on the eyes, especially if used from standing. That's why I will not buy them in 8X, only in 6X.
While I think very highly of the 8X Katmais, I won't have one in anything but 6X as well for the same reason. E