What glasses were used on the Zeiss Victory Pocket VP8x25 and VP10x25? (1 Viewer)

[jcnguyen09]

I recently got the Zeiss VP 8x25 and attempted to compare the glass quality with the Victory SF 8x42. I can tell either the glasses or the coatings might be different. The color on the SF 8x42 is more vivid and richer and the contrast is sharper. Could be different because the difference in apertures and light volumes as well. The question is "Does Zeiss use the same glasses on the VP and other Victory SF 32 and SF 42 ? It could be different since SF is made in Germany and VP x25 is from Japan.

 

[John A Roberts]

Hi JC,

The short answer is: 'No one outside of Zeiss knows' and the same is the case with the other optics manufacturers.

There are various manufacturers of optical glass, with three of the major producers of high quality glass being Schott, Hoya and Hikari/ Nikon.
See a link for each in post #12 at: Glass types in NL Pure-series
And while each has a comprehensive catalogue of optical glass, it's only a small part of their overall production.

Binocular manufacturers use a variety of glass in each model, depending on the optical needs/ performance balance that they’ve chosen
(including the price point).

The optical designs of the Zeiss Pocket x25 and the the SF x42 are fundamentally different (the number of lenses and groupings), and so the glass used for the individual lenses will differ. Likewise the optical designs of SF x32 and x42 are also significantly different, so again the glass used will differ.

- - - -
One of the things that needs to be considered is the difference between objective transmission and subjective/ perceived brightness.

As an example, I have a Leica UV 8x20 along with a UV HD 8x42. From the comprehensive work of Gijs van Ginkel (at: Verrekijker testen | House Of Outdoor & Optics ), we know that the 8x20 has significantly higher transmission than the 8x42. See a graph of the 8x20 UV from a 2020 test, and a graph comparing the 8x42 UV HD and UV HD+ from a 2016 test.

However, even in bright conditions (where the 8x20’s smaller exit pupil is not an issue), the image from the larger model is perceptibly brighter.


John

 

[jcnguyen09]

John, Thank you for your very valuable technical information. I am more of the binoculars user and gain some knowledge and experience as a users but not much deep dive into technical details of the optics. The optical quality would set the price ranges for sure. Zeiss victory series go from $2.5K-$2K for SF to $700 for VP. Pretty much that huge gap in cost can give the perception that VP might have a cheaper, different type of glasses on them. But as you said No body could know for sure except Zeiss!

 

[tenex]

From the comprehensive work of Gijs van Ginkel at Verrekijker testen...

Prodded by your link, I just verified that (thanks to my new PC) I can now load the House of Outdoor website, so I have some long-postponed reading to do! I'm posting this for the benefit of a few other members here who also reported getting only an error code when trying to access it. As I suspected, this site is unusually intolerant of outdated browsers for some reason -- in fact the only site I ever encountered that behaved this way.

 

[Troubador]

John, Thank you for your very valuable technical information. I am more of the binoculars user and gain some knowledge and experience as a users but not much deep dive into technical details of the optics. The optical quality would set the price ranges for sure. Zeiss victory series go from $2.5K-$2K for SF to $700 for VP. Pretty much that huge gap in cost can give the perception that VP might have a cheaper, different type of glasses on them. But as you said No body could know for sure except Zeiss!

Dont forget that the smaller size of the VPs mean the lenses, prisms and optical tubes are much smaller than the SF32's and 42's and this will result in a substantial cost saving.

Lee