Introduction

I recently took these Vanguard Spirit ED 8x42 Binoculars with me on safari to Zimbabwe and below is my in-depth review of them:

Choosing full sized 8x42 binoculars like these Vanguard Spirit ED's as safari binoculars is not an obvious choice as I usually recommend taking mid-sized or even compacts instead that are far easier to pack in with your luggage.

But if you are looking for the best possible performance and are not too fussed about your baggage size, then a quality full sized binocular is the way to go.

Main Highlights

• ED glass lenses (extra low dispersion glass)
• One of the lightest quality full sized binoculars on the market
• 100% Water proof & Fogproof
• Excellent image quality
  
  

The Safari Guide Opinion

The photo of me below using these Vanguard's looking at an elephant was taken by my wife whilst on Safari in Zimbabwe. Whilst binoculars may not seem necessary being so close to something like an elephant, but I find it really interesting is to look at all the little details. Things like their eyes and skin are so incredible and a quality pair of optics like the Vanguard 8x42 Spirit ED can really help you to to appreciate them. I must confess however that my heart was in my mouth, but I also knew that from their body language, that we were not really in much danger and it was far safer for us just to remain calm.

42mm Objective Lenses
My usual choice for a safari binocular is to take a fairly compact and tough pair of binoculars, something like the Steiner 10.5x28 Wildlife Pro Binocular or the excellent Minox 8x33 BL Binoculars that won an award for the Best Safari & Travel Binocular in 2010. The main reason I usually take a compact or mid sized binocular is because I like to keep my luggage as light and compact as possible, but for this trip I knew that as well as the big stuff, I would also be doing a lot of birding early in the mornings and so I decided that I wanted to focus more on the binoculars performance and in particular low light performance. Therefore a "full sized" 8x42 binocular would be ideal:

Binoculars with an 8x magnification and 42mm objective lenses like these Vanguard Spirit ED 8420 are a common choice for bird watching, as they often strike a good compromise between magnification, as wide a field of view as possible, their light gathering potential and size of device.

Like all 8x42 binoculars, these have an Exit Pupil of 5.25 and a Twilight Factor of 18.3, wich both indicate that they are fine for most low light conditions like what you find early in the morning and early evening when most birds and other wildlife is most active. It is important to keep in mind that these figures do not take into account the quality of the lenses and prisms, but they do make it possible to compare the performance of binoculars and as we have already mentioned these Vanguard's do have really good quality lenses, prisms and coatings that will produce a brighter image than inferior binoculars of the same configuration.

Carrying full sized binoculars in the Field
I like to carry my camera as well as my binoculars with me in the field and it is for this reason that I usually opt for a compact that I can easily tuck away in my pocket when not in use. The down sides to this are as we have already discussed the fact that compacts don't produce as high quality images and takinf them in and out of your pocket can also become a pain.

A solution to this is to use your full size binoculars with a harness. That way your hands are free to use your camera and with the best ones, your binoculars are still easily accessed. For more, take a look at a review I wrote on the excellent LockDown Optics Deployment System, a binocular harness that I highly recommend especially if you are going to be doing some walking in the bush

Optics

The biggest selling point of these Vanguard Spirit ED binoculars is the fact that they use ED glass (extra low dispersion glass), that helps to prevent chromatic aberration (color fringing).

They do this by better directing and concentrating the wavelength of light more effectively onto your eyes. Lenses made from extra low dispersion glass have less air bubbles and glass deformities that are more likely to cause image distortion. Because of the costs involved and precision needed to make them, they are only found on high end cameras, telescopes, microscopes and binoculars.

Lens & Prism Coatings
As well as the ED glass, Vanguard have used a whole host of coatings to help produce a bright and high quality image. These coatings are so good that Vanguard say that the 8x42 Spirit ED has a light transmission of up to 90% which "results in a near-perfect viewing experience."

Fully Multi-Coated
The optics on the Vanguard Spirit ED binoculars are fully multi-coated, which means that all air to glass surfaces have received multiple layers of antireflection coatings. This means that they reduce the amount of light reflected away from the lenses and therefore more light gets to your eyes.

Other Coatings include Vanguard's own V-Max coating, which is a silver coating that is applied to the lenses that they say is amongst the "most cutting-edge lens treatments in optics" and that provides near perfect light reflection and will result in a brighter as well as sharper contrasting image.

An Emerald Coating is also added to the objective lenses that they say has been specifically designed to bring you the full spectrum of color within the band of green tones. This idea is specifically aimed at the wildlife and nature observer as it is said to ensure the "most vivid and natural shades of green."

Phase Correction
These Vanguard Spirit ED 8x42 Binoculars use BaK-4 prisms as opposed to the far inferior (and cheaper to make) BK-7 prisms. On top of this Vanguard have gone a step further and added a set of Phase-correction coatings on the prism glass that keeps light in correct color phases with the result of producing clearer images and better color reproduction. This is a feature that is only generally found on high end roof prism binoculars.

Optical Performance

So do all these high spec optical components and coatings add up to produce a superior image? Well as I do with all my reviews, I compared the view through these with my benchmark binoculars, before leaving on safari:

Image Brightness & Quality
Compared to my benchmark 8x42's, the brightness of the image produced was excellent and I therefore rate them very highly.

As well as bright, the image like the 10x42 version is very sharp and is their contrast. One of the coatings that Vanguard use on the lenses (see above) is their own Emerald Coating which they say helps to provide the full spectrum of color within the band of green tones for more vivid and natural shades of green. To be honest with my eyes, I could not notice any differences in the greens when looking at things like trees compared to my benchmark. What I will say however is that when looking through the binoculars, the image does feel very natural and you cant see any tinting of the image that is sometimes noticeable on cheaper pairs of binoculars, especially those with ruby coatings that often have an unnatural greenish tint.

The ED glass obviouslt works well as no matter how hard I tried to look for it, there was no noticeable colour fringing (chromatic aberration) around the edges of objects that you can find with cheaper optics.

The amount of softening of the image on the periphery of the view was excellent and overall I would say that in terms of image quality and compared to other binoculars in their price range these are easily some of the best that you can get. I would also go as far as to say that they are also as good as many binoculars that are much, much more expensive than these.

Field of View & Close Focus
The field of view for the 8x42 Vanguard Spirit ED is 110m at 100m / 330ft at 1000 yards (6.3°) which is pretty good, but they do fall short of the very best. For example the Leica 8x42 Ultravid HD (389ft at 1,000 yards) has a wider field of view, but it must be remembered that these Vanguard's are literally only a fraction of the cost of them.

The minimum close focusing distance is 2.5 meters (8.2ft), which is about average as I consider anything under 6ft to be excellent.

Outer Body

Their weight of 640g (22.6) makes them one of the lightest quality full sized binoculars on the market and their dimensions (145x125mm) are fairly standard for a full sized binocular.

I really like the very tactile hard rubber armoring on the binocular with the comfy thumb indents on the underside of the barrels. This armor will not only help to protect your optics from small knocks and bumps, but also helps with grip in wet conditions.

This rubber also has the added benefits of being less reflective and dampens down any sounds from objects hitting them - things like watches or a wedding ring - something that often happens to me when I grab hold of a pair of binoculars. This sound on exposed metal binoculars or a flash of light being reflected off of them can frighten away easily spooked birds and other wildlife.

Water & Fog Proof
The Spirit ED is completely sealed and filled with dry nitrogen gas to prevent them from fogging up and making them 100% waterproof.

Fully sealed binoculars are not only important in the wet as it will also prevent any small dust particles from entering the system that could ruin your view.

Eye-Relief
The twist-up mechanism on the eyecups work well and they have one fixed intermediate stop. The maximum eye relief is an excellent 19mm, which should be more than enough for most people who wear glasses.

Non-eyeglass wearers will just use the eyecups in the fully extended position. But if you do wear glasses, you can adjust them to the distance that works best for you to ensure that you view the full field of view without having to remove your glasses.

Focusing
The focussing wheel on the Vanguard 8x42 Spirit ED not only looks good, with it's silver trim and the grooved rubber track on it but it only takes about 3/4 of a turn to go from infinity to it's closest focusing distance of 2.5 meters (8.2ft).

This means that focusing from near to far (or vise versa) is very quick. With such an aggressive mechanism it can however make it a little trickier to fine tune your focus as any small movement of the wheel moves the focusing plane a relitively big distance, than on less aggressive mechanisms.

The diopter adjustment that is used to correctly set up the binoculars to accomodate for the differences in your eyes is located on the right barrel near the eye-cup and consists of an etched hard rubber ring. On my pair, it was smooth and easy to adjust, whilst tight enough to ensure that it will not move to easily accidentally.

Also Included

I do like the soft black carry case that is of good quality as is the very good quality as well as comfortable neck strap.

A nice feature of these Vanguard binoculars is that you can convert the neck strap to the carry bag strap using the clips. This allows you to have a very comfortable and longer carry bag strap but you can also then quickly move the strap back onto the binoculars when using them.

The plastic lens caps fit well and should not accidentally fall off they also have fittings that enable you to loop them through the neck strap.

A lens cleaning cloth is also supplied.

Main Specifications

• Magnification: 8x
• Objective Lens Diameter: 42mm
• Exit Pupil: 5.3
• Twilight Factor: 18.33
• Eye Relief: 19mm
• Weight: 22.6ozs (641g)
• Length: 5.7in (14.5cm)
• Width: 4.9in (12.4cm)
• Prism Type: Roof Prism Binoculars
• Real field of view: 6.3°
• Apparent field of view: 50.4°
• Field of View: 110m at 1,000 meters
• Field of View: 330ft at 1,000 yards
• Close Focus Distance: 8.2ft
• Waterproof: Yes
• Fogproof: Yes
• Lens Coatings: Fully Multi-Coated
• Phase Correction Coatings: Yes
• Extra Low Dispersion Glass: Yes
• Tripod Adaptable: Yes
  
  

Cost & Where to Buy

Priced at around £260 - £300 ($250 - $280), I think that you are getting and extreamly good quality pair of optics for your money

UK Shoppers Buy in the UK:	US Shoppers Buy in the USA:
Vanguard Spirit ED Binoculars on Amazon.co.uk	Vanguard Spirit ED Binoculars on Amazon.com

 

Conclusion

Overall if you are looking for a binocular with very high quality optics that translates to an extremely good view, but don't fancy spending the large sums of money that the "top end" brand names sell for, then I highly recommend these Vanguard 8x42 Spirit ED Binoculars.

Strong Areas: The fact that Vanguard have managed to include so many top quality features including ED glass into a binocular and keep it down to the price that they have, is very impressive. The view through them is excellent as is their low weight and I just love the quality of the extras like the nicely padded neck strap that doubles as the carry strap for it's case.

Weak Areas: It would have been nice if they had a slightly wider field of view and possibly a closer minimum focusing distance.

Similar Binoculars

Other Full Sized Binoculars that I have reviewed:

Top of the range Mid-sized Binoculars:

 

 

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