Thread: Cheapy cheap night vision

Hi all . Does anyone have any experience with the super cheap night vision monoculars ? The type you find on AliExpress or Amazon for under a Hundy ? I’m kitted up with a decent sytong thermal monocular and pard nv rifle scope but looking for options for my young son to have a look through on night missions. I played around with the phone app streaming type thing but it’s a dick around. I would prefer something that he can look through on his own . just wanna know if those cheapies are a complete waste of time or not?

I bought a cheap one from AliExpress thinking it would be a fun toy for the kids to play around with.
Was $50 odd. Build quality is really cheap plastic. When I opened it I thought it was going to be junk but it works surprisingly well.
Really good detail on it. 10x zoom, and it's really shaky at max zoom, but can be tripod mounted.
The screen is portrait not landscape which is less ideal than landscape. Field of view is narrow.
Can take photos too. It's definitely a fun toy, but it could be quite usable.
Going camping next week I'll really test it to see if I can see bunnies etc but so far I'm surprised.

I've only used it around the house. Can clearly read the words on a bottle from 10m away, and can see the lemons on the tree from 30m so I'm guessing hares etc will be easily spotted sub 50m. But with such a narrow field of view it might be tricky!

Thanks mate. That’s good to find out about the narrow field of view, it’s something I hadn’t considered.

Originally Posted by Buzz

Hi all . Does anyone have any experience with the super cheap night vision monoculars ? The type you find on AliExpress or Amazon for under a Hundy ? I’m kitted up with a decent sytong thermal monocular and pard nv rifle scope but looking for options for my young son to have a look through on night missions. I played around with the phone app streaming type thing but it’s a dick around. I would prefer something that he can look through on his own . just wanna know if those cheapies are a complete waste of time or not?

I might have a pair of Aliexpress nightvision "binos", the same cheap stuff you're talking about. If I find them tomorrow I'll send them to you.

e: yeah I've found them, DM me your address, I'll post em during the week. They'll be sweet for a kid to piss around with, but the screens pretty bright so might blast your (human eye) night vision if hes not careful.

It's this : https://www.ebay.com/itm/357713834303

Just gone outside, this is the 5th (bottom pic) and 7th (top pic) IR output levels, the closest cow is 70m away and it's absolutely pissing down rain. So they'll be grand for you kid. Not sure it takes video in the NV mode, think it might only do video on the daytime channel.

also worth noting the image on the little screen is much nicer than blown up photos on the computer, probably have to get the focus really perfect for images captured to look decent.

how safe is this cheap stuff I remember back ohh many years ago we had a Russian night vision monocular ex almost Vietnam era came with a free blindness warning - I would hope we have moved on

Originally Posted by Barry the hunter

how safe is this cheap stuff I remember back ohh many years ago we had a Russian night vision monocular ex almost Vietnam era came with a free blindness warning - I would hope we have moved on

no radiation or high-voltage tubes like old Russian models. They use CMOS sensors and IR LEDs, probably don't stare into the IR illuminator though.
Absolutely safe, I'd be more concerned about the rechargeable battery to be honest.

thanks mate good to know that old russian thing worked we thought it pretty cool back then - mate has a modern jobby we take out but that was from memory bloody expensive when he got that and its not night vision its a thermal

IR nightvision doesn't have to be expensive to be good. If you can mount an additional IR torch that is brighter, the image will improve a lot.

From memory the LED rather than laser type illuminator are better for a smoother image. The laser gives a sparkly image, but is better for range.

I have a set of these binos - cheap and cheerfull and actually better than you might think. I use them for checking lambing ewes at night , and looking for rabbits.

Originally Posted by Pauly5

IR nightvision doesn't have to be expensive to be good. If you can mount an additional IR torch that is brighter, the image will improve a lot.

From memory the LED rather than laser type illuminator are better for a smoother image. The laser gives a sparkly image, but is better for range.

Laser with a good adjustable lens is better in every aspect from my use. Laser on flood is way nicer than led (both expensive UK torches that I've compared).

Wavelength also makes a decent difference.

Yes, fair call, the lense makes a difference, but the cost will go up. For this purpose it's about an affordable option.

Re wavelength, the 850 nm will give you the brightest image, 920 nm being not so bright.

A buddy of mine has a AliExpress one- paid a bit more than the dirt cheap ones - but his works to 150m spotting deer eyes and good vision to about 70/80m. still has to verify and shoot with a good torch (red)

Awesome !! It’s hard to know about these things as you don’t come across them in the shops. it looks like they’ll do the job to keep him engaged when walking around in the dark. It’ll give the young guy some autonomy with where he’s looking. Thanks for the responses