I remember reading /hearing a while back that new production L3 tubes had "dethroned" the ITT tubes in quality, image and general specs for Gen 3 tubes.  My understanding is that ITT tubes had reigned the king or best for the longest time until possibly just recently as in the last year or two.  full disclaimer - I am not a tube snob, (only aspiring) nor do I know much at all about tubes/Night Vision.  I know that the L3 White Phos is now the gold standard but based on current new production (green tubes only), which tube is generally the better purchase - L3 Omni VIII or Harris Pinnacle?

I already have two L3 Omni VIIIs (love em), but was thinking about a third PVS14 and wanted to see if I should give Harris a shot.  

Thanks

ETA - looks like the "What exactly is Pinnacle" thread has some opinions on this- that L3 is better.  Still welcome any comments or thoughts.  Thanks in advance.

Interesting and good point, I had forgotten about the eotech debacle (never bought one of those based on low battery life vs. aimpoints). Not trying to split hairs but isn't Eotech a subsidiary of L3?  Did L3 know about the lying that Eotech did?  If yes, I would probably give Harris a shot on that alone.

Thank you.  Do you see the same peppering in the Night Enforce models that TNVC sells?

The thickness of the ion barrier film is negligeable at best as the film is so thin. it really isnt so much the thickness of the film that makes it susceptable to recoil dqmage as it is the autogated power supply. The constant switching on and off  of the power supply to keep the photocathode performing at its peak
Voltage during tye ON cycle causes the electrostatic field beteeen the photocathode and the MCP to change constantly and these constant changes in the field causes the MCP to move backwards and forwards(repel and attract) at its center. This is what causes that whining sound everyone knows to listen for. Its the mcp making a humming sound as it forced back and pulled forward at a very rapid rate. This moving back and forth of the MCP is also why the recoil of a weapon can be quite disasterous for a tube. It can.cause the MCP to strike the photocathode abd leave a nasty burn in the PC and then around the burn you will se the film laquer that was smeared around it. This is why if an autogated power supply was mated to a thick film tube that had less distance btween MCP and PC than other thick filmed tubes, and then subjected it  to recoil, it would be a worse outcme than thinfilmed. you would have the absolute worst combo of tube and power supply for such a use. The reason people say that the old thick film tubes are better for recoil is because thet usually have more distance between tye PC and MCP and they used DC power supplies .  No changes in the electrostatic field, mean no flexing of the the mcp and that means less chance of recoil damage.  Wheter its a thck film, thin film, or filmless, adding an autogated power supply to any of these makes it a tube that should probably stay off of a weapon.  The only advantage that filmless tubes have over filmed tubes in terms of resistance to damage is that when they are turned off they cant smear films all over the PC like filmed tubes do sometimes when powered down and subjected to heavy force. When powered on though a filmless with an AG power supply can just as easily leave a nasty burn from an MCP strike to the photocathode as any filmed tube can when subjected to heavy directional force. It wont have a laquer smear around the burn, but it will still be just as much of an unusable POS as any fimed tube with recoil damage.

A few things thatt should be noted are that the knights armament and flir clip ons have recoil reducing tube cradle systems and also the .50 bmg that is fielded has a fantastic recoil reduction system incorporqting a reciprocating barrel. Put the same tubes into a mounted fourteen on top of a .308 scar and it will be quite the bad day for the tube. Theres no dick measuring contest neccessary when the facts are involved about how the tubes are engineered and the sciene behind Why they work the way they do and act the way they do under given circumstances. I have about two hundred tubes right now that hace recoil damage and they are thin filmed, thick filmed and filmless and none are good for anything except to salvage power.supplies for rebuilding which is the only reason why i even bothered with them. Every single one that uses an autogated power supply has pretty much half of of its viewable image area unusable  from the center outward. All Tubes that have DC power supplies have regular light burns and other small defects in their images but could still be usable if neccesarry. The distance between the MCP and the PC determines a tubes halo value. So a tube with a DC and a high halo is going to be tge hands down best for using on a wrqoons platform in a system without a recoil reduction cradle lile the ones in the clip ons you mebtioned. i wasnt ere to start an argument just to point out the facts as to why some tubes are better than others when used on a weapon.

Here you go...



Litton filmless mx-10160bL-3 omni VIII thin filmed autogated programmable PSU. subjected to shock while no power was applied to tubeL-3 omni VIII thin filmed autogated programmable psu. subjected to shock while power was applied to tubeITT omni VII thin filmed autogated pinnacle PSU. subjected to shock while no power was applied to the tubeITT omni VII thin filmed autogated pinnacle PSU. subjected to shock while power was applied to the tubemaybe you want to geuss whats going on in this tube? L-3 tube with autogated programmable PSU.

I never said it was a wide spread issue. My original point was that the film on the face of the MCP isnt what gives a tube its resistance to recoil. Its the spacing between the MCP and The PC which is not defined by the thickness of the film or vice versa. When an autogated power supply is added it makes a tube that much more susceptable to damage. All the damaged tubes i have at the moment are former milspec units removed from service due to recoil damage or burns from bright light sources, ect. I have pictures of all of their images and will gladly share wity you if you would like to see them. I will respectfully agree with you that yougo through alot of  systems every year. Just as i have built/repaired a couple thousand tubes and studied them in both the components that make them up into an intensifier assembly and alsoi have a good understanding of the processes that go on inside the tubes that allow the user to see the image outout by the tube. Im not saying you dont, but just saying i do. Again im not trying to be a know it all or anything like that. I deffinitly dont know everything. I dont think its even possible for a single person to know everything about electro optics and not even when it comes to night vision. But thats the beuty of it. If it was all known then it wouldnt be such an interesting subject. Anyways no hard feelings and if your interested in seeing them and want me to send you the pics of all the recoil damaged tubes images i have id be more than happy to do that and share them with you. Lmk

I think after reading through the threads here it appears that L3 filmless WP tubes are superior to ITT light film/"Pinnacle" tubes.  You are seeing the dudes with plenty of extra cash getting the newer tubes as an upgrade.  So technically I would give the nod to L3.  As for having to work with them, as a dealer, no idea; as an end-user I would just go through a good dealer.

If I wuz gonna buy a replacement tube, right now, I would get a L3 filmless White Phosphor tube.

BTW I remember at one point in time, years ago, I had guys on arfcom slam me for suggesting that mounting their -14 on an weapon wasn't a good idea.  5.56 all day long was the mantra.  I think that may have been because their experience was with early, non-AG tubes with thicker films, which may have allowed this to be so.  But then again, the issue of the housing not being rated for recoil, regardless of tube.  

I would not weapons mount my -14 at this point in time.  Between a good head mount/weapons laser/illum system, and using the RDS reticle as a passive back-up, there is no value in it, for me.

I had a good chat to some Harris people at a convention last year. Basically, L3 never dethroned Harris - that wasn't possible. Harris was too far ahead.

No, instead the king went mad, and ran off into the wilderness and everbody looked at L3 and said, "Well, I suppose that makes you king now."

You see, Harris isn't a night vision company. They only see night vision as a means to sell more radios. Stuff like the SENVG and camera based systems? Yeah, that's all Harris. So they bought Excelis  with the idea that night vision is night vision and what they really want to sell are radios. 

Then they ripped the guts out of what was ITT, while it was still living and breathing. Too much technology knowledge was lost and Harris is just a shell of it's former glory now - and they will never recover, because the executives at Harris are busy releasing garbage statements from a Chief Technologist that's taken on the role after having never worked with night vision before, doesn't seem to understand it ( no leadership, no experience ! ) and they don't seem to realize that the scientists they have lost over the past 2 years were more valuable than a bunch of documentation records. 

Harris may one day catch up with companies such as KATOD and China North, but I doubt they will ever catch up with L3 and PHOTONIS.

But their radios are kind of cool. Actually, that much they did succeed with. If you want radios mixed with NV, they are somewhat in a league of their own, and this may given them a monopoly in emerging markets in around 10 years time, if they can hold on that long... Markets that L3 can't respond to.

Just to see how far Harris have fallen, check this out - https://www.harris.com/sites/default/files/the-gen-3-advantage-white-paperv3.pdf

Honestly, if anyone here posted garbage like this, they'd be ripped apart. I've never seen so much crap in one place, except perhaps on Snipers Hide. 

So, yeah, Harris have a long way to go... I don't know if they will be able to get back. It all really depends on how their strategy with radios go and while that is actually a good strategy, they chose the wrong technology mix... But that alone isn't enough to stop Harris from succeeding. It does, however, mean they are a poor choice for your next PVS-14.

David

Wow, that white paper is a bag of dicks... Jesus...

As for Harris radios, they are sort of cool, but since one can't actually buy any of the new ones, and Harris won't support their older products I don't exactly have alot of respect for them as a company (Every other radio company I've talked have tried to help when dealing with even their ancient product lines)

remember when Harris made TV transmitters and media prepping software.....i remember and use it.... well both were both sold off some time ago, so its not really Harris.

Well I loved the way that white paper opened up, with a bunch of dobcha about how it was based on "the data", which as Hawk pointed out, tells you this dick has absolutely no field experience.  I think this is a very good point because on paper you estimate performance, based on specs, but at the end of the day, it's what actually works out in the field.  You can talk about FOM's and SNR's all day long, but then you get a tube that has a certain combination of performance figures, which doesn't look impressive on paper, but preform well together in the field.

The paper is recent - Late last year. The guy who wrote it is new at his job.

Eric Garris, Chief Technologist ( Harris ) - He's only been there for two years, but apparently is in charge of the place now. https://www.linkedin.com/in/eric-garris-51497315

With leaders like this, Harris is pretty much lost in the wilderness because he clearly doesn't have the background or experience to understand the product or the marketplace, even a little bit. 

I'm sure he's quite a smart and likable guy outside of night vision, but clearly isn't the right person to be running their night vision interests. The first sign that he's gaining any experience will be that he removes that crazy document from Harris' website because it's not doing either him or his company's reputation any good.

This is why I personally rank Harris behind China and Russia now. They still have some momentum from their old products on the production line, but that's in trouble too lately and I don't think they have the experience in the Harris leadership team to understand that they are going to eventually fold, the way they are going. Even if they did manage to hold on, they are frozen in time at the moment. Older Harris (Excelis/ITT) stuff from 2 years ago is still good - some of the best. But L3 isn't slowing down, and both L3 and PHOTONIS have surpassed them and they are standing still.

If Harris had any sense, they would restructure their NV operations under a new manager, or sell of tube manufacture entirely, and perhaps go into digital NV for their radios... EBAPS or Black Silicon perhaps. And some small, low resolution, ultra-low latency stuff... That's where the big money is in the future. Unfortunately, that's another huge growth area the US has missed somehow and RDECom seems to be mono-focused on developing roadmaps from the past... Well, I'm guessing that they have added some new intensifier out-of-band research since last September, but I don't think they understand that OOB isn't just about Spectrum ( or Virtual ) anymore.

David

All of this hopefull progress will depend on one thing. Can they make money?  Gotta keep the higher ups and shareholders happy. Quality product is lower down on the Totem pole unfortunately

@CJ7, what exactly do you mean when you say "go into digital NV for their radios" maybe I'm dense but I don't really see much connection with radios and NV...

I mean that next-generation equipment will require ultra-low latency digital NV and transmission/redisplay capabilities. The US is way behind in some areas and is heavily focused on virtual technology, which it does lead, but meanwhile it's missing practical extensions of existing technology. I'm pretty sure that these other areas have not been missed by China, for example, and China is presently the world leader of new technology that hasn't made the transition to military systems yet.

And that digital systems ( well, sensors that can convert an image into a serial data stream.... ) will be in huge demand. Not just one unit per soldier, but multiple units per soldier. Disposable technology. 

Harris really has a world lead there on everyone else since they have been developing radio technology forever and I originally thought when they took over Excelis that they might be moving in that direction, but they don't seem to understand where warfare is headed in the future and while they fail to grasp that, others will gain traction in that area. The only lead Harris maintain is their radio technology, but even that will be superseded in the next decade.

Meanwhile companies like Sionyx and Intevac are pushing new imaging technologies but both are focused on non-remote systems, even though I'm sure both will claim remote capabilities but there's lots of kinds of remote, and they don't have the radio solutions that Harris have.

Hmm. Put another way, read my book on amazon and you'll discover much of what is being talked about now, out of band, multispectral, etc, I wrote about more than a decade ago.

Or, TLDR;  Think about what else NV can be applied to, in future military technology, that doesn't involve people wearing NODs. Then radios and low-light imaging sensors makes a lot more sense... In a chilling way.

Regards
David

I wouldn't be surprised if you're correct about that, and you're right about the date... It does look like someone just slapped their name on the document.

So I take this to mean that ITT/Harris tubes are pretty much toast compared to the L3 stuff right now.  So that begs the question.  How many previously mfg'd (good) ITT tubes are still in the marketing pipeline, including secondary markets.  At what point will ITT tubes be a thing of the past and L3 will truly rule the roost.  If you look online these days you see a shit-ton of ITT "Pinnacle" stuff still out there.  As was mentioned, they are no longer exclusive to certain vendors.  For example you have "NVD PVS14-HP+" which is basically a hand-select "Pinnacle" tube.  Before if it didn't say NE or TNV in front of it, I woulda ran the other way.  

So I guess you could say L3 has achieved rough parity these days, but some day soon, they will surpass ITT.  

Now if you open this up to L3 Filmless G/WP, well, there's another kettle of fish.

Actually, I am hearing the occasional mention of a bad tube batches coming out of Harris amongst other issues, and some of the L3 tubes coming out in the past year are crazy-good and Harris tubes simply can't keep up with them. 

Photonis has already surpassed Harris tubes in general IMO and 4G can beat ( close match ) Omni VIII. If L3 was still just producing Omni VIII level tubes, it wouldn't be at the top of the pile today. Don't underestimate their new stuff. 

And a good tube is still a good tube no matter who makes it - Whether Harris or L3. 

What is needed in these days and times, is an expert who can verify the quality of the tube you're getting. So getting a tube that the reseller has tested and verified meets a practical high quality standard is still just as important as it always has been.

Hand Select never goes out of style. Even when the Night Enforcers from ITT were all amazingly good, they still had the odd duff one. Testing each tube before sale is still just as important today as it was a decade ago. And it only takes an experienced eye to pick up what the best test equipment in the world will miss every time.

David. 

I think that is a very good point about someone actually inspecting the tubes, hand selecting them, and then providing the data sheets for you.  Unless you possess this same capability, this argues strongly for why you should buy from a reputable dealer, versus that smokin' deal from somewhere else.  When I read these threads where guys are asking for advice, I just cringe when all these guys say, go ahead, take the chance, build it yourself, etc; I did and it turned out just fine.  As was just stated, if you don't know exactly what the tube is, you don't know shit.   So regardless of which tube you get, which one is generally the best is from a good dealer who is giving you exactly what you're paying for.

Alot of tubes come from the factory with their V2 gain setting seemingly incorrectly set or not set at all. I have the ability to make adjustments on the newer L-3 autogated programmable power supplies and have "fixed" more than a few tubes that were overly noisy, among other things, that came from L-3's manufacturing facilities in a state that would cause them to be considered "lesser" tubes, when they just needed to be tuned correctly. Most folks are unable to make adjustments to these newer L-3 tubes with the programmable power supplies, due to the need for special equipment. Because of this i suspect alot of these tubes get sent back and sometimes a bit of salt is left on the reputation of the manufacturer and the tubes it puts out.