Yes, I'm having several hundred sheets pulled from last few months and will report back in a bit.

That is about right.  We've already seen the uptick across the board in both the 11769 and 10160 formats.  These based on hundreds and hundreds of tubes.

Ok, after pulling the sheets. (No, I'm not gonna list them all with redactions, it would be a loooong thread! LoL)

EBI .6 Average
HALO .7 Average

L3/Harris is continuing to produce the best tubes we have ever seen in the 15 years of offering high end NV gear. Now if they can just keep up with demand.

I strongly prefer WP to GP, despite having "come up" with green.

That being said, phosphor color is pretty low down on my list of priorities, for example as I've said multiple times before I'd take "meh" GP binos over the best UF WP PVS-14 I've looked through in most situations if the choice were offered.

Couple things I've noticed over the years--intended as general data points, not trying to tell anyone else that they're wrong, as again, it is very clear that there's a strong component of personal preference, and everyone's eyes and brains are slightly different in the way they process NV. Working full time in NV has made me very interested in the different ways that different people process visual inputs--I think that we often assume that everyone else "sees" like we see, when in fact there can be quite a bit of difference in how different people process the same images, colors, and lighting conditions.

Broadly construed:

- With no previous exposure or experience with NV, most people immediately prefer WP--probably having to do with a more "natural" image. The corollary to this is that most of the people whom I encounter that prefer GP tend to have used it quite a bit, and have achieved a certain level of familiarity and comfort with it, and WP may, among other things, simply be "too different" than what their neural pathways have locked in in terms of processing NV images

- This could even potentially result in a physiological/psychological reason for preference for some people, regardless of science suggesting that in general white may have significant advantages. Depending on your mental plumbing, if you needed to rearrange things to "get used to" GP, it may be difficult for you to rearrange them again for WP and trying to "go against the grain" might literally cause more eye strain and fatigue. At the same time, some people are able to switch from one to another and immediately have a preference for WP, and/or can switch back and forth at will with no issues, again, different people, different brains, different ways of responding to the same stimuli

- A significant number of people, possibly correlated with eye color, tend to actually prefer darker images. This is not just with image intensifier tubes, but with any screens in general. This does however relate to night vision not only in terms of WP generally being perceived as brighter than GP even at the same intensity, but also certain types of filtering, lenses and lens accessories, gain control, etc.,

- At the same time, in general, darker images tend to mean you can see less, less detail, not as far into dark spaces--the question also becomes at what point have you reached a point of diminishing returns between comfort and visibility. That point may be different for different people.

Personally, having spent many a night sitting on top of mountains staring at goats with hemorrhoid pillows for butts in a single green monocular, for me I can "stay in" WP for much longer than I can with GP. That is to say, I would and still do frequently take "breaks" when appropriate while wearing NODs, which could be as simple as flipping the goggle up and blinking a couple of times and taking a breath before putting them back in the deployed position. With WP, I find myself needing to do this far less than with GP--both in how long it takes before I have to do it the first time ("breaking the seal," as some might say), and how frequently I feel compelled to do it once I start.

Moreover, I would say that I feel less tired using WP than GP over the same duration, which on the one hand could relate to the "blue light" and "looking at screens before bed"--it could simply feel that GP is "less harsh," and almost encourages circadian rhythms to take over, while WP short circuits them--but the end result for me is feeling more alert for longer.

Finally, in terms of the afterimage (the pink/purple/red hue after looking through GP goggles), I do perceive this, and logic would suggest that most people do perceive it with WP, however, with most WP images having a bluish cast when powered up, not start black and white/grayscale, rather than having a red dominant cast, I find that it is much more of a pale yellow when using WP, which in turn feels more natural and is less therefore less noticeable (e.g., many interior lights also tend to have a slight yellowish cast to them as well, typically advertised as "daylight" versus "pure white") to the extent that some people may not even realize that it's happening versus the extreme obviousness of everything suddenly being pink.  

~Augee

Do you mean a lower spec GP bino?

Personally, assuming that we're placing a realistic cap on what we mean by "lower spec," insofar as we're talking about, say, a 1600 FOM GP versus 2200 FOM WP and not, say, a 1000 FOM toasted and blemmed to shit green tube(s) to try to nitpick and find a situation that would be an exception, in general if given the choice:

I'll always take two tubes over one.

I'll always take a dedicated set of binos over bridged PVS-14s.

To me it's almost less a matter of weight with bridged PVS-14s as it is long-term fatigue.

I can (and have) throw on a set of bridged PVS-14s with one OMNI III tube and one OMNI VII tube. Or even with a GP OMNI VIII tube and a WP Photonis ECHO, and I'll be just fine... for a while.

Over longer periods however, for me at least, the excess processing power my brain is using to resolve those images will result in... really just, reduced ability to concentrate and focus, and increased fatigue over time/need to take breaks.

Ironically, blems are almost irrelevant to me as long as tube quality and alignment are good though--as long it's easy to "stitch together" a complete image from two eyes, it's all good.

~Augee

The PBM will function with only one PVS-14 installed, but once you install them, you won’t want to uninstall them.



The PBM really was designed as a quasi-permanent modification for end-user groups that had large numbers of fleeted PVS-14s and were not likely to get dedicated binos any time soon, e.g., military personnel in support units.

Honestly if you wanted to separate the PVS-14s regularly, I would recommend the NPBM instead. It’s lightweight, and you can just push the empty arm up and out of the way when you want to use a single PVS-14, and it’s not that difficult to install and remove the PVS-14s from the bridge.

You will lose the central power, but depending on your use, it may be worth considering.

~Augee

LOL, I feel you!   My wife and I go on NV "dates" - she loves to drive the Ranger at night with NODs.

She always says "where is MY Ultralights? You can use the regular BNVDs."