Alastair Smith wrote:
>I am interested in purchasing a scope and saw in the birding-aus
>archives that you said, 'I'll mail something of a review of the scope
>e-mail from Birding-Aus & comments on the TS-501 at a later date.'
>Any chance that you can give me your thoughts on the Kowa,
>retailers and price.
Hi Alastair
I have been a bit busy, but this committment has been lurking at the back of
my mind!
I've used the little TS-501/Z a few times now in the field, and I'm quite
impressed. It's a 50 mm, angled scope, with a 20-40x zoom. Most hardcore
wader watchers would sneer at the tiny little thing, but that's not what I
bought it for. I'm an occasional scope user, and wanted something of
reasonable price & performance to fill that niche. Portability was also an
issue, as I'm intending to take it on overseas trips to remote locations,
plus carry it over distances here in Australia. Many would say that a 50mm
scope is too dark on an overcast day - I've not found it to be so. Many
would say that a zoom lens on anything other than a Swarovski or Leica is
not worth the $$$ - I disagree. I've found the Swarovski 20-60x zoom
utterly useless above 40x - far too dark, blurry & vignetted to be worth the
bother. The little Kowa 20-40x offers *useable* magnification - extra mag
up to 60x max is worthless. The Kowa is fantastically portable - it weighs
about 30% as much as my Swarovski binoculars - and it's only about 25cm
long. The image is remarkably sharp - particularly at 20x. All up, I'm
very happy with it. I paid about $520 for it from the Birding Shop at Birds
Australia in Melbourne. There may be better prices around, but not where I
could try it out against a few other brands/sizes.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
L A W R I E C O N O L E
2/37 Myrnong Crescent, Ascot Vale, Victoria 3032 AUSTRALIA.
Phone AH (03) 9370 3928; BH (03) 9510 5750; Mobile (0419) 588 993.
E-mail: <>
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