Real World Opinions on Thermal Monoculars ?

Dlask Arms

Dlask Arms

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Looking at getting a small handheld thermal. Anyone have real world knowledge of these and willing to share, I' love to hear about them.
 
I would say wait a few more years and then explore. The generation leaps, at least to me, are significant and at this point the quality is that good that manufacturers would be primarily competing on price.
 
Can you share more about your use cases and budget?

I have used several from a number of manufacturers, FLIR, L3, Insight, Pulsar, etc.

But really use case and budget can vary wildly.
 
I'd spend a grand on one for poops n giggles. Nothing serious for use, my kids and I like to play outside in the summer and we have nods already and those are a hoot.
 
I have a small Flir handheld.

I use it for detecting wildlife. It's good at that. It's an older unit so the refresh rate is low. Try to get one with a refresh rate that works for your uses.

I also use it when looking at real estate. It's good for finding water leaks not visible to the naked eye.

I found a repaired major upper floor toilet leak that the sellers had not disclosed. In real estate, everyone lies.

The FLIR camera is my truth machine.
 
Dlask Arms said:
Looking at getting a small handheld thermal. Anyone have real world knowledge of these and willing to share, I' love to hear about them.
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To not exactly name drop, call… Chilly Dock Depot (pm for the name if you can’t figure it out). They are amazing, know their stuff inside and out! And will spend the time going through the options with you. Zero affiliation, but I have bought, NV Goggles and thermal scopes… best prices, quality and options in Canada in my opinion.
 
I have been playing in the same rabbit hole and from what I have researched the Iray Camp 19 seem to be the best value for money I can find.
 
They're pretty much going to be standard equipment for every grunt within 5 years; i follow OSINT in the Ukrainian ####show and cheap (<$1000) thermals have completely changed everything, nothing can hide. Chinese thermals are just as good as the US stuff for a small fraction of the price and 256 pixel arrays can still pick out wildlife at a pretty useful distance, so if you have some disposable money i can't recommend getting one enough.
 
Flir tk scout is pretty good for the money. It doesn’t have any magnification and fairly short battery life but it does work well. I wouldn’t want thermal mounted on a rifle or rhino mount because there are some times when it just isn’t effective. They work really well in the winter but on a warm sunny day dark coloured objects like rocks and trees warm up quickly and wash out other heat signatures. On an overcast day in the winter or at night animals and people stand out from a mile away but you can’t really see anything else if everything else in the field of view is the same temperature.

You can use it to tell from a long distance if a parked vehicle is running or judge about how long it’s been turned off. When it’s cold out you can tell if someone is sitting in a parked car even if it’s been turned off for hours because the glass glows from body heat of the person inside.

If you live in an area with wildfire risk you can use it to find hot spots and embers in the grass or brush, even during the day.

If you don’t have any thermal at all it will probably pay for itself pretty quickly because you will end up using it around your shop and house inside and out in the winter and find drafts, inefficient windows, spots on the ceiling that are letting out more heat than they should be. I have used mine to diagnose hydraulic issues on heavy equipment because when the machine is cold and running you can see which lines and valves and filters the fluid is flowing through with controls in different positions. Electricians and home inspectors use them to inspect electrical boxes and wires to see if a circuit is generating more heat than it should be.
 
A few months back I saw a video on youtube where some guy was hamering framing nails through a 2X4 using the screen of a smart phone.... kind of got my attention and I learned about cornings gorilla glass and also that for around $600 a guy could get an android phone with over 100mega pixel regular camera, plus thermal imaging and also infra red imaging and illumination, plus all the other crap smart phones plus a huge battery and bullet proof construction and the one I was looking at even had a port that you can attach an endoscope to or a magnifier..... kind of blew my mind!

I can't recall off hand the name and model but one of the brands I was checking out was Doogee and also Ulefone.

I will probably get one and not even bother with a sim card and just use it for the cameras and on wifi.

Edit, checkout the Ulefone power armor 18t.
 
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Can-down said:
A few months back I saw a video on youtube where some guy was hamering framing nails through a 2X4 using the screen of a smart phone.... kind of got my attention and I learned about cornings gorilla glass and also that for around $600 a guy could get an android phone with over 100mega pixel regular camera, plus thermal imaging and also infra red imaging and illumination, plus all the other crap smart phones plus a huge battery and bullet proof construction and the one I was looking at even had a port that you can attach an endoscope to or a magnifier..... kind of blew my mind!

I can't recall off hand the name and model but one of the brands I was checking out was Doogee and also Ulefone.

I will probably get one and not even bother with a sim card and just use it for the cameras and on wifi.

Edit, checkout the Ulefone power armor 18t.
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Thanks for that reccomendation.
I think I might just make that my next phone.
 
stripperclipper said:
Thanks for that reccomendation.
I think I might just make that my next phone.
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I haven't tried one myself, I'm still rocking an iphone 4s.... :)

The infra red camera and endoscope I can use at work doing renovations and I've been slowly folowing the tech for a while when I saw these androids.

I can see where a monocular would be better for scouting in the bush but some of the phones look pretty impressive.
 
Dlask Arms said:
I'd spend a grand on one for poops n giggles. Nothing serious for use, my kids and I like to play outside in the summer and we have nods already and those are a hoot.
Click to expand...

I think the big issue with thermals is that the entry level is even higher than old NVG PVS14 surplus setup. Almost like 3k entry level which is very expensive when you're not actively in a combat scenario. I 1000% want thermal tech to get more widespread so price go down and it has. When could you imagine getting a 3k thermal sight 60hz 10 years ago? Maybe the leftover stuff in afghanistan in the last past years but otherwise it's all super expensive.
 
Can-down said:
I haven't tried one myself, I'm still rocking an iphone 4s.... :)

The infra red camera and endoscope I can use at work doing renovations and I've been slowly folowing the tech for a while when I saw these androids.

I can see where a monocular would be better for scouting in the bush but some of the phones look pretty impressive.
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I am rocking a second hand s10, because it's Samsung's last model with a headphone jack.
That jack is another item it the "pro" column for me.
 
vcarriere said:
I think the big issue with thermals is that the entry level is even higher than old NVG PVS14 surplus setup. Almost like 3k entry level which is very expensive when you're not actively in a combat scenario. I 1000% want thermal tech to get more widespread so price go down and it has. When could you imagine getting a 3k thermal sight 60hz 10 years ago? Maybe the leftover stuff in afghanistan in the last past years but otherwise it's all super expensive.
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The Flir scout tk is like 850 bucks and works awesome
 
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