Brunton Watchband Compass Model 9068

[David C. Menges]

I bought four of these compasses a while back (one for each member of our family). Instead of a pointer, this compass has a disk that points north.

For whatever reason (not magnetic enough, lots of drag?) the ones I had did not know which way north was, or were not otherwise inclined to point that way. Encouraging them with gentle shakes had little to no effect.

Hopefully Brunton has redesigned them, because otherwise I’ll have to give them a zero (oh, a 1). I tossed mine.

[Ryan Jordan]

First, an apology to the members.

I’m sorry for bringing these things into the BPL Gear Shop.

I assumed, wrongly, that the Brunton quality found in their precision instruments, would be transferred to this compass.

Boy was that a bad assumption.

These things are useful as corporate gifts to people who want to be like outdoorsmen but have absolutely no clue what a compass is, how to use it, or why theirs does not work.

I can’t get this thing to work indoors, outdoors, away from metal, near metal…

The Suunto version is marginally better, but please don’t rely on these for navigation.

If you want to buy one of these, get it now, because I have zero desire to reorder them for BPL.

[Brett .]

Ryan, David,
I had a similar bad experinece with the Suunto Comet. I wrote a long email to their custommer service dept. explaining bearing friction, viscous damping, etc.. and how to fix the compass.. Never heard back; they just don’t care.
Contrast this with the Cammenga corporation, who make excellent products (and loan compasses for free to the Boy Scouts by the way). I bought a tritium wrist compass, and explained I was evaulating it; I got a personal response from Matt Cammenga, the president, asking me for my feedback! The Cammenga wrist compass is not perfect (it rattles a bit), but it is rugged and get this; it points North! $30 in luminous and $40 in the radioactive Tritium model which I got. Of course you can pull it off the strap and put it on a cord. Mine lives on my keychain and simply does its job when I need it. The Suunto is in a landfill somewhere. Bottom line Ryan, please consider stocking the Cammengas.

http://store.cammenga.com/Scripts/prodList.asp?idCategory=28

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