Originally Posted by
Defaultmp3
RNVGs with the best white phosphor tubes you can afford, preferably hand selected. Or DTNVS if you really want the articulation. TNVC is who I generally recommend, even though I'm not a fan of how some of their employees carry themselves online; they might be pricks, but to customers they appear to be the most consistent and trustworthy. I have also heard good things about High End Armament Technology (AKA HEAT) and Kosher Surplus. I would steer away from Steele Industries, US Night Vision, and Night Vision Inc. There are a bazillion other little shops/assemblers out there, who might do great work, or might not.
GPNVG-18s are pretty legit, they do bring serious capabilities, but the civilian available ones appear to have rather mediocre tubes, with no ability to hand-select (unless you were willing to drop the cash to buy the system yourself and then swap out all 4 tubes).
Hard pass on the PVS-31 as a civilian; their fragility and minimalistic features makes them a poor choice outside of cloning, IMO.
The problem with JRH is that you're mostly stuck with NVD housings, which tend to be a bit less well-supported; they're perfectly fine for most folks, I'd wager, but there's less aftermarket accessories. That being said, if that's not an issue, and the various NVD housings fulfill your requirements (I personally have no interest in any of their housings with the availability of the DTNVS), JRH is probably right up there with TNVC in terms of customer satisfaction.
The Boson Systems MNVG and Nocturn Industries UANVB Katana are both interesting housings, but both are yet to be widely released, so meh.
Just as an explanation, I personally chose the RNVGs with hand-selected L-3 22UAs, with an emphasis on having low equivalent background illumination (EBI). I did not see much use in articulation for myself, as I don't plan on running around enclosed spaces a lot with the NODs flipped up, particularly in vehicles, which is where the articulation is a huge boon due to its ability to fold flatter against the helmet. Nor do I plan on often mounting a rifle with a CNVD or operating a thermal device, so having one pod up and one pod down didn't matter to me. Instead, I preferred the simplicity and durability of the solid aluminum housing. That being said, if I absolutely wanted articulation, I would likely go with the DTNVS over the various NVD housings, due to the reported high durability of the DTNVS, the interpupillary distance (IPD) stops and better aftermarket support. I do not see much use in the big feature that the NVD housings offer that the DTNVS lacks, manual gain, due to the fact that I have high quality tubes and am running dual tubes; manual gain can be useful in monoculars to help match your unaided (or thermal) eye, or if you have poor quality tubes where excessive gain could cause issues with image quality.
Disclaimer: all my information comes mostly from reading, with some minor CQB FoF experience under NODs.
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