CammengaCompass Military Grade Phosphorescent - Lensatic Compass Shock, Sand, and Waterproof, Tactical, Navigation - Made in The USA

This compass is the best of quality and is accurate.Will live and function for ever.This is the one to buy.There are a few models to review and do that first.I purchased this one for my 12 year old grand son’s birthday. I have mine in my pocket for the last 45 years. I have it for travel and boating in the Great Lakes.

Product works well. Have a strange magnetic anomaly in my house, so I had to go outside away from my house before the thing pointed north. But it works. Sturdy.

Awesome buying experience, unbelievably quick shipping and the Cammenga lensatic compass is second to none in quality.

Pouch fastener broken upon arrival. Seller ignored my concerns. Cammenga customer service offered the GI version pouch for $5. Four stars because the compass is good, as well as the Cammenga customer service. One star knocked off for pouch and seller ignorance.

This is a very well built compass, I do wish that I had bought the one made with tritium but unless you are trying to hide in the dark, just use a flash light. I really like how the dial is held in place when closed up to keep it from getting damaged. Also the dial moves smoothly and stops nicely.

The only difference between this Cammenga Model 27, and the military issued Cammenga model 3H, is that this one uses phosphorescence rather than tritium for the glowing parts. That means this one is "glow-in-the-dark" and needs charged up via an external light source, while the 3H uses a radioactive isotope to produce light. Having the phosphorescent version isn't a big deal for most users that aren't worried about a flashlight giving away their position when using a compass at night. The downside to paying extra for the 3H, is that tritium has a half-life of 7 years and gets pretty dim after 10 years or so; if you're like me, you probably won't be using at night often enough in the next ten years to justify the additional expense. I quickly hit it with a flashlight before taking the attached photos.Aside from that, it is the tried and true durable compass of the military. It can take a beating, works well, and features a bezel with very tactile 3 degree clicks that allow you to easily count and adjust it without looking. I suggest watching a video of proper holding and sighting technique, because it makes a big difference. The metal loop is actually to put your thumb through, with the compass sitting on top of your closed fist; with the compass held this way and your hand held tightly up against your cheek like you would press it against a rifle stock to look through a scope, you can easily sight an object in the distance and see the angle through the lense without moving your face at all. If you hold it out in front of you and try to sight an object, you have to move your head to read the angle, which results in you moving the compass away from your sighted object and inaccurate readings.When used properly, a lensatic compass like this can take more accurate readings than a mirror style map compass. The downside is that it is not as easy to transfer the azimuth you've sighted into a map with a lensatic compass like this, without a protractor. I recommend pairing it with the MapTools pocket protractor (about five bucks on their website or Amazon).

I read a lot of good stuff about the compass before I bought it but I didn’t know it was made like things were made back in the 80s, to outlast your heirs and their heirs. Opening the clam needed some effort, very strong joints. Tough thick metal encasing a free floating liquidless compass with phosphorescent tick mark and looking window. All you have to do is flash a flashlight on the compass for 5 seconds & you can read everything in the dark. Closing the compass - brakes stop the compass stops rotating in stow away mode. Also no need for a ruler. The ring rotates in clicks 3 clicks 1 degree. Once you take angles from a map all you have to do is count clicks left or right to set declination. Directions are to the T accurate when I compared it to iPhone compass app. Amazing stuff really. Even if you don’t use one..nice collectible.

The media could not be loaded. I really wanted, and expected, to like this compass, but the one I received is essentially unusable. Two major problems. The first is that the supposed damping is clearly not functioning at all. See the video; I put this down with a bit of a twist, and the thing just spins for ages. I wanted to use this on a sailboat at sea, but there's zero chance of this ever settling enough to get a bearing on a landmark.The second problem, (see the second half of the video) is that the little magnifying lens that's supposed to let you read the dial while looking at the distant landmark just flops about; there seems to be no way to get it to take up a position and stay in place. Problem 2b is that there doesn't seem to be any way--even when holding it in place with my other hand--to get the lens at an angle that would let me look horizontally at a distant landmark and yet see down at a meaningful angle to see the compass disk markings. I didn't work all that hard on that last problem, as I knew this was a dud from them moment i saw the lack of damping. Sending it back and will have to pay half as much again for something else it seems.It does, however, appear to be very robust. I noticed that when the protection ring thing is folded up, it locks the compass card so it won't get damaged by being flung around. So, in fairness, I gave it five stars in the durability category.