Who Makes The Best Loupe To View Coins?

I have a Harris 16X that I got at my LCS. I am not that excited about it. I think I may get the B&L triplet; I have heard good things about it. I think an illuminated magnifier may be good too. My eyes are starting to wear out and I am not even 35 yet!

I use a B&L 7x APO Triplet, by far and away the best lens for under $75.00 IMO. Zeiss would probably be a touch better, I don't think for general coin viewing or grading you would ever need more than a 10x power, for variety hunting, 15-30x can sure come in handy, I have a really old Panasonic pocket microscope that I think is 20x range and lighted, very nice for checking double dies and RPMs or RPDs.

The best coin magnifiers and loupes are from Eschenbach. Zeiss would be next on the list. They are not inexpensive, but they blow away the B&L ones. That said, this is not what a collector would purchase as a first loupe. A first loupe should be at least a triplet loupe. And they generally come inexpensive at a 10x. Having an inexpensive 5x as well is good to have to get a full overview of the coin.

Just for your own edification, I dropped in a picture of the most popular one that dealers use which is a 3+6=9 achromatic loupe.

The 5x loupe is also well liked because of its wide field of vision.


Here is a link to the entire Eschenbach Loupe line on our website so you can see them all:

http://www.safepub.com/sections/coi...ifier-loupes

There really is no comparison in quality - which is why Eschenbach is the preferred brand for graders and dealers. If you are in Baltimore, just stop by and take a look.

Good question. All the posters have good suggestions. A while back I bought a B&L triplet, but I didn't really see a difference over the generic cheap loupe I had before.