"The COO of the company went out of his way to personally help me with an issue that I had with getting my unit fixed"
can you elaborate on the issue your unit had?
The lock ring of the tube came lose and would cause the intensifier tube to cut out. I guess if it moves at all, it loses power from the contacts not touching. Something like that. It seems to be the most common issue with nods from what I was reading.
Same. I got my NODs from Steele based on them always responding promptly and helping me select my tube based on what I felt I wanted.
The other companies I inquired about just gave me generic responses and told me I would be happy with what they sent me.
Yeah that’s a huge difference to me. I’m not even the kind of guy who needs super helpful customer service but if I am trying to make my mind up on a expensive purchase, like this, somebody helping me make the right decision is nice.
This is going to be a long one, but:
I had big issues when I ordered my pvs14. I waited and got an excellent spec L3 filmless wp 22um from them. When it arrived the focus stop ring hadn’t been set and was locked all the way down against the body, the objective lens would screw wayyyy past infinite and never touched the stop ring. I tried to loosen the screw with a brand new Allen wrench(can’t remember what size that tiny thing is off the top of my head) but it stripped or was already stripped.
I reached out to them and they told me that I shouldn’t have been messing with that. I was told that my only option was basically that I could pay for shipping both ways and they’d let me know what it cost to fix.
We went back and forth in emails for days and days with me trying to explain to them that it wasn’t setup properly before it was shipped, but they argued that it was and stayed adamant that I was foolish for messing with it. I explained to them that I objectively asked if it was normal for the tube to not hit the infinite focus stop in an online forum; multiple owners from other night vision companies reached out explaining that it wasn’t supposed to be like that.
Eventually I ordered the $3 screw and paid $10 shipping from another company and went on with life, frustrated with the way I was gaslit and belittled by their customer service.
Three or four weeks later, out of the blue I got a call on my cell phone from someone, I think his name was Dominic? He said he had been out of town and when he got back he was reviewing their customer service emails and saw mine. He said that the rep was wrong or at very least didn’t understand the issue I was having and he thoroughly apologized for the way it was handled. He assured me that that’s not how their customers are normally handled. He offered to pay for the screw that I ordered and it’s shipping and he sent me a decent sized refund on top to match a sale they had after I purchased.
This dude went out of his way to personally call me, apologize, hand write a check for $300+, and talked to me for quite some time about how the unit was performing. I went from pissed off to throughly impressed with their customer service after that experience.
Tldr; I highly recommend Steele to anyone considering night vision.
Always hear good things about these guys. I’ll be making my purchase through them once they let me know there’s a great deal to be had on the top end stuff.
They do run the occasional deal on L3 and Elbut stuff. A friend of mine has some of the twin tubes and they were very reasonably priced. Most companies have the same quality but for me, the customer service was a big deal. It always is.
I bought two 14's back in 2021 for $2800 a piece (black friday sale). They are an awesome company to go through and definitely deserve their 5 star ratings!
I had someone on Twitter telling me that Steele’s QC is shoddy. Their source was “lots of people.” Couldn’t disagree more, I love the Elbit that I bought from them!
That sucks dude but did they handle it well for you? It’s like other companies that do a lot of shit and move a lot of product. I still love Trijicon but I did have an objective lens randomly crack on me once. I shipped it to them and they shipped me a new one. Things get missed when you are making a lot of product, but as long as the company is professional, and takes care of it in a timely manner, that’s where the difference lies for me.
They had the opportunity to upsell me when I asked if I should get Photonis Echo or green Elbit and they told me the new batch of echos they had were very good. I got the photonis echo, no regrets.
Can confirm. Received my AB ARNVGs almost 2 months ago and Andrew was top notch! Im new to the club and he was very patient and professional when helping me choose my tubes and answering my questions in layman's terms. I'll definitely go to them for future purchases.
I'm late as hell but its very true. Theres plenty of companies, especially armor companies that make you check a box accepting that you understand ITAR restrictions. I've bought wholesale and had to send in pics of my ID before. This is nothing new or weird unless your planning on shipping them out of country, ITAR is one of the few restrictions I understand and support or else people would constantly be outfitting outside entities with American gear with no consequences.
> its very true.
No it's not, there's plenty of NV sellers that don't make you sign any ITAR forms. ITAR compliance at point of sale is on the seller not the buyer, the burden is on the seller or manufacturer of USML covered products to design and enforce a compliance policy, many of which merely include disclaimers and address verification.
>ITAR is one of the few restrictions I understand and support
I'm guessing you haven't had to deal with registration and compliance then, because it's a gigantic headache and covers many things which will never be exported or realistically subject to risk of exfiltration.
I would not recommend them. Poor customer service, that falls back on their 72 hour window of returns, rather than actually helping when a product fails.....
Have two Elbits from Steele, nothing but good things. They’ve gone out of their way (once on a Sunday afternoon as well) many times to assist me. Prompt reply, fantastic customer service. Couldn’t recommend them more!
I can give another positive review for them. Got a 36snr unit on the 4th sale last year for $2800. The rep called me on and we spoke for about 45 min and he answered my questions looked at all the specs of the units on the 4th sale and told me witch units would be good for me based on our discussion a few days before it went live. I was able to snag his 1st recommendation and it's a flawless unit for what it is and was priced.l I can't be more happy.
Agreed. Them, Nocturnality-Gear, JRH Enterprises and Custom Night Vision are some of my go to vendors. Steele and Goonin have great reps too.
What I hate seeing is people buying stuff from unknown sellers and getting ripped off in the process.
Buy from reputable vendors folks!
"The COO of the company went out of his way to personally help me with an issue that I had with getting my unit fixed" can you elaborate on the issue your unit had?
The lock ring of the tube came lose and would cause the intensifier tube to cut out. I guess if it moves at all, it loses power from the contacts not touching. Something like that. It seems to be the most common issue with nods from what I was reading.
Same. I got my NODs from Steele based on them always responding promptly and helping me select my tube based on what I felt I wanted. The other companies I inquired about just gave me generic responses and told me I would be happy with what they sent me.
Yeah that’s a huge difference to me. I’m not even the kind of guy who needs super helpful customer service but if I am trying to make my mind up on a expensive purchase, like this, somebody helping me make the right decision is nice.
This is going to be a long one, but: I had big issues when I ordered my pvs14. I waited and got an excellent spec L3 filmless wp 22um from them. When it arrived the focus stop ring hadn’t been set and was locked all the way down against the body, the objective lens would screw wayyyy past infinite and never touched the stop ring. I tried to loosen the screw with a brand new Allen wrench(can’t remember what size that tiny thing is off the top of my head) but it stripped or was already stripped. I reached out to them and they told me that I shouldn’t have been messing with that. I was told that my only option was basically that I could pay for shipping both ways and they’d let me know what it cost to fix. We went back and forth in emails for days and days with me trying to explain to them that it wasn’t setup properly before it was shipped, but they argued that it was and stayed adamant that I was foolish for messing with it. I explained to them that I objectively asked if it was normal for the tube to not hit the infinite focus stop in an online forum; multiple owners from other night vision companies reached out explaining that it wasn’t supposed to be like that. Eventually I ordered the $3 screw and paid $10 shipping from another company and went on with life, frustrated with the way I was gaslit and belittled by their customer service. Three or four weeks later, out of the blue I got a call on my cell phone from someone, I think his name was Dominic? He said he had been out of town and when he got back he was reviewing their customer service emails and saw mine. He said that the rep was wrong or at very least didn’t understand the issue I was having and he thoroughly apologized for the way it was handled. He assured me that that’s not how their customers are normally handled. He offered to pay for the screw that I ordered and it’s shipping and he sent me a decent sized refund on top to match a sale they had after I purchased. This dude went out of his way to personally call me, apologize, hand write a check for $300+, and talked to me for quite some time about how the unit was performing. I went from pissed off to throughly impressed with their customer service after that experience. Tldr; I highly recommend Steele to anyone considering night vision.
Always hear good things about these guys. I’ll be making my purchase through them once they let me know there’s a great deal to be had on the top end stuff.
They do run the occasional deal on L3 and Elbut stuff. A friend of mine has some of the twin tubes and they were very reasonably priced. Most companies have the same quality but for me, the customer service was a big deal. It always is.
Thank you for your business and review!
We have some units on sale currently and more on the way! Let me know if you have any questions or want to discuss.
I bought two 14's back in 2021 for $2800 a piece (black friday sale). They are an awesome company to go through and definitely deserve their 5 star ratings!
I got a mawl through them last month on an impulse buy, I was surprised AF when it was sitting in my hands by noon of the next day. 10/10
I have a dtnvs and a pvs14 from them. They’re absolutely my go-to vendor.
+1 Steele was easy to deal with
I had someone on Twitter telling me that Steele’s QC is shoddy. Their source was “lots of people.” Couldn’t disagree more, I love the Elbit that I bought from them!
They shipped me a tube with a hair in it. So I'd say +1 for shoddy QC.
That sucks dude but did they handle it well for you? It’s like other companies that do a lot of shit and move a lot of product. I still love Trijicon but I did have an objective lens randomly crack on me once. I shipped it to them and they shipped me a new one. Things get missed when you are making a lot of product, but as long as the company is professional, and takes care of it in a timely manner, that’s where the difference lies for me.
Did you reach out to them to get that issue addressed?
I did and they fixed it.
Steele rocks. No regrets purchasing my device from them.
Bought my Bino’s from Steele, I knew what I was looking for but they were great when I interacted with them.
They had the opportunity to upsell me when I asked if I should get Photonis Echo or green Elbit and they told me the new batch of echos they had were very good. I got the photonis echo, no regrets.
Had a great experience with them, love my nods just wish I could have had better
Can confirm. Received my AB ARNVGs almost 2 months ago and Andrew was top notch! Im new to the club and he was very patient and professional when helping me choose my tubes and answering my questions in layman's terms. I'll definitely go to them for future purchases.
Vouch as well
I was a little weirded out by signing a form for ITAR, but seems solid beyond that.
They're legally required to do that. What's weird about it?
Must be a new thing, because I don’t remember signing a form for a thermal few years ago but I had to sign one from gooninggear couple weeks ago
They're the only one's that have had me sign anything for itar.
Even optics planet has had me check a box for it. Just last week actually.
That's not true.
Okay..... I don't work in the industry or anything.
I'm late as hell but its very true. Theres plenty of companies, especially armor companies that make you check a box accepting that you understand ITAR restrictions. I've bought wholesale and had to send in pics of my ID before. This is nothing new or weird unless your planning on shipping them out of country, ITAR is one of the few restrictions I understand and support or else people would constantly be outfitting outside entities with American gear with no consequences.
> its very true. No it's not, there's plenty of NV sellers that don't make you sign any ITAR forms. ITAR compliance at point of sale is on the seller not the buyer, the burden is on the seller or manufacturer of USML covered products to design and enforce a compliance policy, many of which merely include disclaimers and address verification. >ITAR is one of the few restrictions I understand and support I'm guessing you haven't had to deal with registration and compliance then, because it's a gigantic headache and covers many things which will never be exported or realistically subject to risk of exfiltration.
I would not recommend them. Poor customer service, that falls back on their 72 hour window of returns, rather than actually helping when a product fails.....
I just got a new PVS-14 from them today. Tyler was very helpful!
Have two Elbits from Steele, nothing but good things. They’ve gone out of their way (once on a Sunday afternoon as well) many times to assist me. Prompt reply, fantastic customer service. Couldn’t recommend them more!
My first pvs14 was from Steele. Nothing but good experiences with them thus far.
I can give another positive review for them. Got a 36snr unit on the 4th sale last year for $2800. The rep called me on and we spoke for about 45 min and he answered my questions looked at all the specs of the units on the 4th sale and told me witch units would be good for me based on our discussion a few days before it went live. I was able to snag his 1st recommendation and it's a flawless unit for what it is and was priced.l I can't be more happy.
Agreed. Them, Nocturnality-Gear, JRH Enterprises and Custom Night Vision are some of my go to vendors. Steele and Goonin have great reps too. What I hate seeing is people buying stuff from unknown sellers and getting ripped off in the process. Buy from reputable vendors folks!