Suunto Kompas

Like others, I read on-line articles/reviews of "best compasses" and this compass was highly rated by trusted sources. Purchased it for SAR training without having checked the reviews on REI - mistake. Used it in the field on our first training experience. Being a student of SAR, I wondered if I was doing something wrong and checked with our instructor. Sure enough, the needle sticks and when it floated, it was a few degrees off. I'm going to try the NH model and see if that does the trick. REI customer service was great about the return and confirmed the equipment failure.

It was time to retire my 30 year old Silva Ranger, and this seemed the obvious choice. It seems okay during casual use, but I spent a weekend at SAR training, and had a terrible time with the needle sticking. I could hold this up, take a bearing and then rotate my body 30 degrees while the needle stuck in one spot. Utterly useless. This will be returned.

In most respects, this is a very well built compass with a great feature set. It worked well initially, but after only a few trips it developed a sticky needle that has made it almost useless. My understanding is that the Northern Hemisphere version has a different needle that isn't prone to the same issue.

I literally just bought this compass and it already has cracks at the bottom of the compass near the clip and right by the bezel. Seems like the simple act of opening and closing the compass is enough stress to crack the plastic. This seems like a serious design flaw since the oil may begin to leak out. I watched a review for the compass and the one featured in the video had fractures in the same place. I expect much more from a $100 compass.

I hade Suunto mc-2, but I have recently sold one, because quality is bad. I bought a Silva compass!