Ultimate Survival Technologies WayPoint Compass

The needle is smooth in all 5 of the ones I bought. It points true. I bought then to make survival kits so I wanted small but still great for orienteering. In an emergency these are exactly what I want.

In the store it looked like it worked OK. When I first opened the package the needle would follow my finger around the dial then stick down to where I left a static buildup. I could clean the static build-up off but I would not trust it to use for instructing young scouts especially in low humidity environments. There is no North line under or on the outside of the dial so you can't use it for orienteering (i.e. set it for a specific direction). The dial case is mounted "in" the base not "above" it so there is no way to have a north line under the needle that stays the same direction as the base. To use for orienteering you would have to scratch a line for north in the top of the base just outside the dial. This would be a simple design change that would make this compass more functional. Package instructions say to set the direction by placing on a map, then just follow the direction arrow. It would work for that. So should be OK for general hiking when following a map. The dial is loose in the housing so could easily be accidentally shifted after setting a course heading. This would also make setting a specific heading difficult with any degree of accuracy.

pverall you get what you pay for

Very slow to point to north and you have to hold it exactly level for it to work at all Junk

I bought one in a pinch because I lost mine. Pretty useless for orienteering. If alll you need it for is to point North, it may work for you. Not a good one to teach scouts how to use a compass or do any orienteering courses.

After using it for a few months, the compass fell completely apart. Meaning that the liquid filled dial and the black degrees ring separated from each other making the compass useless. Very poor construction. DO NOT RECOMMEND !!

This model is junk. Look for the Coleman brand that Walmart used to carry and purchase that one. Much better quality compass than this one

Useless. Needle stuck upon opening. Never able to get it to release. I guess I was lucky that at least it was cheap.