Burley Optical Services
Why Choose Us?
Burley Optical Services is a fully independent Ophthalmic instrument support company and we pride ourselves on taking on even obsolete Ophthalmic instruments.
​
Free telephone support...true...(although what your network does is out of our control)
If we can help you over the telephone then we will, our belief is to treat everyone fairly. If its something so simple that a visit would be cheeky...then we do everything to help over the phone. It builds trust and that is hard to achieve in the modern world
​
Fixed price repairs and servicing...true...(few exceptions that are not unreasonable and made clear prior to visit or discussed once we know what we are dealing with, no nasty surprises)
​
We will not charge call out, this applies to both standard and emergency calls.
​
We pride ourselves on keeping everything simple.
​
Nothing high value is sold without your consent, to be honest we love the challenge in repairing items that just need a bit of TLC.
Background or some of what we do.
At Burley Optical Services we aim to always give the best service possible.
​
Our main expertise is with the Henson Visual Fields systems having worked in their production since 1989. Many of the older systems particularly the PRO5000 Henson Compact 6000 and 3500 have my name in them or test number and many were hand built by myself.
​
Having also worked with Rodenstock (Rochester), Topcon, Pro-Laser, WECO and Buchmann UK we pride ourselves on our broad range of equipment understanding. Working for and with these companies certainly enhanced my knowledge of systems within the industry.
​
Slit lamp microscopes, we absolutely love restoring these! They are just wonderful instruments, and the worse the condition the happier we are in transforming them back to something usable.
​
If you own a Magnon LM350 or 100... Keep it, let us fix it... In our view one the best manual focimeters ever made and still looks great.
​
We are also qualified to carry out PAT Testing so can offer this alongside our servicing and repairs for a nominal extra cost.
​
Qualified in Control system engineering (City & Guilds) is something that has proven essential when dealing with many refraction unit failures.
​
Fault finding to component level, not something you hear of much these days, none the less we have the means to do this. Something we learned from years of working in Industrial Engineering (Clifford & Snell test engineer)
​
John also worked for 10 Months as a Military keyboard programmer and test engineer where he needed to work in Octadecimal and Hexadecimal to ensure that the right keys showed the right commands. He went back to Tinsley to manufacture the Henson systems as he missed the team he had known previously...his working relationship with Tinsley (now Elektron) has never lapsed.
​
How did it start, Why Burley Optical Services ?
John Pilbeam founded Burley Optical Services in 2004 when he was faced with redundancy whilst working for WECO. His diary was full at the time and he sat with the management and announced his intention to go self-employed. He got his Job back only this time working freelance. He was the second to last person to walk away from the warehouse when it finally closed down.
​
The name Burley is in honour and to the memory of Johns grandad, Lyric Burley, the greatest engineer he ever knew and the one person that inspired him in to the philosophy that you really can repair and do anything if you try hard enough.
​
Not only are we dedicated to repairing optical equipment, John also works part time for the Observatory Science Centre in Sussex, operating and maintaining some of the largest telescopes in the UK, and supports a local charity shop with their PAT Testing.
