I have been selling the Burris Eliminator scopes for a couple of years now, and was impressed with the Eliminator II. The Eliminator III is a marked improvement over the Generation II model, and is impressive on many levels. Speaking frankly, some of the hesitation over this product comes from the fact that it is made by Burris. However everything about the Eliminator III is remarkable. I have been experimenting with this scope on a precision 308, and have been writing a comprehensive review, but here are the Cole's Notes.
The rangefinder is accurate and responsive. I have had customers freehand targets past 800 yards when examining the scope at the store, and I have pinged targets past 900 easily: the published range is 1,200+ with the scope's ballistic function. I have had customers ping targets through the store window easily and repeatedly.
The adjustment is crisp and positive, and the values are 1/8th MoA allowing for a very precise zero. The 16x model has 40 MoA of adjustment, which is plenty for setting a zero beyond 100 yards with a variety of calibers.
The ballistic function of the Eliminator III is quite impressive: the scope utilizes a user configurable drop number (calculated at 750 yards) in conjunction with the ballistic coefficient of the particular bullet to estimate the drop of whatever you are shooting. The scope database comes with over 1,500 factory loads, however if you have hand-loads or a factory load not included in their database, determining the appropriate drop number is quite easy.
The ballistic calculator allows for altitude compensation: the ballistic tables include adjustments to the drop number and BC, at 1000 foot increments in altitude.
Perhaps most impressively, the scope has an inclinometer and compensates for angle. In other words, the scope will give you the equivalent horizontal distance when shooting up or down hill, and illuminates the holdover dot accordingly.
The X95 reticle is reminiscent of a Horus/Tremor reticle, with a "christmas tree" of dots that widens out below the center point of the reticle. When you range a target, the scope illuminates your hold-over dot, gives you the numerical equivalent horizontal distance to the target, and a 10 mph windage hold-off estimate. Thus, if the scope gives you a windage hold-off of say, 1.5 (with a 10 mph wind), you simply move down to the illuminated hold-over dot, and then over 1.5 dots into the wind. If the wind is faster or slower than 10 mph, you adjust accordingly: with the above example, a 5 mph wind would be .75 dots, a 20 mph wind would be 3.0 dots...
The Eliminator III X95 reticle operates in the first focal plane, which means that the hold-over/windage function works at any magnification. In contrast, virtually any ballistic reticle (Leupold Booney-Crocket, Zeiss Rapid-Z, Nightforce Velocity...) are second focal plane, and thus only work at a specific magnification.
In situations where the rangefinder cannot read the target (i.e. snow/rain/fog), the scope will illuminate a series of hold-over dots from 100 to 1,200 yards based on the calculations for your caliber/load, giving you holdover dots to work with so that you won't be left in the dark.
In short the scope is pretty impressive, and the price is reasonable considering what you get. I have them in-stock at $1,699.
