Rat gun?

There is a ghetto way to do it on the cheap. Ive been working on one for my semi 22rf for rats in the barn.

basicly get a IR back up cam off ebay. Mount it behind a low power scope. Setup the small screen off the side of the rifles fore stock. Mouth a high power led IR flash light on bottom of barrel with ebay clamp. Attach 12v to electronics. Adjust camera eye relief to focus and see the cross hair on screen. Sight in rifle. Costs about 75$

There are you tube videos about it.
 
I've been using a Carson 'Mini Aura NV-200' monocular behind a 3x scope for the past couple of years. It took a bit of work to get it into a configuration where the view was clear, but I'm quite happy with the result. Essentially I took the cheap Carson viewer and dismantled it partially so as to remove the IR emitter, adding longer wires so that it could go into the back of a 3/4" aluminum tube above the scope. That was to get it clear of the vertical turret on the $40 eBay'd scope, a no-name-brand 3x compact thing which works just fine. Up front on that aluminum tube I added a lens from a projector (I keep various scraps, and when a neighbour tossed their digital projector I tore it down and recovered all the lenses) which worked to focus the infrared beam into a circle about the same size as the viewing area of the scope. That doubled the effective range of the IR illumination.

The monocular I mounted behind the scope using a combination of heat-formed Kydex plastic (for holsters, sheaths, available at knifekits.com and other sources), PVC pipe, odds and ends and hot glue. Had to adjust the objective lens to bring it in a bit closer. Lots of fiddling, experimenting to find the right balance between focus in the scope and in the monocular. Then I found that the AAA batteries burned out in about 20 minutes of use with the Carson, so I hot glued on a 3x AA battery box from an electronics store and just change the batteries externally. The larger batteries burn close to 3 times as long, and they're cheaper than the AAA's it's built to accept, so the fuss with rewiring it for the external battery box was worthwhile.

The only problem I have with this setup is that rats see the red glow of the IR emitter very well. Freaks them out. So often I'll have to hit the dimmer twice to bring it down to minimum illumination if they're closer than 10 metres or they'll get spooked too quickly. Must look like a big scary red glowing eye to them. Out further they don't spook so much at full brightness. Here's the monocular on its mount, but without the extra 2" or so of tube I recently added with the lens to focus the beam:

nv200_with_mount.jpg
 
anyone else have a DIY night vision setup? there was one guy that had on on this forum, it was like the one posted by gerard above but was on an SKS, username: 'geologist' maybe? this may be better posted in a different sub forum
 
A few years back, before I set up the infrared thing, I used a few layers of red plastic film in front of a flashlight mounted to line up a narrow beam for a 4x scope. The rats could see it but weren't initially alarmed by the dull red light so I had a few seconds to take a shot. The much duller red glow of the infrared emitter is better though they still see it. Thermal will be ideal, as there's nothing lighting my end of things at all. But one can have some success with a red flashlight.
 
i made a scope mount "adapter" for a canadian tire night vision camera, and mounted a cheap chinese laser to the barrel of a cheap chinese co2 rifle, works decent out to about 20 or 30 feet, now i am waiting for a cheap chinese ir flash light to try and extend it's range.

poor rats haven't got a chance.
 
Another member here, M4chef used to do vermin control. He told me they simply used a red light which would shine their eyes back at you nice and red. Put one right between the red dots.
 
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