The best kept secret in optics?

Buy the cheap stuff and you need to run BUIS because the possibility of failure is higer.
Buy expensive stuff and you don't need anything because the possibility of failure is low.

Buy whatever you want, if it suits your needs and lets you get out and sling lead at the range then enjoy you cheap optic. I prefer Aimpoint because I know it's quality I don't need to worry about.
Once you use a quality optic you see the difference in glass quality and can't go back, I may be considered an elitist but I just know what I like and what has worked for me without failure.
 
rkm456 said:
Are we all pretending this isn't Kidd X/TDC?
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:cheers:

Same tone, and attitude, looks like we've all been thinking the same thing...

Have to take a look, sounds like my kind of gear.

cr5 said:
Buy whatever you want, if it suits your needs and lets you get out and sling lead at the range then enjoy you cheap optic.
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This is the most important thing right here.
 
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I have a secret to, i won't say it loud listen closely, it's call Schmidt & Bender don't spread the word.

They really are good optics
 
caramel said:
I have a secret to, i won't say it loud listen closely, it's call Schmidt & Bender don't spread the word.

They really are good optics
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And yet my long range shooting buddy doesn't like S&B glass. He regularly shoots well past 1000 yards and dumped his S&B's, think it was something about the mirage or something, I'd have to ask him again what it was he doesn't like about them.

Just shows that what some with experience love others with experience may not. Doesn't mean one is better than the other or that it's no good, only that everyone has different eyes and everyone has some things that work for them and some things that don't.


How did TDC and KiddX end up the same person? I liked TDC before he turned to the pink side but KiddX not so much.
 
If you cant afford both, then buy a budget optic (that works, preferably with a warranty) and invest your savings in ammo for shooting. If you blow your load on the optic so the rifle can sit in your safe and never be used then was it really worth it? No. No it wasnt.

Now on the other hand when I was looking for a MS sight, the Eotech was on sale. At that point the price difference between the equivalant holosun was only about 20 bucks or so, which made it a no brainer for me.

At the end of the day, if you dont ever shoot, then Joe blow with his holosun and airsoft accessories is going to wipe the floor with you every time.
 
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cr5 said:
And yet my long range shooting buddy doesn't like S&B glass. He regularly shoots well past 1000 yards and dumped his S&B's, think it was something about the mirage or something, I'd have to ask him again what it was he doesn't like about them.

Just shows that what some with experience love others with experience may not. Doesn't mean one is better than the other or that it's no good, only that everyone has different eyes and everyone has some things that work for them and some things that don't.


How did TDC and KiddX end up the same person? I liked TDC before he turned to the pink side but KiddX not so much.
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Mirage is due to temperature change and heat.
 
Brutus said:
That's kind of funny. I thought mirage effects have almost nothing to do with the optics and more of ambient temperature concern.
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It's about how the glass lets you read the mirage, different glass sees through it differently than others, depending on your eyes and the glass you can read the mirage and use it rather than just have it in the way.

I first saw the difference when shooting one day using a Sightron SIII on one rifle and a Bushnell Elite 6500 on another rifle. I sold my Bushnell for a big loss right after that and have no interest in ever owning another.
Inside 300 yards there wasn't a lot of noticeable difference but once I was shooting past 500 yards I couldn't even look through the Bushnell without wishing I never bought it.

caramel said:
Mirage is due to temperature change and heat.
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I know what mirage is and what causes it.
What I'm talking about is what you see through the glass.
With what little exposure I've had to S&B I thought it was great, but my more experienced long range shooting buddy wasn't as impressed and sold his.
 
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In optics, probably more than in most things, you tend to get what you pay for. Optics prices as a function of gun prices? That was a silly and simplistic idea when it first came up years ago; it doesn't sound any more intelligent today than it did then. It was meant to introduce shooters to the idea of an optic being a precision instrument on which it was worth spending some time and money, not to be repeated like a mantra. So...decide what you need, do a bit of research, buy wisely and enjoy shooting. I base my optics-buying decisions on my intended uses for them. The only time I will ever demand the absolute best I can afford is for a serious hunting rifle...or for a .22lr!

A serious hunting rifle is one which I will take on a serious hunting trip (duh...:)), and that's the only time that I will ever likely be faced with a possibly once-in-a-lifetime shot, a shot that is really, truly important to me. I want the best that I can afford for that shot...not necessarily the most expensive, because that probably carries features that I don't need and/or actually don't want...but the best quality that offers the relatively simple features I desire.

A good .22 is one of the guns I will shoot constantly, in every weather, year-round, virtually every day when I am home. I'm probably going to spend 100x or 1000x as long looking through that scope as I will through most others. I want to enjoy that experience, and great optics help make that happen. None of those shots is going to be of life-changing significance to me...but all of them will be as enjoyable as I can make them, and all of them will be valuable practice. I will want different features on these scopes than on my hunters.

Black rifles? Meaningless impractical toys for me; I'm not going into combat, and I live far enough into the sticks that zombies will only show up in small numbers so I don't ever need firepower. I never intend to "trust my life" to one of these things, so any scope or optic that fits and works is fine, for the probably limited time that I will own the rifle. This is where the money will go towards ammo rather than glass.

Becoming a good shooter demands...insert drum roll...shooting a lot! Much more important (for the vast majority of shooters) than quick-reload drills or high-cap mags or having the latest/greatest scope with a road-map for a reticle and glass made from meteorites. I know that lots of catalog cowboys will disagree with me, but that's okay...difference of opinion is one of the few things that is still legal in Canada. :)
 
cr5 said:
It's about how the glass lets you read the mirage, different glass sees through it differently than others, depending on your eyes and the glass you can read the mirage and use it rather than just have it in the way.
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Any idea of why the difference? I'm assuming coatings, and/or lens chemistry, can anyone expand on this? It would be good to know as I have a scope that I'll want to upgrade eventually.

jjohnwm said:
Becoming a good shooter demands...insert drum roll...shooting a lot! Much more important (for the vast majority of shooters) than quick-reload drills or high-cap mags or having the latest/greatest scope with a road-map for a reticle and glass made from meteorites. I know that lots of catalog cowboys will disagree with me, but that's okay...difference of opinion is one of the few things that is still legal in Canada. :)
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I could have bought a real nice scope with my new rifle. I bought enough supplies to make 500 .223 match quality, and 500 6mm CM match quality reloads insted. It's paying off, groups have shrunk off the bench/belly, that's resulted in better shooting offhand or from improvised positions...I still basically suck though.
 
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Mirage isn't in the scope; it's in the air, and how well you see it would depend upon how well you can focus the image of the mirage, wouldn't it? I am guessing...and it's just a guess, I'm no long-ranger...that a higher magnification would help, since the higher the mag the smaller the depth of field. Then, assuming you have an image-focus adjustment, you could focus on the mirage itself, rather than on the target, just to get an idea what it was doing? I would think this would be a lot easier with a spotting scope rather than an aiming optic. You could look at the mirage with the spotter, decide how to compensate for it, and then make the required alterations in your scope settings or hold?

Interesting question. Why not ask in one of the Precision forums where the long-range guys hang out? Black Rifles doesn't seem to be the place for this.

Even if you "still basically suck"...for sure you suck less than you once did, thanks to all that shooting. :)
 
redshooter said:
Any idea of why the difference? I'm assuming coatings, and/or lens chemistry, can anyone expand on this? It would be good to know as I have a scope that I'll want to upgrade
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Unfortunately I don't really know about it enough and I don't have enough exposure to the really high end stuff to explain it properly.

The best scope I own is a Nightforce NXS 5.5-22×56 and I've used it and my Sightron SIII 6-24×50 to shoot out to around 1200 yards. At 1200 yards I can clearly see the 9 targets on one of those large pages that have the 1 inch grid. I tried to look at the same target with a Bushnell I could never get a clear sharp image.

You really just need to look through them at something at 1000 yards to see the difference. If you're never going to shoot past 300 yards it's really not a big deal and a guy could easily get by with a cheaper scope.
I also find that when trying to use cheaper scopes my eyes get tired faster because they're always trying to focus on the mushy image given by cheap glass. When using my NF the eye strain is reduced and I can shoot more in an afternoon.

Jerry at Mystic precision has done a lot of write ups on scopes describing the differences in clarity and definition as well as how the image is affected by mirage.

On the topic of black rifle dot sights which is what I think this started out as. There is a difference in image quality if you look through an Aimpoint or EoTech compared to a cheap whatever made in China, I've also found that as I get older and my eyes get more astigmatism the dot on the cheap ones stretches into an oval a lot more on the cheap ones than it does on my Aimpoints.

I don't know why these always turn into arguments. You get what you pay for, if you don't need the best and a $300 sight is good enough for you then enjoy your $300 sight, just don't try to tell me it's as good as the Aimpoint I bought that is of course overkill and higher quality than I need. But I bought it because I can afford it and I like that a battery lasts a few years even if you leave it on all the time.
The older I get the more I find that I need to use higher quality optics, it's hard to go back to using cheaper stuff.
 
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