Vortex Razor HD Light Weight Offering
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twintips16
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- Mar 16, 2012
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Yeah, thats the one thing that has me thinking too. Im not a huge fan of BDC style reticles. But that HSR reticle doesn't have anything going vertical in the scope outside of some thin hash marks. I didn't feel it was enough to capture my eye in a quick dark situation.
And since some of my hunting occurs in that situation, it was needed in my mind. Similarly, I wish the BDC had a vertical line even if it was semi thin. At least they did design it to have 2, 4, and 8 moa reference in the windage. Those too could be more definined though, other then a step up in thickness of the horizontal line.
If they could merry the two reticles together...... It would be real close to perfect in my mind.
Just saying and thats just my opinion.
And since some of my hunting occurs in that situation, it was needed in my mind. Similarly, I wish the BDC had a vertical line even if it was semi thin. At least they did design it to have 2, 4, and 8 moa reference in the windage. Those too could be more definined though, other then a step up in thickness of the horizontal line.
If they could merry the two reticles together...... It would be real close to perfect in my mind.
Just saying and thats just my opinion.
twintips16
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- Joined
- Mar 16, 2012
- Messages
- 176
Well it looks like vortex is on the ball. I got a shipping notice today and will have my scope Tuesday. I will mount it on my new 7mm rem Sako A7 waiting at home and hopefully get a chance to fool with it next weekend.
duckhunter175
Well-Known Member
Can't wait to hear some more reviews on this!
mtnwrunner
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Tag.
6point5x284
Well-Known Member
I had mine shipped to my families place in MT, and won't be able to pick it up now until Memorial Day weekend when I head over for my Prairie Dog shoot, so hoping some others get one soon and post some reviews! Especially on the turrets, and glass clarity!
Finally had time to look through one yesterday afternoon. Performed a full characterization of the elevation turret and studied the clarity. Don't have time for a full summary right now, but overall very happy with the scope and it met my expectations. More to come...
Rich Coyle
Well-Known Member
You want to exchange cash for a scope and I want to exchange a like new Leupold VX-6 4-24X52 scope for cash.lightbulb
Hah! Good catch. An uncompromising condition on my scope purchase is that the scope will weigh no more than 22 ounces. It's going on a relatively light, packing weight, 338 Lapua Improved. Anything between 19-22 oz and the scope must, additionally, walk on water! 
Scopes less than 19 oz have the overwhelming advantage in this purchase decision.
Scopes less than 19 oz have the overwhelming advantage in this purchase decision.
Ok, here is some more info on the 3-15x42mm HD LH. A buddy of mine got the scope in a couple of weeks ago and we finally had about a half hour to run it through some tests. Coincidentally, I recently purchased a Vortex Viper HS 4-16x44mm on sale over Midway to use on a backup rifle. So I characterized the HD LH side by side with the Viper HS.
The optical quality of the Razor HD LH is clearly superior to the Viper HS. With a yard stick (Lufkin, aluminum, yellow, w/ black lines) positioned exactly 47.75 yards away (143ft 3in measured with a contractors tape), broad daylight, the HD LH could make out the 1/4", 1/2" and full inch lines on the yard stick, and the 1/8" lines were somewhat muddied with the 1/16" lines, of course you could still determine the 1/8" line locations by inference between 1/4" lines, I'm just trying to give an idea of what I could see looking in the image of the scope. I tried taking some pics with my iphone, but they were not representative of what I could see with my eye, so not posting those up. The Viper HS really could just see the bold black numbers and vague 1/2" lines between the bold numbers... Not a bad image, just couldn't hang with the HD LH.
The overall image of the HD LH is also more bright and crisp with sharp edges and appeared to fill the entire area of the scope tube. The Viper series has always felt like the image has a bit of tunnel vision, where the image has a thick black dead space between the image edge and the scope tube.
The reticle itself on the HD LH is awesome. This seemed to be the biggest complaint I heard before this scope came out since the reticle does not have a vertical post. Reticle style is personal and some may not like it, but I was very happy with it. The center crosshair is made up of two 1.5 moa lines (+) that are thinner than the rest of the MOA reticle which I liked, and outer portions of the horizontal posts were very bold and did a great job directing my eye to the center crosshairs.
Now for the turrets. I ran the HD LH through the entire turret range, up and down several times while watching how the turrets tracked for accuracy to an MOA scale and precision (repeatability). The precision was the same as any other scope I have tested out. Spot on. I have tested out Leupold (VX3/6), Vortex (Viper and Razor) and NF (SHV and ATACR), and every scope has always returned to perfect zero and also dialed to any specific MOA setting each and every time. I could also not perceive any backlash within the HD LH or the Viper HS.
The accuracy to an MOA scale of the HD LH tested out to 2.4% error of over-travel, over the full range of motion, while the top usable 40 MOA of travel (assuming you're running a 20moa rail) tested out to only 0.8% of over-travel error. The error of the upper 30 MOA (likely the usable range if youre mounting with something like Talley lightweight rings) was also 0.8%. It appeared to have most all of the error stacked up in the bottom 10 MOA of the rotation range, which would never be used unless you ran something like a 50 MOA rail. The Viper HS tested out to have 1% of under-travel within the bottom 20 moa of turret range. The top 24 moa of the turret range tested out to have no perceptible accuracy error. Because we all use a ballistic solver one way or another to determine drops, the only thing that matters is that we know the correction factor and that the turrets are repeatable. In the case of both of these scopes, the turrets were extremely repeatable.
The feel of the turret clicks is also worth mentioning. They felt very similar to the VX6 3-18 that I own. So personally, I thought they were great. But I'm guessing everybody is going to be complaining that the turrets are mushy. I tend to roll my eyes every time I read about "mushy" turrets, but I digress... if you want a scope with all kinds of "tacti-cool" features, this probably isn't the scope for you. But if you want a scope that is very light weight, very compact and has great optics with just the right amount of features to effectively kill game at long ranges, then you will be very happy with the HD LH.
Now I have to decide if I want to sell my VX6 to buy this new HD LH The VX6 does have a zero stop, but I'm not sure that is worth the extra 1/4 pound on a hunting rifle. With capped turrets, I really don't think a zero stop is necessary...
Let me know if you have any particular questions about this HD LH.
The optical quality of the Razor HD LH is clearly superior to the Viper HS. With a yard stick (Lufkin, aluminum, yellow, w/ black lines) positioned exactly 47.75 yards away (143ft 3in measured with a contractors tape), broad daylight, the HD LH could make out the 1/4", 1/2" and full inch lines on the yard stick, and the 1/8" lines were somewhat muddied with the 1/16" lines, of course you could still determine the 1/8" line locations by inference between 1/4" lines, I'm just trying to give an idea of what I could see looking in the image of the scope. I tried taking some pics with my iphone, but they were not representative of what I could see with my eye, so not posting those up. The Viper HS really could just see the bold black numbers and vague 1/2" lines between the bold numbers... Not a bad image, just couldn't hang with the HD LH.
The overall image of the HD LH is also more bright and crisp with sharp edges and appeared to fill the entire area of the scope tube. The Viper series has always felt like the image has a bit of tunnel vision, where the image has a thick black dead space between the image edge and the scope tube.
The reticle itself on the HD LH is awesome. This seemed to be the biggest complaint I heard before this scope came out since the reticle does not have a vertical post. Reticle style is personal and some may not like it, but I was very happy with it. The center crosshair is made up of two 1.5 moa lines (+) that are thinner than the rest of the MOA reticle which I liked, and outer portions of the horizontal posts were very bold and did a great job directing my eye to the center crosshairs.
Now for the turrets. I ran the HD LH through the entire turret range, up and down several times while watching how the turrets tracked for accuracy to an MOA scale and precision (repeatability). The precision was the same as any other scope I have tested out. Spot on. I have tested out Leupold (VX3/6), Vortex (Viper and Razor) and NF (SHV and ATACR), and every scope has always returned to perfect zero and also dialed to any specific MOA setting each and every time. I could also not perceive any backlash within the HD LH or the Viper HS.
The accuracy to an MOA scale of the HD LH tested out to 2.4% error of over-travel, over the full range of motion, while the top usable 40 MOA of travel (assuming you're running a 20moa rail) tested out to only 0.8% of over-travel error. The error of the upper 30 MOA (likely the usable range if youre mounting with something like Talley lightweight rings) was also 0.8%. It appeared to have most all of the error stacked up in the bottom 10 MOA of the rotation range, which would never be used unless you ran something like a 50 MOA rail. The Viper HS tested out to have 1% of under-travel within the bottom 20 moa of turret range. The top 24 moa of the turret range tested out to have no perceptible accuracy error. Because we all use a ballistic solver one way or another to determine drops, the only thing that matters is that we know the correction factor and that the turrets are repeatable. In the case of both of these scopes, the turrets were extremely repeatable.
The feel of the turret clicks is also worth mentioning. They felt very similar to the VX6 3-18 that I own. So personally, I thought they were great. But I'm guessing everybody is going to be complaining that the turrets are mushy. I tend to roll my eyes every time I read about "mushy" turrets, but I digress... if you want a scope with all kinds of "tacti-cool" features, this probably isn't the scope for you. But if you want a scope that is very light weight, very compact and has great optics with just the right amount of features to effectively kill game at long ranges, then you will be very happy with the HD LH.
Now I have to decide if I want to sell my VX6 to buy this new HD LH
The VX6 does have a zero stop, but I'm not sure that is worth the extra 1/4 pound on a hunting rifle. With capped turrets, I really don't think a zero stop is necessary...Let me know if you have any particular questions about this HD LH.
