Which High-End Spotter to Buy?

[joseph]

You may find this interesting:

Premium Spotting Scopes in Review: Nikon, Zeiss, Leica, Pentax 80mm, 85mm, 105mm Optics

My dilemma is finding a scope to resolve bullet holes at 500 meters in good conditions. I have a Zeiss and a Leica, both straight lens 20-60X80. Not fully satisfied with either of them. Any help would be appreciated.

Sako 7 - Will the Kowa Prominar do this?

I have the answer for you and all you need is a laptop or small TV and about $150 including shipping. Oh it might let you look at your bullet holes at up to 2 miles.

HobbyKing Online R/C Hobby Store : 900MHZ 1500mW Tx/Rx & 1/3-inch CCD Camera PAL

A co-worker uses one of the cheaper ones on his RC airplane and says his works good to maybe 1 mile.

"Aim small miss small",

joseph

 

[Sako7STW]

I have the Swaro ATS 20~60 x 80 HD. The problem seeing bullet holes is not the spotter it is the Mirage. If we could get rid of the heat waves any of the spoters would probably work. I find my self backing down on power to reduce the mirage and get a clearer picture.

All this said I am basiclly satisfied with the scope. But for what it cost I am not doing back flips about its performance.

Jeff

I meant to bring that up yesterday and forgot. A friend of mine has a older Swaro and the new HD. Sometimes he likes the older one better because for some reason it seams to not pick up as much Mirage as the new one. However in low light conditions, there is no comparison, HD all the way. Without alot of Mirage, any of the upper end scopes will show you bullet holes at 500M and beyond.

As far as movement while focusing, the Kowa is very good that way, they have dual focusing knobs that allow a fast focus and then a fine tuning. Nice thing is because you only touch the knobs and not grasping the whole scope there is less wiggle. On the other hand, at first the knobs were not a natural motion to find while looking through the scope at the same time. But after a few hours behind it, it is natural now but the ring type focus on my Nikon was more natural feeling but not near as precise.

I also find I hardly ever turn mine up past about 40x as I naturally shake and no matter what scope it bounces unless I hold myself off of it. I actually wish Kowa would produce a 15x extra-wide angle eyepiece for the scope to cover more terrain at one time while scan spotting, this would be very useful when looking for Antelope on the huge prairies out here.

My next step for my Kowa is I want to get it fully setup for digiscoping but dang it is spendy.

 

[Gene]

Hey Joe - I just read the link to Hobby King store, and I read the customer reviews. This one in particular bothers me:

"Received this item and test the product.The ground test result was around 300m away from the tranmitter.Any distance away from 300m the video quality was blur and signal disconnect.I will try it on my glider for the result."

Beyond 300M the quality was blurred. The price is OK, but that statement knocks it out for me.

 

[joseph]

Ya I've read things like that, but it might be hit or miss. My co-worker says his works pretty good. They do come from Hong Kong I think and take 2 weeks or less to your door. I ordered a back pac from a different company in Hong Kong last summer and had it in 8 days and payed about 1/4 the cost of the same thing here.

It could be a gamble, but my co-worker that a lot of RC fliers use them.

I think I'm going to take the plunge.

joseph

The one my co-worker got only cost $50 + shipping.

 

[Gene]

Thanks Joe; let me know whether it will pick up bullet holes small as .224 at 500.

 

[joseph]

I do not see why not. You put the camera about two feet from the target and the video is transmitted back to your laptop at where you are shooting from.

joseph

 

[bohe]

Another vote for the Pentax Pf80Ed.I bought one last year and have nothing bad to say about it.For the $ its great,but if I had to hike alot,I would also have a more compact spotter for that.Usually what I use it for is shooting out to 700(so far)

I didnt have the $ to spend on the Leica,which IMO is the best.

It doesnt matter how much you spend...mirage is still the enemy.

I bought a Manfrotto 055 (cant remember which model)tripod,and it works very well.I was not happy with the Manfrotto head I bought so I brought it back,and am now deciding on what to replace it with.

 

[new shooter]

I looked through Swaro then look through Kowa- Prominar TSN-884 Floride Lens I Bought the Kowa Prominer. I love it. I spend all day glassing in eastern montana off of buttes I CAN SPOT DEER SEVERAL MILES AWAY. Then take the 338 ax and kill my dear. I do use my swaro binocular and swaro rangfinder. That's what works for me.

 

[jmden]

Bushnell - Elite 15-45 x 60 mm, Matte [781548P]

I've got this fairly cheap Bushnell Elite (at the time I bought it several years ago, about the best compromise between price, being compact, lightweight and fitting well in a pack when your miles from the trailhead) and I can see .308 or .338 bullet holes in white paper just fine at over 1K in reasonable lighting conditions and low to no mirage. Just mention that to say that seeing bullet holes, even .224s at 500m plus, is not that big of a deal for many scopes and you might consider not using that as a defining criteria for selecting a scope.

One way to check if you have good glass is to how well you can resolve fine detail in low lighting conditions--the hairs on mounted animal at 50yds plus indoors can be once selection criteria to consider. With my eyes, for instance, and this test, I can look through a pair of Leica Ultravids and then Swarovski ELs with same objective lens size and find that the Swarovski's clearly comes out on top. The Swarovski will focus and resolve better for my eyes than the Leica's. If you have to sit there and move the focus wheel back and forth much trying to get a clear picture and don't get it such that you keep on trying to focus, that's a glass issue.