At Outdoor Life.

I’m not sure these are the best, and the prices are stunning in some cases.  They range from $2000 in some instances up to $3200 for the Zeiss.  It’s just not clear to me who would drop $3200 on a scope like that except professional shooters in the military (e.g., Army snipers).

Some expected names like Leupold (and whatever model they have up there will doubtless be discontinued within a year), and Athlon.

Some unexpected omissions.  Why wouldn’t they include Arken Optics give the features and reasonable price?

What do readers think?  Would you spend $3200 on optics for a hunting rifle or carbine?

The best deal I ever got on a scope was when Gander Mountain was closing their store in my town.  They wanted big parking lots to compete with Bass Pro Shop for selling RVs.

The last days of the store they had everything for 50% off (not including firearms, which were 15% off sticker).  I also used a membership from a friend which gave me another 10%.

I picked up a Nikon Black FX1000 FFP 6-24×50 for $190.  It was a deal too good to pass up.

BLUF: He likes it.

Rex.

Competition is a good thing.  I like the recent flurry of red dot sight designs, prism sights, LPVO, etc.  If EOTech and Trijicon want to stay competitive, they’re going to have to come down a bit on prices.

But what do I know.

TTAG has what I consider a very good explanation on FFP versus SFP (although we’ve covered that before as well).  It’s worth lifting a bit out.

As you may have gathered, first focal plane scopes place the reticle in front of the magnification lens, resulting in a reticle that shrinks or grows as the magnification is adjusted. That means the reticle’s tic marks or gradations always cover the same minutes of angle or milliradians, regardless of the magnification level. The measurements of the reticle are accurate at any magnification.

So your holdovers are correct at any magnification.  That’s the upshot.

That can be really useful for rapid ranging or engagement at distances without dialing the magnification up or setting the turrets. While that might be of limited use in a more simplistic reticle, with a mil grid like the HorusVision Tremor or the Schmidt & Bender GR²ID reticles, there is little need to manipulate the turrets once the optic is zeroed.

The shooter can accomplish all adjustments using holds. But those holds would be dependent on magnification in a second focal plane scope. In contrast, the shooter can range, engage, and adjust at any magnification with a first focal plane. It makes engagement far quicker. That might be much more of a tactical consideration than for, say, competition or hunting. But it is still a valid consideration.

In many ways, this choice does depend on your budget and requirements. Many with a sniper background (including the author) still question the point of a second focal plane variable optic. Others argue that the reticle on a first focal plane optic gets too small at lower magnifications and too large at higher, obscuring the target.

So there are downsides too.

Seems to be a comprehensive analysis.

I found this to be a useful and very practical video.

I watched this video today.  Deal with the language, or just don’t watch it at all.

BLUF: The Trijicon MRO is awful.  Trijicon has apparently tried to fix it, to no avail.

I’ve read comments before at various websites where readers were giving other readers a hard time about buying Holosun (even Primary Arms has Chinese products).

The problem is that the Chinese are whipping America at producing good quality products for cheaper.  That’s America’s fault, not China’s.

What are we supposed to do – throw good, hard earned money after bad?

And do any other Trijicon optics suffer from the problem of lack of glass clarity, magnification in 1X optics, etc.?

Does the Trijicon RMR produce a screwed up sight picture due to fish bowling?

I’m just asking for a friend before the friend throws away good money.