$5,000 rifle scopes?

[JFrank]

VT says..
I am “scope poor” most of the time,

i was too’ but sold off a few and put the money back into bank, then bought a couple more.
Ya gotta be careful in this area and maybe find a covert method of delivery especially if the budget committee ( wife) is home. And remember that they can smell your fear..

 

[rabid wombat]

@South Prairie Jim this might be a deal for someone….

https://www.optics-trade.eu/us/marc...tte-no-3-5mm-100m-1-8moa-1-16-dot-262063.html

 

[hq]

Hmm. That seems to be a couple of grand cheaper than Schmidt & Bender 3-27x56 High Power, about the same as S&B PM II -series base models and approximately half the price of Hensoldt 3.5-26x56 FF. Just to name a few. Where did the "most expensive scope" come from anyway?

 

[rabid wombat]

Where did the "most expensive scope" come from anyway?

I think what I posted is different from @South Prairie Jim ’s scope. Dumb coincidence, I saw this when looking at other demo’s. I am not familiar with March, so others will have to comment.

 

[HowieG]

I’m afraid I’m going to dash your hopes here.

Cost or worth? You’ve conflated two things that are very different.

Worth is entirely subjective so I’ll start with cost, which is summation of material, labor and overhead.

I don’t want to get into a cost accounting class here but it is almost assured that a $600 scope made in the Philippines cost a lot less to manufacture than a $3,000 scope made in Germany.

Why?

Tighter tolerances = the more it cost
More features = the more it cost
Skilled labor = the more it cost
Lower volume = the more it cost
Better materials = the more it cost

As to the subjective worth of the additional cost + margin (price to the consumer) of a high end vs a lower end optic, obviously there are enough consumers that believe the difference is worth it to keep these businesses thriving.

Kahles, which has been making scopes for the last 120 years, is the definitive example. I happen to own two of them and their worth is self evident to me.

What hopes? And who said anything about Filipino scopes? By the way, who makes the 5 grand scope and where is it made?

I am slightly confused about your preferences as you mention $3000 German scopes and then talk about how you own Kahles scopes.

Anyway, thanks for supporting my point about people thinking really expensive scopes are worth the money, thereby keeping companies in business and supporting capitalism at it's best. I remain in favor of that whether the qualities of the materials, brilliance of the designs, and actual performance of the completed products are really that far apart or not. Oh, I must mention the excellent marketing in successfully convincing people they are getting the best whether that is actually the case or not. Everybody should have a chance to be satisfied with their purchases.

 

[HowieG]

Yes. The scope is the aiming mechanism of the rifle. See my photos provided above. When a shooter can’t find the edges or center of a target because their scope offers aberration or lacking resolution, they can’t aim consistently, and performance suffers - as measured by rounds on target, game taken, and group size. If you can’t see it, you can’t hit it.

As a parallel, an aphorism in photography is “date the body, marry the lens.” This is said to new photographers to remind them, succinctly, that glass matters much more than the body, and while body performance will change rapidly in time, relatively, good glass prevails. Exactly akin to your analogy of a $3000 scope on a $200 rifle, which you wrongfully assumed would be an absurdism, sticking a flagship lens like Canon EF 70-200 f/2.8L III in front of a Canon Rebel T6i, an entry level, 10yr old camera, will give drastically better results than sticking a $150 kit lens EF-S 75-300mm f/4-5.6 STM in front of a $2500 Canon R6. Both the body and lens obviously matter, and certain genres of photography, like sports, are exceptionally demanding of the camera body, but the glass is what we see, and we can’t do anything to get around that.

So yeah, if I had the choice of shooting a Savage Axis Precision with a Tangent Theta or an Impact Precision with a Vortex Strike Eagle, I’d take the Axis with the Tangent Theta every time…



I am “scope poor” most of the time, so when I get a new rifle, I need a scope too - I don’t keep scopes just sitting around. I buy scopes to saddle onto rifles for certain applications, and typically, if I try a scope and find I don’t have use for it, I resell it. I’m more apt to take a good scope off of a rifle and rezero it onto something new, even for a short time, than to buy a lower grade scope than I’d actually want just to have it lay around waiting for a rifle to mount. That paradigm has always seemed like an insecure sorority girl to me - always with some guy, wasting energy even if they don’t actually like them, and in fact, knowing they don’t actually like most of the dudes most of the time, just to have a guy on their arm.

When I try a new rifle, usually I have the scope bought before I get all of the parts for the rifle, but otherwise, I pull a scope from another rifle - usually one of my SigSauer Tango4 4-16x scopes from my hunting rifles or I pull one of my Bushnell DMR II’s from my plinking rifles.

I am an amateur astronomer and dabble in astro photography, so I am fairly familiar with optical concepts and quality concerns. When I threw the Axis out there, I wasn't referring to the Axis II Precision. I was referring to bargain basement hunting rifles. Insert your favorite cheapo in place of the Axis. Doesn't have to be a Savage.

I too don't prefer to have a bunch of equipment, optical or otherwise lying around, but I do usually have one or two scopes not mounted up at any given moment. Sometimes, things just work that way. Sometimes, you get rid of a rifle, but keep the scope. Maybe break a scope, buy another, and then later get the broken one repaired. Maybe a rifle drifts through temporarily and you strap your spare scope to it temporarily. Actually buying a new rifle is a pretty good excuse to buy new glass, but I usually don't think along the lines of "gee, I just picked up a 50 dollar rifle at the flea market and now I need a $2000 Nightforce for it".

I used to have more of the cheaper scopes stored because once that was all I could afford, and I replaced them with better glass later. Those went by the wayside though, either through breakage or giving them to a friend in need. Scopes like the Bushnell Banner and the Tasco World Class. I actually miss the Tasco a little. It was a pre China one.

 

[Varminterror]

Anyway, thanks for supporting my point about people thinking really expensive scopes are worth the money, thereby keeping companies in business and supporting capitalism at it's best. I remain in favor of that whether the qualities of the materials, brilliance of the designs, and actual performance of the completed products are really that far apart or not. Oh, I must mention the excellent marketing in successfully convincing people they are getting the best weather that is actually the case or not.

There’s no sense in being bitter that folks are stating that there IS a difference worth the price in the performance of high end scopes over lower end scopes. Nobody is saying lower end scopes are all just junk, but it’s a hell of a lot more than just marketing when you see the difference in between a $3500 optic like the Kahles or $4500 optic like the Tangent Theta vs. a $1000 optic like the Bushnell DMR III or Vortex Viper PST II, or even $2k optic like the Leupold Mk5HD.

If glass quality didn’t make a difference for ANY of us, we wouldn’t waste the money buying it. I have a $100, $400, and $2000 50mm lens. The photo quality is NOT the same between the 3. Can we sell sessions with the $100 and $400 lens? Sure can, and have. But side by side with our L series 50, we can see the difference in every photo - so the $1600-1900 difference wasn’t wasted for us.

Equally, 4 years ago took a chance and got a screaming deal on Swaro SLC 15x56 binos for $680. I had a $1700 Bushnell Elite Tactical scope on my match rifle, and thought I was doing ok, and was using a Bushnell Elite spotting scope at the time. But then at a match in TX, it rained to beat hell and we lost visibility. During the height of the rain, the RO’s on each stage gave us discretion on when to start our runs - looking through our spotting scopes and picking when we felt the fog and rain lifted well enough to see to shoot the stage, we’d dive into it and the clock would start. On one 1400 yard stage, I waited a few minutes and finally saw the fog break to reveal the 1400yrd targets, and I dove to my rifle - but I didn’t realize my $2500 Swaro binos could cut through the fog much better than my $1700 Bushnell scope, and when I got to the rifle, I couldn’t actually see the targets… so now, I have a $3500 Kahles on top of my match rifle, with the same glass as my binos (Swaro & Kahles = same company), and my 15x56 binos are relatively close on FoV to my 56mm riflescope when on 15x… so I have very uniform view through both. Only way I’d be happier with that combo is if I had a reticle in my binos too. AND… frankly, that $2500 set of 15x binos can see better downrange than my $1600 Bushnell Elite 20-60x80mm spotting scope, with better quality glass making up for reduced magnification, and then some…

Same same regarding whining about the Axis Precision vs. the standard Axis. It’s the same metal work, just dropped into a cheap Oryx chassis - it’s still the cheapest of the cheap action and barrel, with absolutely no accurizing done… but it has a chassis which could be used for the sport, and the standard Axis doesn’t… it’s just making excuses.

Rifles don’t buy scopes. Sure, most of us buy better quality rifles for given applications which would dictate better quality optics, but the same aphorism applies, if you can’t see it, you can’t shoot it. I’d rather have an Axis II with a Tangent Theta on top than a custom Impact with a Bushnell Banner.

 

[Nature Boy]

What hopes?

your hopes

I hope nobody actually thinks that the aluminum, glass, steel, and whatever else comprising the parts of a $5K scope are really worth that much more than the same types of parts in a $600 scope

As I said earlier in this thread, I have no experience with or knowledge of scopes with a street price of $5k. I used examples of scopes in the $3k range vs your proposed $600 scope to make my point, which it seems you have missed entirety.

My point, restated and simplified.

1. A $3,000 scope cost demonstrably more to manufacture than a $600 scope because of the material, labor and overhead that go into them.

2. Worth is subjective. What an item is worth to me can be different for someone else.

Anyway, thanks for supporting my point about people thinking really expensive scopes are worth the money….
….. I must mention the excellent marketing in successfully convincing people they are getting the best whether that is actually the case or not.

Maybe you could clarify the point you were trying to make. I could be wrong but it sounds like you’re taking the position that people who purchase a higher end optic are either fools or easily duped by slick marketing campaigns because YOU believe the difference between them and a $600 scope isn’t “worth it”

 

[rabid wombat]

Equally, 4 years ago took a chance and got a screaming deal on Swaro SLC 15x56 binos for $680.

Outstanding! Huge Swarovski glass for Leupold pricing….still close to a 4mm exit pupil, must be nearly blinding on a bright day. Likewise, hard to hold steady and HEAVY. Great glass….we all should be so fortunate….

Good analogy on the 50mm camera lens…like everything above, most need to see it to understand. Very hard to describe the visual in words on the internet….

 

[Varminterror]

hard to hold steady and HEAVY.

I don’t have too much trouble holding them steady, but I’m well practiced holding a camera steady, AND most of the time I have them on a tripod, or will rest them on my trekking poles. I can free hand them - if they were any smaller FOV like 50mm or 42mm, it would obviously be tough.

They’re definitely not light or compact. It could be worse, but they weren’t built to be petite, for sure. I carry them in an Alaska Guide Creations harness when hunting, they ride a lot better than my Ruger SRH Toklat, so I don’t really notice them.

 

[HowieG]

There’s no sense in being bitter that folks are stating that there IS a difference worth the price in the performance of high end scopes over lower end scopes. Nobody is saying lower end scopes are all just junk, but it’s a hell of a lot more than just marketing when you see the difference in between a $3500 optic like the Kahles or $4500 optic like the Tangent Theta vs. a $1000 optic like the Bushnell DMR III or Vortex Viper PST II, or even $2k optic like the Leupold Mk5HD.

If glass quality didn’t make a difference for ANY of us, we wouldn’t waste the money buying it. I have a $100, $400, and $2000 50mm lens. The photo quality is NOT the same between the 3. Can we sell sessions with the $100 and $400 lens? Sure can, and have. But side by side with our L series 50, we can see the difference in every photo - so the $1600-1900 difference wasn’t wasted for us.

Equally, 4 years ago took a chance and got a screaming deal on Swaro SLC 15x56 binos for $680. I had a $1700 Bushnell Elite Tactical scope on my match rifle, and thought I was doing ok, and was using a Bushnell Elite spotting scope at the time. But then at a match in TX, it rained to beat hell and we lost visibility. During the height of the rain, the RO’s on each stage gave us discretion on when to start our runs - looking through our spotting scopes and picking when we felt the fog and rain lifted well enough to see to shoot the stage, we’d dive into it and the clock would start. On one 1400 yard stage, I waited a few minutes and finally saw the fog break to reveal the 1400yrd targets, and I dove to my rifle - but I didn’t realize my $2500 Swaro binos could cut through the fog much better than my $1700 Bushnell scope, and when I got to the rifle, I couldn’t actually see the targets… so now, I have a $3500 Kahles on top of my match rifle, with the same glass as my binos (Swaro & Kahles = same company), and my 15x56 binos are relatively close on FoV to my 56mm riflescope when on 15x… so I have very uniform view through both. Only way I’d be happier with that combo is if I had a reticle in my binos too. AND… frankly, that $2500 set of 15x binos can see better downrange than my $1600 Bushnell Elite 20-60x80mm spotting scope, with better quality glass making up for reduced magnification, and then some…

Same same regarding whining about the Axis Precision vs. the standard Axis. It’s the same metal work, just dropped into a cheap Oryx chassis - it’s still the cheapest of the cheap action and barrel, with absolutely no accurizing done… but it has a chassis which could be used for the sport, and the standard Axis doesn’t… it’s just making excuses.

Rifles don’t buy scopes. Sure, most of us buy better quality rifles for given applications which would dictate better quality optics, but the same aphorism applies, if you can’t see it, you can’t shoot it. I’d rather have an Axis II with a Tangent Theta on top than a custom Impact with a Bushnell Banner.

There’s no sense in being bitter that folks are stating that there IS a difference worth the price in the performance of high end scopes over lower end scopes. Nobody is saying lower end scopes are all just junk, but it’s a hell of a lot more than just marketing when you see the difference in between a $3500 optic like the Kahles or $4500 optic like the Tangent Theta vs. a $1000 optic like the Bushnell DMR III or Vortex Viper PST II, or even $2k optic like the Leupold Mk5HD.

If glass quality didn’t make a difference for ANY of us, we wouldn’t waste the money buying it. I have a $100, $400, and $2000 50mm lens. The photo quality is NOT the same between the 3. Can we sell sessions with the $100 and $400 lens? Sure can, and have. But side by side with our L series 50, we can see the difference in every photo - so the $1600-1900 difference wasn’t wasted for us.

Equally, 4 years ago took a chance and got a screaming deal on Swaro SLC 15x56 binos for $680. I had a $1700 Bushnell Elite Tactical scope on my match rifle, and thought I was doing ok, and was using a Bushnell Elite spotting scope at the time. But then at a match in TX, it rained to beat hell and we lost visibility. During the height of the rain, the RO’s on each stage gave us discretion on when to start our runs - looking through our spotting scopes and picking when we felt the fog and rain lifted well enough to see to shoot the stage, we’d dive into it and the clock would start. On one 1400 yard stage, I waited a few minutes and finally saw the fog break to reveal the 1400yrd targets, and I dove to my rifle - but I didn’t realize my $2500 Swaro binos could cut through the fog much better than my $1700 Bushnell scope, and when I got to the rifle, I couldn’t actually see the targets… so now, I have a $3500 Kahles on top of my match rifle, with the same glass as my binos (Swaro & Kahles = same company), and my 15x56 binos are relatively close on FoV to my 56mm riflescope when on 15x… so I have very uniform view through both. Only way I’d be happier with that combo is if I had a reticle in my binos too. AND… frankly, that $2500 set of 15x binos can see better downrange than my $1600 Bushnell Elite 20-60x80mm spotting scope, with better quality glass making up for reduced magnification, and then some…

Same same regarding whining about the Axis Precision vs. the standard Axis. It’s the same metal work, just dropped into a cheap Oryx chassis - it’s still the cheapest of the cheap action and barrel, with absolutely no accurizing done… but it has a chassis which could be used for the sport, and the standard Axis doesn’t… it’s just making excuses.

Rifles don’t buy scopes. Sure, most of us buy better quality rifles for given applications which would dictate better quality optics, but the same aphorism applies, if you can’t see it, you can’t shoot it. I’d rather have an Axis II with a Tangent Theta on top than a custom Impact with a Bushnell Banner.

Well, okay, I give up. Can't get my point across so I'll stop.

 

[Varminterror]

Well, okay, I give up. Can't get my point across so I'll stop.

The point you’ve been pounding pretty soundly has been:

Maybe you could clarify the point you were trying to make. I could be wrong but it sounds like you’re taking the position that people who purchase a higher end optic are either fools or easily duped by slick marketing campaigns because YOU believe the difference between them and a $600 scope isn’t “worth it”

 

[HowieG]

your hopes



As I said earlier in this thread, I have no experience with or knowledge of scopes with a street price of $5k. I used examples of scopes in the $3k range vs your proposed $600 scope to make my point, which it seems you have missed entirety.

My point, restated and simplified.

1. A $3,000 scope cost demonstrably more to manufacture than a $600 scope because of the material, labor and overhead that go into them.

2. Worth is subjective. What an item is worth to me can be different for someone else.



Maybe you could clarify the point you were trying to make. I could be wrong but it sounds like you’re taking the position that people who purchase a higher end optic are either fools or easily duped by slick marketing campaigns because YOU believe the difference between them and a $600 scope isn’t “worth it”

Okay, let's give this a shot again. First, I am in no way interested in how you spend your money. Spend a hundred grand on a scope and it's fine with me. Your money and your desire. Like you said, worth is subjective. I have thousands of dollars in astronomy equipment sitting here in this room and I think it's worth it. A lot of people don't, but I don't care. Second, I have been running on two or three of these threads and things are getting confusing. My aplogies for that.

As simply as I can state it, my point is that extra money doesn't always result in extra quality or extra performance. I am referring to all products here. We hope that improvement is the result, but it ain't always the case. You can pay more and get less. It happens in cars alot. If things do work out and there is improvement, the law of diminishing returns applies. As you go up the chain, a 100 % increase in money will no longer result in a 100% improvement. Eventually, it might be a 100% money increase for a 2% gain. At a certain point, it stops. You just can't see it anymore. So, I surmise that the difference between $3700 scope and a $5000 scope is probably pretty small. We can keep going up in price, but perfection is unobtainable for ANY price. We tracking??

Okay. Let's look at optical quality. I have looked through a ton of scopes between probably 100 bucks and $1400. The jump between a bubble pack scope and a $400 scope is large. Might even be 50% or more if the bubble pack scope is really horrible. With me doing the looking, the difference between the $400 scope and the $1400 scope is fairly small at ordinary ranges. Maybe 10% depending on the scopes. Maybe not even that much. Some companies turn out pretty darned good stuff throughout their range.

Let me turn this over to you now for the high end stuff. How much improvement do you see between the $1400 scope and a $2500 scope, or $3500 scope? I don't know if you have actually looked at a $5000 scope. And, yes, it is all subjective. Can you quantify it for me?

 

[Nature Boy]

yes, it is all subjective. Can you quantify it for me?

I took my best stab at it in post #10 on the first page

 

[armoredman]

I recently bought a new higher end Leupold scope (for me anyway) for a little less than 1K. My first new scope in decades. It has some nice features like side focus and the CDS system. Optics crisp and clear but that's always been the case with my Leupolds I have bought. Where's the 4K difference?

$5,000 for a scope? I whine about $500!

 

[HowieG]

$5,000 for a scope? I whine about $500!

I used to for sure. I spent like 300 bucks for a scope in the 1980's and that was some pretty serious money.

 

[HowieG]

As far as glass goes (the raw product, not finished lenses), scope manufactureres all buy from the same companies. Both Leupold and Vortex say they buy the type of glass they need from various glass manufacturers depending on their needs at the time. Hoya, Schott, etc all make good glass. Leupold says they buy based on price.

I would imagine Zeiss pretty much uses Schott since they own them.

 

[Atavar]

When it comes to optics it is a case of diminishing returns. If you are buying a $100 scope another $100 would make a huge difference. If you are buying a $1000 scope another $1000 will make a big difference. If you are buying a $2000 scope another $2000 will make a small difference.
As you approach the leading edge of high end optics it takes a boatload more money to realize even a tiny improvement.

 

[Varminterror]

Let me turn this over to you now for the high end stuff. How much improvement do you see between the $1400 scope and a $2500 scope, or $3500 scope? I don't know if you have actually looked at a $5000 scope. And, yes, it is all subjective. Can you quantify it for me?

It’s a lame game to pull the “quantify it” when you’re effectively asking to quantify the number of elephants that fit on a purple.

But I offered some input to that specific question - comparing $1400 (ish) scopes to $3500 (ish) scopes, and will offer more here. The unfortunate part here, sitting with exactly the items within my reach about which you are THEORIZING, is that you’re simply too stubborn to listen. But for those others playing the home game…

Here’s an example of what happens in a $1400 scope, relatively commonly, which doesn’t in a $3500 scope - this is a very good scope, was around $1700 street when it was new in production and the Gen 3 version is $1500 currently. This scope has better clarity with less issues than most optics on the market, and we do have to zoom pretty hard and be pretty scrutinizing to notice, but zoom in and note the slight purple chromatic aberration boiling in the mirage flare along the dry grass line below the targets, the slight purple aberration mottled into the trees, and the slight lensing haze at the edges. Now, this was a pretty rough lighting day, and I’m slammed on the ground and shooting over a crown, on a bright day, and shooting ~20-30 degrees towards the sun, so the opportunity for glare is actually nicely avoided here, but there are still some notable issues in the image.



Here are a couple shots from a $1900 MSRP 20-60x80mm spotting scope, right around 20x. Check out the tree at the bottom of the first image - mottled and discoloured by CA, and check out the consistent edge clarity lag and the chromatic aberration around the white letters on the truck in the second photo.



Compare those against the mirage riddled photos shot through my $2700 binos in my previous post. The differences in clarity, color truth, image definition, edge clarity, etc are all obvious.

I was like you in my past. I’d never looked through truly elite level glass until maybe 10yrs ago, hell, I used to think Leupold 40x Competition optics were cream of the crop optics for a long time, and I thumped my chest about my Vari-X III’s. But one day I looked through a Nightforce BR scope, and then Schmidt & Bender, and NF ATACR’s, and Tangent Theta, and Kahles, and Zero Compromise, and Swaro… not just in a store or at a 100yrd range on that nice afternoon you decided to go shoot, but on a soupy, snotty day of mirage, and on hazy mornings where fog and rainfall cast everything grey, and on ridiculously bright afternoons in cattle pastures where EVERYTHING is the color of dead grass and burning sunlight into your eyes as if you’re looking directly into the sun, and snowy days where snow casts blue and purple all over the world…

The difference is there. It’s visible, and it’s tangible in performance at matches.

I’ll spend somewhere around $7000-10,000 on PRS competition, travel, and ammo this season. Even if I pretend a 5yr total depreciation schedule applies to riflescopes, there’s only $400/season difference in my investment between $1400 scope and a $3500 scope, less than 5% of my total cost this year, and really, that scope isn’t going to be $0 value in 5 years… let’s say I pick up ONE impact per match this season , that’s ~$20-30/point, and I’d pay that price any day of the week and twice on Sunday at most matches. And in MOST cases, the stage or match where you need that clarity, you need it a lot more than just one point (note that coyote target in my previous post… that was the average target size and target distance for that match! And I could see it, and the other targets, better than most of my competition that day).

Not everyone needs nor should everyone buy top of the line optics. But it’s pretty arrogant of you to continue poking and insulting as if the money spent is wasted simply because you can’t justify the expenditure for yourself. I don’t even live that way myself - I have a Bushnell Banner on one rifle and a Kahles K525i on another. My 9yr old son has a $49 (industry pro discount) Bushnell Trophy on one of his rifles, and an $1800 Bushnell DMR II Pro on another. I have a $3600 Nightforce ATACR 7-35x coming (hopefully shipping this week) from NF to go on my 2 mile rifle, but I have a $120 clearance Nikon Buckmaster on my crow rifle… I have a Leupold VX3i sitting on my wife’s Savage 12, a Burris XTR II on a 10/22 Charger pistol, and a handful of SigSauer Tango4’s and a couple of Bushnell Elite 3200, 4200, and 6500’s on my hunting rifles… I have a few pairs of boots which would have been $700-900 if I’d have had to pay for them, and I have a $50 pair of Under Armour running shoes that feel like cardboard - both shoes do the jobs I bought them to do… but one is obviously better quality than the other…

I’m damned sure not going to pretend all of these scopes are as just as good as one another just because I don’t want to pay $3600 for a Vortex Razor Gen III or another Kahles, or don’t wanna pay $4500 for a Tangent Theta…

 

[HowieG]

It’s a lame game to pull the “quantify it” when you’re effectively asking to quantify the number of elephants that fit on a purple.

But I offered some input to that specific question - comparing $1400 (ish) scopes to $3500 (ish) scopes, and will offer more here. The unfortunate part here, sitting with exactly the items within my reach about which you are THEORIZING, is that you’re simply too stubborn to listen. But for those others playing the home game…

Here’s an example of what happens in a $1400 scope, relatively commonly, which doesn’t in a $3500 scope - this is a very good scope, was around $1700 street when it was new in production and the Gen 3 version is $1500 currently. This scope has better clarity with less issues than most optics on the market, and we do have to zoom pretty hard and be pretty scrutinizing to notice, but zoom in and note the slight purple chromatic aberration boiling in the mirage flare along the dry grass line below the targets, the slight purple aberration mottled into the trees, and the slight lensing haze at the edges. Now, this was a pretty rough lighting day, and I’m slammed on the ground and shooting over a crown, on a bright day, and shooting ~20-30 degrees towards the sun, so the opportunity for glare is actually nicely avoided here, but there are still some notable issues in the image.

View attachment 1125345

Here are a couple shots from a $1900 MSRP 20-60x80mm spotting scope, right around 20x. Check out the tree at the bottom of the first image - mottled and discoloured by CA, and check out the consistent edge clarity lag and the chromatic aberration around the white letters on the truck in the second photo.

View attachment 1125346 View attachment 1125347

Compare those against the mirage riddled photos shot through my $2700 binos in my previous post. The differences in clarity, color truth, image definition, edge clarity, etc are all obvious.

I was like you in my past. I’d never looked through truly elite level glass until maybe 10yrs ago, hell, I used to think Leupold 40x Competition optics were cream of the crop optics for a long time, and I thumped my chest about my Vari-X III’s. But one day I looked through a Nightforce BR scope, and then Schmidt & Bender, and NF ATACR’s, and Tangent Theta, and Kahles, and Zero Compromise, and Swaro… not just in a store or at a 100yrd range on that nice afternoon you decided to go shoot, but on a soupy, snotty day of mirage, and on hazy mornings where fog and rainfall cast everything grey, and on ridiculously bright afternoons in cattle pastures where EVERYTHING is the color of dead grass and burning sunlight into your eyes as if you’re looking directly into the sun, and snowy days where snow casts blue and purple all over the world…

The difference is there. It’s visible, and it’s tangible in performance at matches.

I’ll spend somewhere around $7000-10,000 on PRS competition, travel, and ammo this season. Even if I pretend a 5yr total depreciation schedule applies to riflescopes, there’s only $400/season difference in my investment between $1400 scope and a $3500 scope, less than 5% of my total cost this year, and really, that scope isn’t going to be $0 value in 5 years… let’s say I pick up ONE impact per match this season , that’s ~$20-30/point, and I’d pay that price any day of the week and twice on Sunday at most matches. And in MOST cases, the stage or match where you need that clarity, you need it a lot more than just one point (note that coyote target in my previous post… that was the average target size and target distance for that match! And I could see it, and the other targets, better than most of my competition that day).

Not everyone needs nor should everyone buy top of the line optics. But it’s pretty arrogant of you to continue poking and insulting as if the money spent is wasted simply because you can’t justify the expenditure for yourself. I don’t even live that way myself - I have a Bushnell Banner on one rifle and a Kahles K525i on another. My 9yr old son has a $49 (industry pro discount) Bushnell Trophy on one of his rifles, and an $1800 Bushnell DMR II Pro on another. I have a $3600 Nightforce ATACR 7-35x coming (hopefully shipping this week) from NF to go on my 2 mile rifle, but I have a $120 clearance Nikon Buckmaster on my crow rifle… I have a Leupold VX3i sitting on my wife’s Savage 12, a Burris XTR II on a 10/22 Charger pistol, and a handful of SigSauer Tango4’s and a couple of Bushnell Elite 3200, 4200, and 6500’s on my hunting rifles… I have a few pairs of boots which would have been $700-900 if I’d have had to pay for them, and I have a $50 pair of Under Armour running shoes that feel like cardboard - both shoes do the jobs I bought them to do… but one is obviously better quality than the other…

I’m damned sure not going to pretend all of these scopes are as just as good as one another just because I don’t want to pay $3600 for a Vortex Razor Gen III or another Kahles, or don’t wanna pay $4500 for a Tangent Theta…

Yeah, yeah, nuff of the insults from you. I've also seen enough of the apparent tests of your camera. Bye now.

 

[HowieG]

When it comes to optics it is a case of diminishing returns. If you are buying a $100 scope another $100 would make a huge difference. If you are buying a $1000 scope another $1000 will make a big difference. If you are buying a $2000 scope another $2000 will make a small difference.
As you approach the leading edge of high end optics it takes a boatload more money to realize even a tiny improvement.

Yep. Agree totally.

 

[Varminterror]

Yeah, yeah, nuff of the insults from you. I've also seen enough of the apparent tests of your camera. Bye now.

You asked for the difference. It’s there, whether you voluntarily remain in denial or not.

 

[hq]

As you approach the leading edge of high end optics it takes a boatload more money to realize even a tiny improvement.

You're missing the point. At $3k+ price range the difference is not in the glass and coating quality anymore, it's in the features and configuration. We're talking about heavy duty tactical scopes and up to 10x magnification range instead of regular gauge hunting and target tubes and 4-6, maybe 8x zoom here, commonly with a much higher number of high quality lenses that go in a less specialized but in optical terms equally outstanding model.

For example, S&B Polar 96 3-12x54 retails for around $2.5k. PM II 3-27x56 High Power can be had for approximately double that - same glass and coating technology. The weight difference is revealing, PM II is over 67% heavier, because of a larger, heavier gauge tube and a greater number of lenses in it.

Oversimplifying the whole issue to just the retail price is intellectually dishonest.

 

[Txhillbilly]

I've always stayed away from threads like this. People that have never owned / used high end optics will never understand why people spend their money on them, and why we like them so much. For most typical hunter's / shooter's that will never shoot farther than 300 - 400 yards, most sub $1k scopes will do everything that they want.
I was one of those guy's for many years until I looked thru my first Swarovski PH 4-16x50 scope. That was all it took for me to know what I was missing.

I started shooting long range about 30 years ago. It didn't take long to figure out that the scope's I had wouldn't work very well. They didn't track great, and most didn't have good enough glass to do the job very well. Not wanting to spend over $1k at the time, I bought a couple Sightron SIII scopes. They were great scopes that worked for what I was doing at the time, but as years went on I wanted better.
Today, I have two S&B PMII's, a IOR Valdada Recon, a Steiner T5xi, Athlon Cronus, and a Delta Stryker HD on my long range rigs, and couldn't be happier when I'm shooting out to a mile.
While I will say it hurt the wallet when I dished out over $3k on the IOR, and close to it on a Revic PMR428 that I ended up selling after a couple years - Great scope, just way too heavy and high tech for this low tech redneck. I bought both my S&B's used for a great price.
The Steiner, Athlon, and Delta scopes aren't in the same class as the other's, but they also don't give up too much to the other's, yet cost nearly 1/2 as much.
I've shot a few rifle's with ZCO and Tangent scopes. Fantastic scopes, but I doubt that I'll ever take the plunge into that price range of optics.

In today's optic's, there are plenty of scopes in the $1500 - $2500 range that will come very close to the performance of the $3000 - $5000 scopes. Plus, If you look at the used market, you can find some great deals on higher end glass.

 

[wombat13]

I reject the premise that the cost of the rifle should dictate the cost of the optic. This is silly. The precision of the rifle should dictate the quality of the optic. I'm a hunter, not much of a target shooter. So for me, the optic needs to allow me to see my quarry and make a clean shot at the maximum range at which I and the rifle can are capable of a clean shot. That maximum range is sometimes related to the cost of the rifle, but sometimes it isn't.

Two examples. First an extreme example of how an underperforming "optic" is worse than a "cheap" rifle. I was hunting with my M1 Garand and in the first minutes of legal shooting a big buck came in very close. It was less than 20 yards away, broadside, and when I looked through the aperture I couldn't tell what I was aiming at. The deer, trees, and ground were all the same grey/brown. I had to pop my head up a couple times to look down the barrel to judge if I was on target. Second time, the buck looked toward me and I thought "Now or never." I fired, hit a little too far back and got it in the liver. Had to have my BIL help me track and found it in golden rod 80 yards away. Still the biggest or second biggest buck I ever got and I almost lost it because my sighting device was inadequate. That was the last time I took the Garand hunting. I'd like to do so again, but will only do it again if I have filled the freezer and am willing to pass on a shot I could easily make with one of my scoped rifles or if I put an Ultimak rail and scope on it.

Second, example is my Savage Axis II in .25-06. My local range only goes out to 200 yards so that's all the data I have. That rifle will reliably shoot 0.75 MOA out to two hundred. I don't see why I should expect that it couldn't take a deer at a much further range if I ever get to practice. Why would I put a low quality scope on such an accurate rifle? That $200 rifle (actually less) has a $500 (IIRC) Leupold VX-3i on it. Much better than the cheapo scope that came on it (it was the XP model).

If the $900 Kimber I just bought is noticeably more accurate than that Savage I will be very pleasantly surprised.