Anyone with NV experience please help

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jim243

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Well I am looking at night vision scopes now for Christmas and have absolutely no experience with them. It is a 3x Gen I scope for $399.00.

Good, Bad, or what? How long does the element last, battery is a 123 they say good for 40 hours on battery, not sure of the amplifier battery yet.

ANY help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Jim
 
From what I have seen, commercial gen 1 units are terrible, like a $500 leupold has more visibility at night. Now I won't be like a lot of other people and say you can't get some use out of NV unless you spend a fortune, but for your price range I thing you would benefit from looking into military surplus gen 1 cascade tubes (3 tubes stacked). I have had great results with the pvs-2 scope which can be had for about $500 shipped although it is bulky, and the Zeiss Orion 80 is an amazing scope for being gen 1 that can occasionally be found for $600 or so. But whatever you decide to do, I don't think you'll be satisfied with a commercial unit.
 
Gen 1 = not much better than night adjusted eye sight. Some Gen 1 have an eye safe laser that makes them somewhat useful to 50 meters or so. You can add an IR LED torch to improve things, Tactical Night Vision Company have "Da Torch", Derelight have the Night Master 800 or join the UK Night Vision forum and learn how to make a better torch for a third the price. www.nightvisionforumuk.com

I am assuming you are looking at a rifle scope with reticule and not a monocular. Personally I would hold off on any purchase until the Yukon Pulsar Photon is available in the USA. It will be sold as the Sightmark Photon for around $700-$800 and is an IR sensitive digital camera grafted onto a normal rifle scope. Review here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krIk8vtWMNs
US discussion here:
http://www.texashuntingforum.com/fo...80/My_next_acquisition_to_the_hog#Post4345180

I think Bennybone & dfwroadkill in the above thread are both members here as well.

Basically the Photon will give you close to low end Gen II capacity at close to Gen 1 price, with the added benefit that it is not recoil sensitive and can be used in daylight if needed.
if you want a spotting scope type of product, then a Gen I cascade tube (three Gen 1 mil grade tubes bonded together) will give you Gen III levels of gain for around $450 as a do it yourself project. Look up cj7hawk on the AR15 forums or at the UK forum for a how to primer and list of suppliers. The PVS2 & Zeiss Orion 80 are examples of cascade tube units, last time I looked there were complete Orions available through Numrich.
 
Just read your reply above. Definitely save the money to get a Photon then. If you want to shoot past 100m then the digital Photon, Pulsar N550, N750; or any of the D760 type Gen II or Gen III scopes would be the go. The Zeiss Orion with a Stanag conversion mount is very heavy, but would do the job.

If money is really tight then for around $300 or so you should be able to make a do it yourself add on using an IR sensitive security camera, screen from a reversing camera and a day scope adaptor. Again, lots of how to info on the UK forum.
 
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