Coyote calling scopes 22/23 for me

A

AWS

Retired PM Staff
I did a little reshuffle this season, new rifle builds needed scopes. My old favorites still wear their 1.5-6x40ish scopes.

I don't get a lot of long shots, even open country most are well under 100 yards.

I bought a barrel(22-250AI) here on the sight and rebarreled my faux LVSF. To make use of the caliber I pulled the Athlon Argos 2-12 from my 6x45. The Athlon is clearer than the Elite 4200 2.5-10, has a very nice BDC reticle that is bold enough for close in work. It has a FOV of 56' on the bottom end so again nice for those that appear at your shoelaces. Nice scope at a reasonable price.

So now the 6x45 needs a scope, it's a old Rem 600 that I rebarreled to 6x45nearly 30 years ago and extremely accurate. Looking through my collection of scopes (60 years of shooting, collecting and owning a gunshop at one time) they accumulate. Well the Leupold VX-3 1.5-5 gets the nod. What can I say clear, great FOV, light weight with a great eyebox for fast target acquisition and just enough X's to reach as far as I care to shoot the rifle.

Next was the little lightweight 20P I built. Looking at a new scope and was set on getting another Athelon 2-12 when Sightron offered a new line of scopes the S1G2 with a 1.75-5x32 in the offering. With a FOV of 71' on the bottom end and promises of great glass, coatings and 12oz weight it became a very serious contender. I have a rifle that I built in 2005 or 2006(dates are getting a little fuzzy) in 22-204 that has been wearing a Sightron II 1.5-6x40 since the day it fired the first shot and will stay on till it, I, or the rifle stops working. So far the little S1G2 is living up to it's fanfare. Glass is very clear, adjustments are spot on with nice finger adjustments. Cons the turrets are mushy on the elevation but spot on and this isn't going to be a turret twister, just a smidgen of fisheye on the bottom power, I didn't notice it until I was lining up the crosshairs and when the light pole I use got to the edge of the image it got a slight bend in it, still very clear all the way to the edges and not enough to bother with as it is clear there and is only on the very edges of the image.
I have seen this in Weaver V-3's only in one of them and it was far more pronounced. I've killed a lot of critters with the V-3 and never notice it in the field. All in all the S1G2 is a very nice scope, took it hunting yesterday, kept it on 1.75x all day and never noticed the aberration, regrettably no coyotes offered to be a test subject. Will post more when it draws blood.

Finally, the combo gun had an old gloss VariX 1-4 on it and I decided to upgrade it. With this gun again FOV trumps X's with it's 12ga shotgun barrel in the brush, the new Leupold Freedom 1.5-4x20 has a FOV of 74' and it's PigPlex reticle is very fast and compliments the 5.6x50R Mag rifle quite well. I've killed a few coyotes with this scope on other rifle and think it has found a permanent home.

Now to get some more hunting in.

Have a good year.

AWS
 

For the same money, I've been eyeballing the 3x9 version, due to the HHR reticle.

It's only an ounce more, but still has 40' FOV on 3X.

Just not sure if the center of the reticle is too fine for low light.

So, I just spent some of my fun money today on two S-Tacs in 3-16x42 instead......

 
Thanks, hard to believe there was a time when I looked forward to birthdays, now they mean it will be a little harder to do things.

Those S-Tacs look like a real bargain. The year end sale is nice.
 
I bought one of the S-tac 3-16's while up in CO, I mounted it last week and am impressed. It has so much eye-relief that I need to redo the base and rings to move it forward. Rings are here and the base is due in Tues. The reticle is quite fine but will work for open country during the day, I got the MOA reticle. I think it will be the ticket if we have an Egg Shoot again. I have it on a medium weight 20P shooting 40gr NBT's.
 
Originally Posted By: AWSI bought one of the S-tac 3-16's while up in CO, I mounted it last week and am impressed. It has so much eye-relief that I need to redo the base and rings to move it forward. Rings are here and the base is due in Tues. The reticle is quite fine but will work for open country during the day, I got the MOA reticle. I think it will be the ticket if we have an Egg Shoot again. I have it on a medium weight 20P shooting 40gr NBT's.

At $249.99 that scope is tough to beat
 
Doug, you guys rock, I was in CO and you shipped it to me there. I wanted to mount it there but work got in the way and storms made me wait till I got home.
 

I have seven of those 3-16x42's now, they are a heII-of-a-scope for the money.

Tracking and RTZ is perfect on everyone.

6 have the duplex, and one with the MOA-3. Their duplex is just right for a hunting gun, the MOA-3 is a bit thin for low light, so I put that one on a stock Ruger MPR 223 for play mostly.
 
Originally Posted By: gr8fuldougOriginally Posted By: AWSI bought one of the S-tac 3-16's while up in CO, I mounted it last week and am impressed. It has so much eye-relief that I need to redo the base and rings to move it forward. Rings are here and the base is due in Tues. The reticle is quite fine but will work for open country during the day, I got the MOA reticle. I think it will be the ticket if we have an Egg Shoot again. I have it on a medium weight 20P shooting 40gr NBT's.

At $249.99 that scope is tough to beat
where can that scope be had for $249.99?
 
The S1G2 1.75-5 has a problem, while it really looked good and performed well, even killed a coyote with it, it has a problem.

I mentioned the fisheye on the lowest power in the field it became more of a problem. While tracking a coyote through the brush the brush would seem to bend around the coyote and was very distracting, it wasn't noticeable on a standing coyote.

Like I mentioned that I had seen it on a couple of Weaver V-3s, but it was random only in a couple of them and non-existent in most of them. I talked to Sightron customer service and they had me send the scope in. They pulled some other S1G2 1.75-5s off the shelf and ran into the same problem and offered to replace it with a more powerful scope which I turned down and I offered to wait for the 1.75-5 but they said it looked like a design problem and it would take a while to work out so they refunded my money, great folks. I hope they get the problem worked out as this is a great calling scope.
 
All of the 1x scopes I have looked through, have the 'fish-eye' at 1 power. All but one, that is.

The Leupold Freedom 1.5x4x20, for about $300+ had virtually no 'fish-eye'.

If you get the chance, go to an optics shop that has several brands in stock, including the Leupold, and compare them yourself. At 4 power, they don't have it, but at 1 power, they do, except the Leupold.

I worked the gun counter at Bass Pro/Cabelas for 17 years, and had the chance to look through a lot of optics. The most expensive low power scope we had was a Vortex Razor HD 1-6x24, at $2,300, and it had 'fisheye'.
 
I have a number of 1-3 to 1.5-6 scopes from seven different manufacturers and have only encountered it in a couple(not all) Weaver V-3s. I even have an older Sightron II 1.5-6 that is one of my favorite predator calling scopes with no evidence of the phenomenon.
 
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