Scope

K

Kenneth L. Walters

New member
One of many things in life that I know virtually nothing about is handgun scopes. As I want to buy one for a new gun I have I would appreciate any recommendations.
 
The proper scope depends a lot on the gun, the caliber, and what you plan to use it for. A 1911 in .45 ACP for Bulleye I'd say an electronic red dot sight. A Contender in 7mm TCU for deer hunting you might go with a 1.25x-4x variable. A general purpose .44 Mag revolver a 2x fix power scope. A long barrel .22 for squirrels maybe a fixed 4x.

In simplest terms the optimal magnification for any scope boils down to: the size of the target and the range at which it is engaged. An elephant at 50 paces doesn't need much magnification. To head shoot a rabbit at 100 yds requires quit a bit.

So ... what do you want to scope and what to you plan to use it for?

-- Kernel
 
Interesting. Thanks! I plan to use it on a couple 6 inch barrelled revolvers for target shooting. One is a 357 the other a 44. Probably will use full cast bullet reloads. As my eyesight gets older scopes are starting to appeal. Think 2 or 4x?
 
Being that you're new to scoped handguns I'd highly recommend you try a red dot sight first. My dad is 67, wears glasses, and has a real hard time using a scoped handgun (let alone iron sights), he has trouble finding the cross hairs in a fast snap-shooting situation. I put a 30 mm Millett Redot on his 5" 629 deer pistol and he loves it. One big plus is you can use a dot sight with both eyes open, makes it real easy to get on target fast. Compared to a magnified scope I don't think there is any accuracy disadvantage when it comes to shooting "minute-of-deer" out to 100 yds or so.

If you don't like the idea of a dot sight then I'd strongly suggest a Leupold 2x handgun scope. At $200 it's the Gold Standard by which all other handgun scopes are judged. I think you'd be very disappointed with a 4x scope on a big bore revolver except when shooting off sandbags and a very solid concrete bench. High magnification scopes are very hard to hold steady. But their biggest disadvantage IMO is narrow field-of-view which is extremely critical in a hunting arm, not so important in target pistol.

Scoping a Smith is pretty easy since they've been drilled and tapped from the factory for the last 12 years or so. Just remove the rear sight and attach a base. The only minus is you can't easily go back to the open sights. It is possible to drill & tap the barrel and mount a base forward of the rear sight (kinda like a Ruger Redhawk). That way you can remove the scope and go right to the iron sights. -- Kernel
 
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