Solid Low Light Scopes & Mag Qs for the Gurus

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blue9

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Currently have a 3-9x40 VX-II on a .30-06 that I use mainly for whitetails up to 400yds. Most of my good opportunities come at dawn/dusk, and my VX-II is just plain terrible for gathering light (for my eyes anyway). I wind up watching the game thru my good binos clear as day, but not enuff good light in my VX-II to take a responsible shot. So, w/ that as background, what good light gathering scope would you guys recommend in the under $800 range? So, again, good, bright light gathering is key for me.

My assumptions are that I probably need a 50mm objective lens, but can stick to a 1" tube and don't need the 30mm tube. I understand that I can drop down in the size of the objective lens, and get the same light gathering as a 50mm, but that probably puts me in the stratosphere of scope prices.

Also, do I need more than 14x magnification? I wanna leave room to extend my range well beyond 400yds with time (and don't want to buy a new scope to do so), but I'm not an Army sniper, so do I really need the 20X mag that everyone tries to sell me? Seems like that extra money on mag would be better spent on better glass.

Finally, what about reticles? I have the basic plex in my VX-II, but everyone is running to the fancy bullet drop compensation stuff, etc. Seems to me that only clouds up the view, and makes it seem darker.

Insights/suggestions would be very appreciated.
 
800 bills buys a lot of good glass. Yes you will want a 50mm for the type of hunting you want to do at dawn or dusk. Who's good or who's best, I will leave to those that follow me. If it was me, I would go to a good hunting forum to hear from those that actually use their scopes for hunting and get their opinion, me I use mine for target and long distance shootiing, so I am inclined to say a 6-24X50mm would be best, but what do I know, I don't even get up before 7:30 AM.

You can check out some really nice scopes at:

www.opticsplanet.com

Good customer service and reasonable prices.
Jim

For what you want to do:
http://www.opticsplanet.net/vortex-riflescopes-vpr-m-05fp.html

http://www.opticsplanet.net/vortex-viper-pst-4-16x50-riflescopes.html
 
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I don't mount Chinese scopes on my rifles....

My recommendations:

http://www.opticsplanet.net/leupold-vx3-45-14x50mm-long-range-rifle-scope.html (this one with the Boone and Crockett would be the real deal)

http://www.opticsplanet.net/zeiss-conquest-4-14x50bl-hunt-riflescopes.html

You do not need a 6.5-20 or 24... 4.5-14 is fine... With the higher power scopes your field of view gets mighty narrow...

Blue,

Is your scope a VX-II or Vari-X II?? My VX-II 3-9 gathers light quite well considering its price point... Not in the same league as my VX-3 or Zeiss glass but still quite good..
 
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Generally the Leupolds are better than most. I've never had any trouble seeing animals until well past legal shooting time with one. Never felt the need for a 50 mm scope when I could see well enough to shoot after it was legal to do so with a much more compact 40mm. The disadvantages of the higher mounts of the 50's offset any advantages for me. At around $400 the Zeiss Conquest scope I have does offer me a few more minutes of clear light over the Leupolds I own.
 
I recently purchased a Kahles 2.5 - 10 x 50mm scope for my Sako .308. I am very impressed in the clarity & light gathering capabilities of the Kahles.
 
Depending on what you feel your circumstances are. You could try a 4x or 6x fixed scope. 800.00 or a lot less will get you in the stratosphere of scopemakers as well as better light transmission than a variable.

I've had 50mm before on hunting rifles, and the balance is on par with a stack of 50 pancakes in wafflehouse...unless you're shooting out of a blind. I've gone to 40mm max and prefer 32-36mm obj. I'm sure someone is going to expound very shortly on the maximum light transmission for the human eye.
 
If the Leupold doesn't work, you'll likely have trouble finding measurable brightness improvement. (I say this, and I'm not even a Leupold fan).
Just turn the scope down to no more than 5-6x at dusk. That gives you an 8mm exit pupil with a 40mm objective -which is about the largest exit pupil your eye can handle, and should still be reasonably adequate for big game at 400yds. Adding a 50mm objective will simply let you use 1-2x more magnification at the same relative brightness as the 40mm scope at a lower power. A 50mm objective shows the same exit pupil size at 6.25x as the 40mm does at 5x.
Turning up your magnification is just going to make a dusk image dimmer and harder to see. Magnification over 7x is usually only practical for bright sunny days.

BTW, increasing the tube diameter to 30mm does nothing to increase the amount of light reaching your eye. It's solely to give more adjustment range for the erector, and to add some strength to the tube.
 
You can get a pretty good calculation of exit pupil size by dividing the main lens in mm by the magnification power. 50mm/3= 16.6mm, way more than the eye can use. But that large objective lens allows you to have higher magnification with with "more light" so to speak. With a 3-9x50 you can get a 9mm exit cone with a magnification of 5.5, which means it will be "brighter" than a quality fixed 6x42 scope (which has a 7mm of exiting light).

The assumption here is that you are comparing scopes with lenses that have the same light transmission properties. Obviously that is not the case.

Jimro
 
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