Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Celestron spotter

Looking for an inexpensive spotter strictly for range use, and was looking at this one.

Mini Mak 70

Anyone with any experience here?

Celestron makes good scopes at a good price. The Mini Mak, however, doesn't have a band that allows you to rotate the scope after it's mounted and that tripod it comes with is a bit flimsy. If you're just going to sit it on a bench, it will probably work fine - just don't expect much adjustment out of it as far as being able to position it for easy viewing. (I like to have my scope where all I have to do is turn my head just a tad to look through it after shooting).

That shouldn't be a problem, it will be more for someone other than the shooter to call out impacts and adjustments. I seldom go shooting alone, and if so, I'll just make do on those occasions.

I kinda figured another tri-pod for it would be in order, so that's no biggie.

Go for it, then. I've seen some Mak style scopes on the line at Camp Perry a time or two, so they must work OK.

One other question I had was about how far do you think a scope like this would be effective, 3-400 yards? We're talking 6 and 7mm bullet holes.

Thanks for the input. I'm leaning pretty heavy towards one of these.

For a $100 spotter, you'd be lucky to see any size bullet holes past about 200 yards, depending on conditions. I don't know anyone in my realm of competition (Service Rifle) that can see holes past 300, even with the high-dollar scopes.

Ok, thanks. As you can see, my experience with spotters is basically non-existent.

Maybe using the Shoot-N-See targets would help extend the range some. Either way, it sounds pretty handy for setting my 200 yard zero.

I have a Meade ETX 90 Mak and it works great for spotting bullet holes. I do have Nikon 50ED and 60ED as well. I looked on Amazon and here are some reviews on there. Looks like sample variations just like any scope.
http://www.amazon.com/Celestron-522..._cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

Actually, you can buy a lifetime supply of Shoot-N-C targets for what a top-quality spotting scope will cost.

I have the C90 Mak SKU #52268 D 90mm (3.54") F 1250mm and find it great just like SteveWM does with his Meade. You are much better off spending the few extra bucks for a 90 over the 70mm models.


I've also added a star diagnonal to handle 2" eyepieces for night sky use. The provided 1.25" erecting image diagonal is not suitable for astronomy.