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All:

Can someone shed some light on the difference between the Lyman All American and Perma Center scopes? Particularily, the Perma Centers...

Thanks..
RAS

the perma center marked scopes keep the crosshairs in the center of the scopes field. the older scopes without the perma center marking do not. in other words if you move the reticle up and to the left thats where it will be. its not that bad unless you really have adjust the scope to near max adjustment.
hope this helps ed

One of my two Lyman All-American scopes is a permacenter. The other might be also, I can't remember.

How are they in quality?

I had an older Lyman 10x All American it wasn't a Perma-center but worked well for long range shooting and metalic silhouette matches in the 70's, it was the best I could afford. Sold the whole rig to an elk hunter and he used it for years.

erich

I knew the Lymans well who made those scopes and in fact we were family by marriage. Now Charles 111 and his brother have passed on and the division has long since been closed.

The All American series is an all aluminum scope series that followed the Challanger (4X) and Wolvorine (6-8-10X) series. They were lower priced than those previous scopes.

They were of excellent construction and clear sharp optics when they were made and even today are only a half step behind some top brands however their seals are old and dry and they are not supported by Lyman.

I have about ten of them. The permacenter does as mentioned above but the crosshairs turn pink like many scopes of its design yet today in bright light.

To me a 4X is worth about $50-75. I am not buying but selling and replacing them with Leupolds on second level rifles. The Leupolds are being replaced by Conquests on first level rifles.

For some reason there are a few on the forums who mention the old Weaver scopes. They nowhere near a Lyman in optics.

The one with the permacenter has just a plain crosshair reticle. I hunted with it one year on the 99E it came to me on. I took one doe with it. The plain crosshairs are easy to lose, so I took that scope off the 99 and put it on my CZ452 where it does a pretty good job. It is a little too long to clear the rear sight well on my CZ, but I can work with it. I have to place my head just a touch back from where I otherwise would.

The non-permacenter one I only recently acquired, and haven't used yet. It has a post and cross hair reticle, the old kind, not what Leupold calls one. I is ok to look through, but in clearity and FOV neither one compares well with my new Weaver K4 4x38. All three of them are a long way from my Nikon Buckmasters 4x40.

I have 4 Lyman Perma Centers, the 2-1/2x,3x,4x & 6x power scopes. They are excellent quality for their day. Gil Parsons of Parsons scope service considers them one of the finest scopes made in this country. He's a big proponent of tight tolerance machined brass internals for durable operation and cushion mounted lenses & these scopes had those features. There great scopes for a period rifle.

I found a 8x perma-center today that came off a rifle I bought years ago. Fine crosshairs with a dot. Real clear. I wonder if they are collectable?

I have several Lyman scope from the 1950s and 1960s. 50 years ago, they were generally considered to be in the same quality range as Leupold. I believe that Lyman bought their glass from B&L and their Targer-Spot, Super Target-Spot, and Target-Spot Junior were all used by the top competitor of their day.

The catch being that Lyman scope are getting older by the day and are, optically speaking, a few tiers below the current average Leupold.

I don't think that Lyman scopes are particularly collectible, but there is someone out there collecting almost anything that you can think of.

Pretty sure the glass was Bausch& Lomb.

Yes, that is what I have read, B&L glass.

I have one of the Lyman 10 x with dot and Target Adjustments still a good scope

To me the Lyman perma-center scopes are as good as any new scope to my eye. Very good target scope