Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics New Start Ups, Existing Companies and just my opinion

I agree with Formidilosus on everything...but...from a hunting standpoint the reticle needs to be bold enough to shoot in low light. Heavy outer bars coming closer to the center. It's a 6x hunting scope, even a 2700fps .5 bc bullet is only going to slide 4MOA at 500 yards with a 10mph wind..... On a hunting scope, don't sacrifice a bold reticle for a thin reticle with more width than is going to be used.

Most hunters now days want a holdover reticle, or the ability to dial range

My big complaint other than not being able to find a fixed 2 1/2 or 3 to put on my lever guns is that scope tube mounting length seems to be getting smaller and smaller. I don't like having to use offset rings to put a scope on a sav 110.

Same here.

That's because there's two of you that want one.

Doug,
Nicely written post. And an honest one. Thank you. I hope whatever scope Cameraland decides on, is a success.
When you mentioned Pentax optics, their disappearance surprised me. Not sure of the year, but, in the late 90's[?], I bought a Pentax 8x42 DCF HR II binocular. One of the brightest, clearest I've looked thru, especially in that price range. Still have and use them now. Sad to see companies like Pentax go by the way side. Good luck in your endeavor's Doug.

I was mainly talking about all these short tube scopes that don't fit hardly anything without putting on one of those damned ugly picatinny rails or goofy azz offset rings.

Thank you. I had a bunch of friends at Pentax and was shocked when they got "el shafto grande"

Doug,

From the other side, being in both the pure shooting, and the hunting world- specifically western back pack hunting I get a different take than most.


I vaguely remember the CL Meopta scopes, and just as then, when I read abut it in this thread my first thought was- "won't sell". Here's why-

The first thing to realize is that the greater hunting community does NOT drive the market anymore and is not the ones spending money each year. I know most hunters will be upset about the thought that they aren't "THE"market, but they're not. The shooting community is the market it. It isn't hard to see why. Every pure hunter that I know buys a very limited amount of guns, ammo, optics and accessories. Of what they do buy, it's almost always going to be traditional (or offer something unique). Contrast that with the pure shooters: they are always chasing the next advantage- new rifles, ammo, optics, etc, etc. And they consume it in far larger quantities.

As an example- all of the "pure hunters" where I work even seeing the total failures of those scopes still tend to buy Leupold, Swarovski, etc. for their hunting rifles. Of which they usually have only one or two and outside of work shoot a box or two of ammo a year. They may average a new scope every two-three years and they don't know what a Meopta is, and would never spend $350 on one.
On the other side- the "shooters" take the lessons learned at work and apply it to all of their shooting and put Nightforce, SWFA, Bushnell Elite Tactical, etc. on their hunting rifles that they shoot 5-10k rounds a year out of. The average guy probably buys 4-5 new scopes a year and they want the same things in them that they want from work scopes- reliability, durability, good reticles, good turrets. They don't care about traditional brands and absolutely would try a Meopta if it was bombproof. If the first few worked- they'd buy ten each.


Your "Meopta MeoPro 3-10x44 Plex GDLE" appeals to neither group. The traditional hunters won't actually choose it over a Leupold, and it does absolutely nothing for the dudes that actually shoot. Your 6x special scope is in all likelihood going to be the same. It's not without merit, but the "simple fixed 6x with simple reticle that's truly reliable" is WAAAAY over represented on the campfire. Not only that, but it doesn't take much looking back to see that the vast majority of those clamoring for it don't generally follow through and actually buy that many scopes.
I'm not saying don't build it, as I think there needs to be that scope in the market, but I am saying that shooters buy scopes. SWFA sells every 6x42mm and 3-9x42mm SS MQ scope they can make because they work for shooters who hunt, and for hunters who shoot. Getting a company to make a neat 6x scope that is built the same as all their other scopes is an absolute waste of time. It will be a flop.

The first requirement MUST be absolute durability above all else. Second, MUST be perfect tracking. Even if you do both things, if you make it with 1/4moa adjustments and a duplex you're going to sell all of about 20 of them. Make it with 1/10th mils adjustments, low pro elevation turret, capped windage turret, a well designed mil reticle, and the durability to fall off of a cliff and still be zeroed perfectly.... and it will be the next SWFA SS 6x42mm MQ- you won't be able to keep them in stock.

Some of these newer start ups:
Tract, Maven, GPO, Athlon, etc will go the distance as Vortex did 15 or so years ago.

I just think the 3.5-10x44 is not that popular a size.

Maybe a 2-10x40 or a 4-20x50 would have done better.

When we did this we thought:
The Zeiss conquest 3.5-10 sold fairly well at around $550.00. Meopta made this scope for Zeiss and it essentially was a re-wrapped MeoPro. We figured at only $349.99 it was a homerun and we'd blow through them offering a great scope at a great price. We had to commit to a run of 400 scopes. It took 3 years to move through what we had predicted a 6 month supply.
Live and learn

Thank you. I had a bunch of friends at Pentax and was shocked when they got "el shafto grande"