Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Why heavy scopes for dialing?

It's not a joke. To start, it has HD glass and doesn't have a 2.1 exit pupil. Better turrets than Classics too.
I was able to see the reticle at 5x 30mins before sunrise 2 weeks ago, in a moonless night leading to a foggy day. That was in Texas piney woods.
I would have been able to make a killing shot at 200yds (longest clear cut) way before legal time.

It may suck, but I don't know, cause I didn't C-clamp and tested it. I put it on a gun a shot it at different distances, which is what I bought for... the SWFA marketing got me

Just keep giving more rope, don't rain on the party

What I don't understand is why a reliable dialing scope needs an extra half pound of internals. Or more.

I could see 3-4 ounces, but there ain't a lot of room for extra pig iron inside most rifle scopes.

How many dialing scopes have you used extensively, say for years of up and down?

Also, did not know "pig iron" was used inside 21st-century scopes.

You’re no launcher....you’re no launcher at all!

Maybe put your head in one of those C clamps and screw it down tight..... the SS 3x9 will perform just fine.

Don't believe weight has anything to do with it. Accuracy, reliability and long term repeatability on the other hand requires detail and quality, and even then I would tend to think that a manufacturer would make every attempt to keep weight within reason and as light as possible... Nightforce scopes being mentioned, if you compare their cheapest $1k scope to their most expensive $4.5k scope of comparable sizes there is only about a 30% increase in weight.28.5 oz. to 41 oz. If I had to rely on a scope and cost was no factor I'd tend to go with a 30% weight increase for that added reliability. Hell, I like heavier rifles anyway...


Phil

John, you're being kind of literal......

I don't "extensively" use any my dialing scopes, and not sure what you mean by up and down. I change loads and adjust for wind left and right often enough, too

You may not be aware but most of the various steels start out with pig iron. Can you tell us what materials are used in 20 oz + dialing rifle scopes to make them that heavy?

Thicker tubes, not just exterior but erector, and other metal inner parts--instead of the synthetics used in lighter scopes.

Will add that close to 20 years ago a well-known European optics firm introduced a lower-priced, but still optically very good, riflescope. They sent about a dozen to various gun writers, after engraving the writers' names on the scopes. I may not have been the only one to thoroughly test one, but suspect I was, putting it on an accurate .375 H&H and starting to shoot at a 100-yard target. The scope only lasted around 20 rounds before the groups opened WAY up.

I contacted the firm's U.S. public relations person and told about my results. In the meantime a well-known gunsmith friend had encountered a similar problem. As a result the company asked for the problem scopes back, and found a consistent problem with a synthetic inner part. They pulled all the scopes off the market--or at least all they could, as some had already been sold to individuals. The part was changed to metal and the scope went on to become very popular--but it was a simple set-and-forget scope, NOT a dialing scope that would be subject to a lot of up-and-down.

Since the trend toward dialing scopes started I have been sent quite a few for testing, including some that were relatively light. One of these gave up the ghost after a few ground-squirrel shoots on a .17 HMR, refusing to adjust consistently. Obviously recoil didn't have much to do with it. Instead the adjustments simply wore out.

Naw, there's no reason to make the innards of dialing scopes out of heavier, tougher stuff.

Someone should do titanium innards for these boat anchors.

It's the difference of a half pound that makes me curious. The glass lenses are probably the heaviest part of the sub-assemblies in a scope, the tube being the second heaviest. Even doubling the thickness of a scope tube would "only" add a few more ounces. The erector assembly is obviously made of very small parts, changing them from synthetic to metal doesn't seem to account for the significant increase in weight.

Maybe they quadruple the thickness of the tube.

I wonder what a scope would cost if the metal parts were made of titanium......

Ha! Beat me to it!

Is titanium a good material for parts that rub against each other? I'm not so sure about that.

good point.

Huskemaw - now with plow steel!

It does sound like a brand of farm tractor.

"See the new Huskemaw 4200 with more diesel power at your local authorized dealer."

Part of the weight increase can be attributed to larger diameter tubes, typically 30mm instead of 1 inch. Thicker and more of it.

I have replaced a couple of 1 inch scopes with 30mms, and noticed if the objective is kept near the same, the actual feel doesn't seem to be as affected as I first thought it may be.

"Now through Sunday, mention the infamous "diesel cowboy" sent ya for an extra 1/3 MOA discount"

Interesting idea on titanium. The downside is that titanium costs far more than stainless steel per pound.. While titanium weighs only a little over half as much as steel, the price difference might make the cost of SWFA scopes about as much as Swarovskis.