Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics If you had 150 to spend on a scope...

If you plan to shoot at 500, hunt at 400 and prefer a reticle based solution for correction then I’d try one of the Bushnell Nitro scopes from Doug. After rebate you have several options in this lineup to choose from.

These s ones originally retailed at much higher price than the $150ish you can get them for now after rebate. I don’t know how they stacked up at that price, but at the current clearance price I think they’ll do better than most anything you can find that retails at $150.

This is the truth. I rescued one of those circa 1980’s Savages from a pawn store. It had the most misaligned drilled vase locations I have ever seen.

Traded it off to a guy who wanted a project, and he got an ever better deal than me.

For shooting at 500 yards I’d seriously consider a one piece base and good rings, or at least good rings properly lapped.

Burris Fullfield II own 3 of them and love them.

My understanding was scope and rings for $150.Since it’s scope for $150 plus rings,I’d hunt down a used Weaver Grand Slam 3-10x40/ballistic duplex,or secondly a Bushnell Elite/Elite 3500 3-9x40/DOA 600.Mount it with a set of Burris Zee’s...

This thread prompted me to look at Ebay where I found and bought a Nikon Monarch UCC 3-9x40 for 140.00. I feel like I just hit the lottery. Thanks to the OP for starting this thread!!

I'm surprised too. Well done all!

Another vote for Burris here.

For God's sake don't say you want a Leupold, we don't need another thousand page diatribe.



I sent you a PM!

Thanks to all! I got the Athlon that soneone offered to send me to try out. Took it out at dusk last evening and compared it to my brothers Nikon Prosaff 5. I was happy how it certainly held its own. I had compared it earlier in the day to my Sightron SII on another rifle and there again I could tell very little difference. It seemed to be a good scope , so that is where my budget went. Thanks to all the other offers. I had some good ones , and I certainly appreciate the help!

Dumped every Burris 25 years ago was tired of sending them back for repair. Even tho repairs are free still cost $20 to ship.
Slowly over the past 10 years sold off Leupold's. Would send 5-6 a year at one time for repair. Last group of 6 sent back for repair Leupold asked me, they would replace all of the scopes with any model they had. Took them up on there offer and sold them off new in the box. Went and bought Nikon Monarch's, Prostaff 5's and 7's. Have yet to bust one, they are mounted on mostly big bores and slug guns. Nikon has said they will honor there Life Time Warranty, have yet to bust one in 10 years.

Nikon is going out of business. They are not going to honor any warranty.. Plus, when Nikon was in business you weren't going to find a Monarch in the OP's price range ("150").

Yeah, "look for a used Leupold Vari-x IIc 3-9X40". That is laughable, when I just sold one for $325.00. Just slightly over the op's requrirement of "150 max"... Just sayin.

I'm a long time Leupold user (lots of Vari-XIIs, VX-IIs, VX-IIIs, VX-3s, and a smattering of VX3i thrown in over the years), but I recently bought some Fullfield II 3-9Xs. I took the rifles involved to the range yesterday and found that the optical quality is quite good. The Ballistic Plex reticle seems to be about just right. I don't much care for the entire ocular turning for magnification selection and I'm not real sure just how precise the elevation and windage adjustments were (I was not out there to evaluate, but just to sight in). For the price, I think the FFII is damn hard to beat.

Burris Fullfield II 3-9x40 is about as much bang for the buck as you can get for the mission profile you described.

Expat

This.

But the I do have Redfield Revolution with the Accu-range reticle on a T/C Venture that I like a lot.

If I had $150 to spend on a scope......

I’d get a job.

I have $80 scopes and $900 dollar scopes. Some rifles just need $150 worth of glass others get top dollar and yes, I am employed.

Kent

I've had several brands of scopes including Nikons. Maybe I've been extra lucky but have only had trouble with one, a cheap "Simmons" scope. When it happened I had two choices, throw it in the trash or bother with a warranty and decided why bother with wasting any time or frustration dealing with having a scope repaired that I would never be able to have confidence in again. So, if I have another scope break it's a throwaway, unless it so expensive I could sell it after a repair job.

Nikon products usually have pretty good glass. My vote would be to go ahead and buy if you have your eye on one you like. If not my vote for another choice would be save up some beer money until you can afford a Burris fullfield II with the BDC slash marks in the reticle.

This

Does anyone else have experience with this Nikon scope?

Is the 3.6-3.9 inches of published eye relief....accurate?

What caliber rifle have you put this on?

Was considering mounting one on a CDNN-clearanced Thompson Center LH Dimension in 7mag. 1-9 twist.

Have a spot for safe 960 yard plinking. Not setting up for hunting, just shooting for this one. Cheap shooting rifle.

Wait on a sale for a SWFA 6x........or this one? Opinions....

Mike, I have two of those. Both on 6.5 Creedmoors. One in Warne vertical rings on a rail, one in Talleys. I put them on rifles that my daughters will use for practicing longer range shooting. They were extremely easy to sight in since the adjustments were correct. I have not dialed either yet. The glass is better than expected, the weight is reasonable at 20.5 oz. and the build quality is good. I like that the turrets reset to zero. The focus and SF both work well. 6.5mm holes are easy to see on paper at 100 yards at 10+X. I find the eyebox to be pretty friendly up to about 10X, after that it's tight and takes a little getting used to. I haven't used them in low light yet. Without knowing the reliability I can't say they are wonderful, but impressions are good so far and they are worth $200 if they meet your needs.