Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics LPVO upgrade help

I’m looking to upgrade my Strike Eagle 1-8 and need recommendations as I only have experience with the Vortex. I like the reticle and illumination but the low light performance was less than adequate for hunting purposes. I pulled the Strike Eagle, and replaced it with a VXR. About a month ago I put the SE onto another rifle and have been grabbing it more and more.
What options are their for a better glass quality/low light performance LPVO, preferably in mils. 8x-10x top end magnification, with illuminated center dot and hash marks? Thanks for sharing your knowledge/recommendations.
Forgot to mention budget, I’d like to be $600-$700 with low light glass performance similar to the VXR or a little better.

peak98

I can’t imagine that “low light performance” and the typical objective size of a LPVO (20-24mm) go hand in hand.
The recent gold standard is probably the Vortex GenII 1-6 and they can be found right at $1k.

I would look at one of the higher end 1.5-6x40-44mm scopes I have eight of them from 6 different makers and all work well. You still have the large FOV but better light transmission on the higher powers. I did have a Bausch& Lomb but the eye relief changed to much when changing powers.

If you want low light performance it will cost more. The higher end scopes from most brands are over $1000. In the the Vortex brand you might look at the Viper PST 1-6x Gen II which runs about $600. I have the Razor HD 1-6x24 Gen II E and it's a good scope although I haven't used it much in low light conditions. They run about $1400.

Most of the other scope companies offer LPVO's and the better ones should offer good low light performance although LPVO's are not primarily designed for low light performance as they don't generally have large objective lenses. It's really a question of how much you want to spend and what trade off's (weight for example) you are willing to make.

Small objective lenses to limit low light performance, but if you need 1x on the low end, you are pretty much stuck with an objective in the 24-30mm range.

PST Gen2 1-6x24 mentioned above is a good choice. Delta Stryker 1-6x24 is a little more money and a little better performance. If you really need 8x on the high end, high quality options mostly start at a higher price. I am messing with Tract's 1-8x24 and I have to admit it is really growing on me. It gets you above $1k though.

Something of a dark horse here is Bushnell's Korean made 1-8x30 Forge. It is a bit on the heavy side and the reticle is a simple #4. I never spent much time with it since I prefer other reticles in LPVOs, but optomechanically it seemed like a nice design for the money.

If you prefer FFP reticles in LPVOs, the good stuff starts above $1k as well. There, I'd be looking at SAI 1-6x24.

ILya

I appreciate the replies gentlemen, I’m gonna call Doug at Camera land tomorrow and see what he recommends in a compact 2-7/2.5-10 with some sort of illumination. I can probably stay in budget with a more traditional style scope as opposed to a LPVO.

peak98

I'd give the SWFA 1-6 HD a good look. Really like the circle MQ reticle in them. The"I've been very solid mechanically, and FWIW, their glass is good.

March makes a 1-10 but not in your budget

Yes sir, that’s a lil more than I wanna spend for this rifle. I was hoping I’d overlooked something that would be in budget. Low light performance is more important, I should be able to find a traditional scope with illumination in my price range.
peak98

^^^^

This

John