Best All-In-One Solution?

[FourT6and2]

Not sure if this is the right sub forum, but here goes. My Kestrel 5000 crapped out due to a battery that leaked. Must have damaged the internals. So I was about to get a new one when I had a thought...

I've always used three devices when shooting long range: Kestrel for density altitude, laser rangefinder for distance, and my phone running Trasol for ballistic solutions. I haven't really looked at other options on the market in years because I've been using what I have. Trasol seems to work great for me and is accurate. But I wish I could just range and have that one device pop out a ballistic solve. I see Sig offers a rangefinder that does this because it has built-in weather meter? But looking at the fine print, it only offers ballistics out to 800 yards unless you use your phone with an app or something? That kind of defeats the purpose of an all-in-one.

Any other options out there?

Kestrel has meters with ballistics, but you still need a rangefinder. And then there are like 4 different Kestrels with different ballistic calculators? Why so complicated. How do you know which one to use? Applied Ballistics, Hornady, etc. Jesus. Trasol has been working perfectly for me.

There are other rangefinders with ballistics, but you need a weather meter.

 

[6.5SH]

Send the Kestrel in for repair, if under 5 years is still covered IIRC. And use lithium from now on, ALL alkaline batteries have sucked for at least the past 15 years.

As to an all in one, a rangefinder doesn't have an impeller or ultrasonic wind sensor, so you are not measuring but estimating. Look at the workflow as well, what rangefinder has the ease of entering info over a phone or a Kestrel for that matter. Decide what is important to you and choose from that.

FWIW, I DO like having redundancy. The phone/PDA is damn easy to enter info on and SEE, but sucks for reliability and working in extreme conditions. The Kestrel will work in conditions no phone can but is hindered with a limited display and slower input from less buttons. A LRF with a built in solver has no wind measuring and even fewer buttons for directly entering settings unless using a phone. So I'd rather have 3 devices and a paper backup for PACE than a single method/device.

 

[FourT6and2]

Send the Kestrel in for repair, if under 5 years is still covered IIRC. And use lithium from now on, ALL alkaline batteries have sucked for at least the past 15 years.

Mine is older than that I think.

As to an all in one, a rangefinder doesn't have an impeller or ultrasonic wind sensor, so you are not measuring but estimating.

Wind isn't needed; I do that myself. All I need is DA.

Look at the workflow as well, what rangefinder has the ease of entering info over a phone or a Kestrel for that matter. Decide what is important to you and choose from that.

FWIW, I DO like having redundancy. The phone/PDA is damn easy to enter info on and SEE, but sucks for reliability and working in extreme conditions. The Kestrel will work in conditions no phone can but is hindered with a limited display and slower input from less buttons. A LRF with a built in solver has no wind measuring and even fewer buttons for directly entering settings unless using a phone. So I'd rather have 3 devices and a paper backup for PACE than a single method/device.

For me, I just hate having to use three devices. Wind is a non-issue. I've tried using the Kestrel for that, but it's just easier and faster for me to read wind myself from behind the rifle. That's like 75% of the "art" of shooting for me and half the fun. The only time I need to enter info into anything is when gathering DOPE and setting up a rifle. After that, all I need is DA and target distance. Plug that stuff into Trasol and it pops out my solution. So if a laser rangefinder has environmental capability for DA, pressure, temp, etc. And it can store all the info for my rifle and pop out a solution, then awesome.

The only question would be how accurate/reliable is that compared to what I've been doing?

And then I could at least simply down to two devices: Kestrel with ballistics and a range finder. But I guess that's a question for the Kestrel threads.

 

[6.5SH]

Is absolutely the "art" on wind reading but is rare for anyone to be as good as they think they are Vs measuring IMO.
For straight DA a Drop D3 would do it but are 100% reliant on a phone to use it. If doing that may as well use the weather data from your phone itself. Unless ELR ranges a 1000 foot DA difference from actual location to whatever the phone reports isn't going to matter.

For a single device less wind then are at Vortex Fury HD and a phone if doing Trasol. You'd still have some redundancy then. As to accuracy of the DA measurement I'd not think it would make a difference unless into extreme conditions/ranges.

 

[FourT6and2]

Is absolutely the "art" on wind reading but is rare for anyone to be as good as they think they are Vs measuring IMO.
For straight DA a Drop D3 would do it but are 100% reliant on a phone to use it. If doing that may as well use the weather data from your phone itself. Unless ELR ranges a 1000 foot DA difference from actual location to whatever the phone reports isn't going to matter.

For a single device less wind then are at Vortex Fury HD and a phone if doing Trasol. You'd still have some redundancy then. As to accuracy of the DA measurement I'd not think it would make a difference unless into extreme conditions/ranges.

I'm nowhere near as accurate with wind as a measurement, but that's part of the fun for me.
Max distance is 1,000 yards on a square range. Every once in a while I might on BLM land or something and get out farther, but I'm shooting 6.5 CM so it's not like I'm doing ELR. At my normal 1,000-yard range, DA changes throughout the day much more than 1,000 ft. But it follows a pattern.

So other than the Sig rangefinder with weather and ballistics, there are no other devices that do it all?

 

[6.5SH]

I'm nowhere near as accurate with wind as a measurement, but that's part of the fun for me.
Max distance is 1,000 yards on a square range. Every once in a while I might on BLM land or something and get out farther, but I'm shooting 6.5 CM so it's not like I'm doing ELR. At my normal 1,000-yard range, DA changes throughout the day much more than 1,000 ft. But it follows a pattern.

So other than the Sig rangefinder with weather and ballistics, there are no other devices that do it all?

The Vortex Fury does temp/pressure/bearing as well

 

[6.5SH]

Do contact Kestrel to inquire about repair though. They were spectacular handling an issue with a damaged display for me.

 

[FourT6and2]

Do contact Kestrel to inquire about repair though. They were spectacular handling an issue with a damaged display for me.

Ok, I'll do that in the morning. Thanks for the help!

 

[kthomas]

How about using two devices that link to each other?

You could use a Kestrel w/ballistics solver paired with something like the Terrapin-X. Range with a Terrapin-X, and your ballistics solver will have a solution for you in a matter of seconds.

 

[CavReconScout]

This has AB Elite built in, so you can range and get your dope out to an advertised max of 5500 yds at the same time. The older version was 2400AB.

KILO8K-ABS

The Next in the revolutionary new KILO(K) series.

www.sigsauer.com

 

[Kadams1563]

I still believe a Kestrel is the best and simplistic you are going to get.

Pair it with whatever rangefinder you want and you can get your dope through the rangefinder or be like me and just scroll the range up on the kestrel because im not paying that much for a rangefinder to link to my kestrel lol.

 

[carbonbased]

I don’t own either of the following but am looking into this too.

It seems the Sig 10k LRF binos do it all except wind (AB, environmentals, lots of gun profiles all onboard) and they will link to a variety of wind meters including the Kestrel. But they are ~$2100 street price.

The Remarkably Thorough Sig Kilo 10K-ABS HD Rangefinding Binoculars Review

BigJimFish reviews the Sig Kilo 10k ABS HD laser rangefinding binoculars with AB elite

www.snipershide.com