Brown Santa brought me a 2400 BDX to test

[catorres1]

Look what brown santa left on my doorstep:





Just got it and pulled it out of the box today. Been looking forward to testing this one out for a long time! Hope to run it through it's paces this season. First trip will be to Colorado for Elk, then run it through paces at my local range where I tested the Leica 2700. Hope to see how it works on a sheep hunt in West Texas as well, should be interesting.

Let me know if there is something in particular you would like me to look into and I'll try and incorporate that into the review.

Thanks!

 

[scocoabeach]

Look forward to seeing your review. Do you have a Garmin 701 or Kestrel 5700 you can link to and get the full AB engine? I’m hoping to pick up the Kilo 3000 BDX Binos when they are released.

 

[catorres1]

Sorry for the late response, been in Colorado hunting elk for a few weeks, just got back.

I do have a Kestrel Elite, and have paired it to the 2400 it works like a champ so far in my limited testing.


Using the RF with ABU only is also super easy, though it requires using your phone. I actually handed it to my son to see if he could figure it out himself. He took it and had it up and running with his ballistic data in no time. He then used the 2400 to get a range and firing solution for the cow he shot (first elk for either of us), but did not use the Kestrel, just the onboard ABU.

I setup the connection to the Kestrel later, took about 5 minutes tops. So far, it has worked really well, but I spent most of my time in Colorado looking for a bull (unsuccessfully), so will be doing some more in depth testing in the coming weeks. But so far, the experience has been pretty positive with this RF.

 

[dgheriani]

I've got one coming as well. Curious out to what kind fo distances you've been getting good returns with yours? I had a Sig 50% cert I needed to use and figured this would be an improvement in ranging over my Kilo 2200 and the bluetooth integration with my Kestrel should be great for team field matches.

 

[catorres1]

I will be posting a lengthy review, but have been testing it out as much as I can between work and hunting trips. Of course, results will vary significantly based on conditions, but Sig claims, IIRC, 1kish on deer, 1800 yards on trees, and over 3k on 'reflective targets', not sure what that means tbh.

So far, I find that it is very true to their claims, (except for the reflective, have not tested that). I have been pretty consistently able to range trees out to 1800 plus. In bright direct sun, not so much, but hit the right one in shadow and it will do it pretty reliably. Now and then, I have been able to range trees out to as much as 2300 yards, but those are very few and far between, not consistent. Again, conditions and targets mean YMMV, but I would feel comfortable in saying that 1800 on trees in most conditions can be expected, and under many conditions (lower light for example), a couple hundred yards more, with outliers pulling in at the 22-2300 yard range.

As far as the connection to the app, super easy. Handed it to my son and he had it connected and loaded up the ballistics for his rifle in minutes. Then went out and killed an elk with it.

Same with the Kestrel connection. Very rarely, it will not read back ballistic data but if you just range again, it will come. I'd say it's probably 99% or better. Super easy to setup, wakes up and reconnects in about 2 seconds from sleep if the kestrel is running. The one thing I wish they had done is to implement a compass reading in the RF that would transmit target DOF to the Kestrel. It does not, so when using the Kestrel, you will still need to point it at your target and select the direction. The other thing, I have my rifle set for 'mils' in the kestrel, and while the proper holdover numbers come back, they are mislabled MOA. I suspect there is a setting I can change to get it fixed, but have not bothered as I run MOA turrets on my rifles. Only in this one test case, I have been using Mils. Again, the numbers are correct in mils, it's just the label that is wrong. Other than that, so far, it seems to hit all the integration check boxes.

Overall, in terms of connectivity, they have done a pretty good job as far as I can tell so far. Still have lots of testing I will be doing over the next weeks, but overall, pretty impressed with the ranging and very impressed with how consistent and stable the bluetooth connection has been so far.

HTH!

 

[jeffmedlin]

Keep the info coming @catorres1 ! I ended up with the Leica 2400R, and am really happy with the purchase.... any plans on doing a comparison? Make you a deal... come up to Triple C in Cresson Tx.... and you can do a "Heads Up" comparison... and report the findings to SH.