Flame me baby....What about Shepards scopes?

[Bender]

I have one on an old 30-06, How does this community view them? I have enjoyed them.

I was thinking of putting one on my New Rem 700 .223 SPS tacticool. Any luck here with them? I have only hunted with them and this new .223 would be a 50/50 gun. Because I would varmint hunt half the time with it.

 

[Bender]

Won't take the troll bait?

 

[longrangefool]

A reticle with "minute of deer" wouldn't be my first scope choice. But to each their own.

 

[Bender]

Ya. It was cool in 93 when we got it. But oh well. It killed lots of elk with it.

 

[shovelstrokeed]

Ummmm, NO!

I mainly punch paper or ring steel. G2DMR reticle on my 3.5x21 Bushnell makes dialing for corrections a breeze as all my shooting is on square ranges or at least known distances. I do use the windage marks to compensate which that Shepard is lacking.
Scales on the sides are a distraction and further, unless the reticle is specifically set for the round you are shooting (MV, BC, environment, etc) it is more or less useless. I have a somewhat similar reticle in the BDR reticle on my Sworo Z5 3.5-18 on my Ruger Gunsite Scout hunting rifle. It works pretty good on that gun and it has taken 2 deer in 2 hunts. 1 at 175 and 1 at 200. Both deer DRT.
Do you really think it is sporting to even consider a shot at the 600-1000 yard range on the bottom of that reticle? I hunt in an area where I have clear views and a safe backdrop out to 400 or so and even there, I would probably pass on a 400 yard shot. We have lots of deer.

 

[Dan Newberry]

We had a fellow use one of these in a recent long range course we offer. I had not seen them work before, and for the most part, I'm not a fan of any style of hold-over reticle (including the Horus)... too much clutter in the lower half of the reticle really does negatively impact your ability to see ground strikes near the target, and that of course makes it impossible to make a hold correction on a follow up shot. Keyboard commandos never need a second shot of course, but if you're really out there shooting it's gonna happen... :/

The Shepherd isn't too "busy" however... and it did a decent job for the student. What you have to know (which is the case with any hold-over reticle) is that as your altitude and temperature changes (DA), the hold over points after you pass about 600 yards will not be "spot on", and you need to know how to compensate for that. Good notes will help...

Windage holds could be an issue as shovel mentioned above... his points are worth noting.

The Shepherd scopes can be made to work. Not a first or second or third choice, but they'll work. I don't know if I'd want to have more than 300 dollars or so invested in one (just because there are better options out there for that price point, such as Weaver Grand Slam and SWFA 12x)... but after you learn to zero the thing (which we had to look up online, as even the scope's owner didn't know how to do it), it'll work. We took the shooter, who used a 308 and typical 175 grain match load, all the way to our 1040 yard plate with respectable hit counts.

Dan

 

[shovelstrokeed]

To clarify my post above. If the price point is good, and it is what you can afford to put on top of your gun, I'm sure it can be made to work.
Not everyone can afford to drop a few thou on a scope and mount. There are marks to work with and with some time and ammo spent on a range and a decent BC program, one could calibrate the marks to match whatever round you plan to shoot and then using a mental data book or physical one, attain success.

It would not be my preference for a scope for my guns and my styles of shooting. I need all the help I can get and I find that G2 reticle, coupled with the very accurate mil adjustments on my Bushy, make easy what was a difficult task for me. Namely making quick adjustments based on bullet strike as observed through the scope right after a shot. HIT! 0.2 mils high and 0.5 mils right, no guesstimating, it is right there on the reticle. Either dial it or just make the appropriate adjustment to hold which is right there on the reticle. Now if I can just remember which way to turn that side thingy.

 

[JoeZ]

I don't use one myself but I have a fair amount of experience with them and have instructed at least 4 shooters with them over the years.

I can say, if the target is 18" or so and the goal is to hit or not (as opposed to having smaller scoring rings) the scope works very well out to 600 yds, which is the limit of my range. The p2 reticle matches the 308 well enough to reliably ring steel of this size and one shooter even ran a ps22 clip on in front of it and scored Army sharpshooter at night. This is not fantastic but seems a valid system to me.

Some interesting features I noticed about it. The Shepherd has both a FFP and SFP reticles. A shooter could "tweak" his FFP up or down a bit to tune his hold overs for altitude and temp all the while never loosing his basic zero. The scope also has MOA indicators in the glass etched into the FFP and intersecting the SFP crosshair and so if the shooter dials windage or elevation he can see the amount while aiming.

Some drawbacks to the Shepherd scope is the glass is decent, but for the money isn't the best. It does not have target knobs. If your targets are going to be smaller that 18" you'll need to know how much +/- to hold at the holdovers.

I've found with these type of scopes its best to verify the 300 yd hold is dead on and see where the 200 yd and 100 yd end up.

I hope I've helped.


JoeZ

 

[Bender]

Exactly. If they updated them with tactical knobs and better glass it would be a good practical scope. I did like the one shot zero. Worked every time for me.

 

[JoeZ]

If you find tactical knobs for it let me know, my nephew has one. How does one get better glass for it? Sounds expensive.

JoeZ

 

[Bender]

I was hinting that the factory should update what they put out as new scopes. they have not been updated since 1987 I think. Glass was good for its time. but the wheels of progress have moved on and they stayed still.

As far as a BDC reticle and Dual retical I think it was a pretty forward thinking for their time.