A little background, I'm usually a 'FFP/first focal plain' guy and also a 'mil reticle/mil turret' guy.
That being mentioned, I made a recent decision to try a SFP scope again, for reasons to be explained below.
#1 reason is I'm getting older with eyes not so great anymore, and for this application I wanted the reticle on low power magnification/ 4-5x, to be full size for coyote and other critter hunting and in dim light sometimes, plus I wanted the FOV lower mag offers. FFP reticles can be hard to see at that low of magnification because they appear smaller in size.
#2 reason is this rifle that I bought used had a nice pair of steel 1" Talley rings come with it that I wanted to use due to their low mount height on my CZ527 custom in 5mmFBI/32's at 3675 fps.
#3 reason is I wanted a reasonably compact and lightweight scope, and because I'll only be shooting to 500Y on occasion, I didn't need a huge amount of elevation travel and the rifle is on the short side with it's 21" barrel so I wasn't interested in a long scope.
Lastly, and important to me, is I wanted a scope with a mil reticle and to match it, mil turrets.
If you were to look around and into the SFP mil/mil scope thing there aren't many options. I actually got tired of searching...
Well, right under my nose so to speak was this scope in the header/ Athlon Talos 4-16x40. I'm affiliated with Athlon just so you know, thus the under my nose comment. Honestly I was a bit apprehensive because I tend to be a scope snob, meaning I have some expensive glass, like S&B and March, so I'm very reluctant to go too cheap on a scope. I thought to myself, you know Steve, if you don't like it just sell it at a small loss and try something else. So I ordered it, only a $179 MAP scope.
4 days later the box showed up. I got the scope out and played with all the controls, focused the diopter to my eyes, looked around the yard at everything - wiping brow - apprehension quashed ... no complaints so far.
The next day I tried to mount the scope, it turned out I couldn't because the bolt handle hit the eyepiece. So it was Dremel time. Half hour later the work relieving the top of the bolt handle was done. I was fine doing this because new low rings and a modded bolt handle from Calhoon is $160 + shipping, which is even more money that I didn't want to spend. Another 15 minutes and the scope was leveled with eye relief set, GTG. Now I had a chance to get a better look at the glass and reticle, the scope did still seem like a great value so far.
Yesterday I sighted the rifle in at 100Y, the last 3 shots were sub 1/2" and centered, so I was done. Then I went down range at 50Y, so drawing, as exact as I possibly could, two pencil marks 1.8" apart/ that's 1 mil at this distance. This was to check the exact reticle and magnification correlation for 1 mil. At the bench I discovered that on 10x the mil hashes were perfectly correct, yay!
Then I inputted the data to the SHOOTER app for the 425Y turkey. It called for 1.5 mil elevation, which I dialed, and .4 mil left windage which I held for. Bam - smack, repeatedly. All my friends tried, all were pleasantly surprised at the whole of the rifle/scope combo.
Things that stood out to me...
The level of glass in this scope is way above it's pay grade!
The reticle is thickish, which is what I wanted anyway. The specs say .05 mil but I estimate it's thicker than that, like .07 mil??
I really "really" like the capped but "finger adjustable" turrets. Most of the shooting I'll do will be PB or holding over, a mildot reticle is good for this. I also like that the turrets can be set back to zero! None of that coin slot madness here, man, and the turrets show what revolution you are on via numbered lines. The turret lines line up well but are not perfect, slightly off, almost a line thickness, I've seen worse on more expensive scopes so I can live with these like they are.
Side parallax focus - the Athlon specs state the scope focuses down to 15Y, that's an error, it does indeed focus down to 10Y on 16x and less than 10Y on lower magnification. Being a PCP airgun shooter I can appreciate close focus more than most guys and its good to know for future uses in that regard.
Past this there isn't much to say. For me, I ask myself one question, would I buy another one. The answer to that question is yes, yes, yes, a darn good scope for the money, I like it and it solved my dilemma for this rifle project.
For $179 MAP, it's a friggen steal, and if you price shop you can find these cheaper!!!
That being mentioned, I made a recent decision to try a SFP scope again, for reasons to be explained below.
#1 reason is I'm getting older with eyes not so great anymore, and for this application I wanted the reticle on low power magnification/ 4-5x, to be full size for coyote and other critter hunting and in dim light sometimes, plus I wanted the FOV lower mag offers. FFP reticles can be hard to see at that low of magnification because they appear smaller in size.
#2 reason is this rifle that I bought used had a nice pair of steel 1" Talley rings come with it that I wanted to use due to their low mount height on my CZ527 custom in 5mmFBI/32's at 3675 fps.
#3 reason is I wanted a reasonably compact and lightweight scope, and because I'll only be shooting to 500Y on occasion, I didn't need a huge amount of elevation travel and the rifle is on the short side with it's 21" barrel so I wasn't interested in a long scope.
Lastly, and important to me, is I wanted a scope with a mil reticle and to match it, mil turrets.
If you were to look around and into the SFP mil/mil scope thing there aren't many options. I actually got tired of searching...
Well, right under my nose so to speak was this scope in the header/ Athlon Talos 4-16x40. I'm affiliated with Athlon just so you know, thus the under my nose comment. Honestly I was a bit apprehensive because I tend to be a scope snob, meaning I have some expensive glass, like S&B and March, so I'm very reluctant to go too cheap on a scope. I thought to myself, you know Steve, if you don't like it just sell it at a small loss and try something else. So I ordered it, only a $179 MAP scope.
4 days later the box showed up. I got the scope out and played with all the controls, focused the diopter to my eyes, looked around the yard at everything - wiping brow - apprehension quashed ... no complaints so far.
The next day I tried to mount the scope, it turned out I couldn't because the bolt handle hit the eyepiece. So it was Dremel time. Half hour later the work relieving the top of the bolt handle was done. I was fine doing this because new low rings and a modded bolt handle from Calhoon is $160 + shipping, which is even more money that I didn't want to spend. Another 15 minutes and the scope was leveled with eye relief set, GTG. Now I had a chance to get a better look at the glass and reticle, the scope did still seem like a great value so far.
Yesterday I sighted the rifle in at 100Y, the last 3 shots were sub 1/2" and centered, so I was done. Then I went down range at 50Y, so drawing, as exact as I possibly could, two pencil marks 1.8" apart/ that's 1 mil at this distance. This was to check the exact reticle and magnification correlation for 1 mil. At the bench I discovered that on 10x the mil hashes were perfectly correct, yay!
Then I inputted the data to the SHOOTER app for the 425Y turkey. It called for 1.5 mil elevation, which I dialed, and .4 mil left windage which I held for. Bam - smack, repeatedly. All my friends tried, all were pleasantly surprised at the whole of the rifle/scope combo.
Things that stood out to me...
The level of glass in this scope is way above it's pay grade!
The reticle is thickish, which is what I wanted anyway. The specs say .05 mil but I estimate it's thicker than that, like .07 mil??
I really "really" like the capped but "finger adjustable" turrets. Most of the shooting I'll do will be PB or holding over, a mildot reticle is good for this. I also like that the turrets can be set back to zero! None of that coin slot madness here, man, and the turrets show what revolution you are on via numbered lines. The turret lines line up well but are not perfect, slightly off, almost a line thickness, I've seen worse on more expensive scopes so I can live with these like they are.
Side parallax focus - the Athlon specs state the scope focuses down to 15Y, that's an error, it does indeed focus down to 10Y on 16x and less than 10Y on lower magnification. Being a PCP airgun shooter I can appreciate close focus more than most guys and its good to know for future uses in that regard.
Past this there isn't much to say. For me, I ask myself one question, would I buy another one. The answer to that question is yes, yes, yes, a darn good scope for the money, I like it and it solved my dilemma for this rifle project.
For $179 MAP, it's a friggen steal, and if you price shop you can find these cheaper!!!
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