The one you are highlighting looks like the ones in all the reference photos. Talking to Ron Smith, it seems those are what they did testing with but the contract one was different. I attached a photo of what he said were the contract ones, which had the same shape, but had grooves and a suppressor ring cut in it. Somewhere in the timeline on the mod 2, they discovered the flash hiders actually hurt accuracy and actually stopped using them.
Didn’t thoroughbred armament just release a few more on their site?Ok, so who ended up with the (21) issued/surplus MIRS rails today?
Dont blame me for the final price, I got out of it a few bids before it ended.
But uhhh.....can I get one of those?
hahahaI second the need for NF logo ringsI got a new rev B from them, I think the last one they had, around Christmas. These sold today on an auction site. Nice salty ones. It just got to rich for my poor ass. But... heads up, and if anyone on here got them I would love to pick one up to go with the issued stock I was lucky enough to get from 0331. Many thanks again for that.
And I guess I need some NF logo'd rings or caps now too.
Ok, so who ended up with the (21) issued/surplus MIRS rails today?
Dont blame me for the final price, I got out of it a few bids before it ended.
But uhhh.....can I get one of those?
i bid up to like 2600 or something. the box was a mix of mars and mirs. be curious to see what serial range on the MARS rails.
Yeah, I was watching that GB one just to see if it would sell for that. If I would have looked back and seen that it actually sold I probably would have kept going.
You gotta add the 20% auction fee to that, so maybe 325.00 or so...but still, $900.00 is just crazy.
www.nightforceoptics.com
1.5" - that is a badger ord catalogue photo. not a mil weapon.I guess it's hard to tell, but anyone know what ring height these look like?
you are not factoring the additional height of the of the mars rail. A 1.375 height ring on the mars rail would be on the tall side for a pvs/22. The Stiller/Imuns and Rem/Badger/Imuns had a much lower scope base that aligned evenly with the NF mount, where the mars rail, like the MIRS, has a step down to the night vision.
www.knightarmco.com
PVS30 are designed you so can be .250 inches off center - up or down and the unit functions fine. If you take any mars rail gun with 1.125 rings and factor in the mars rail itself, which steps the night vision down, .250 inches, the actual center alignment of the scope is 1.375 relative to the NV unit. Now this would have lined up very well on a pvs22, and while visually not lining up perfect with the optics / PVS30 i shown in my photos, it is in fact within spec of the .250 alignment deviation and functions perfect. To say any of those optic combos is right or wrong, is looking at it wrong. They all work and were used heavily. The only issue with the different systems is a cosmetic one of them looking unaligned.No expert on night vision gear, but here how Crane optics guy explained it, more or less.
Early Mk 13 rifles with MIRS/MARs stated with 1.125” rings, circa 2004-2005. Lowest centerline to bore was desired. (Crane ordered it first 600 MIR rails circa 2004, along with AN/PVS-22 units).
Nightvision optics progressed and ring height was adjusted to get proper center lines between day and night optic. He joked something about the old PVS-17 being “last century” and couldn’t remember the height of its centerline.
At some point the 1.375” rings were adopted to get proper centerline with NV gear, which might have been the PVS-26? He implied this was during PSR contract time period, which had a separate optics procurement. I assume this is Mod 5 era.
I got the impression that a “flat rail” system was desirable to standardize ring heights. (KAC Mk 11/M110 and FN Mk 20 for example). I think the iMUN rail achieved that goal on the Mk 13 Mod 5, with front rail height alignment, correct?
At some point SOCOM instructed vendors to centerline their NV optics at 1.535”, so all flat rail systems could use the same NV gear with perfect centerline alignment, thus allowing a standardized ring height (based on day optic tube diameter of 30 or I guess 34mm?). Maybe that’s why he said 1.5” was “close enough” although spec is 1.535”.
He didn’t say what year that occurred, only that the PVS-30 was designed to that SOCOM spec.
Based on your pic, your PVS-30 aligns perfectly with the flat Mod 7 rail, but sits a little too high (~ 1/4”) with the MARs rails seen above with the 1.125” rings, hence I presume his remarks about settling on the 1.375” rings with the NF 5.5-22x56mm scopes. Not sure about Mk 11, but alignment looks very slightly off, with PVS-30, maybe about 1/8” taller than scope centerline...I think, but hard to see.
(FWIW, it seems SOCOM has ordered all of the following clip-on NV optics over the past decade and a half: PVS-22, 26, 27, 29 and 30, but obviously I don’t know what NV optic(s) operators preferred on their Mk 13 platforms over time).
Knight Vision - Knight's Armament
KAC night vision devices are designed to be positioned in front of conventional day scopes’ on the user’s rifle providing the same night time zero as their unaided day scopes.
I hear you, and I am certainly not an optical engineer. However, as noted by NF rep in post #862, SOCOM asked NF for higher rings for the Mod 5 to better co-witness with NV gear, resulting in the 1.265" rings, but apparently that was not the end of the story... The main optics guy at Crane noted there were three optical and small arms engineers who ultimately "agreed to settle on" the 1.375" ring height based on a switch in NV gear on the Mk 13 Mod ?, but they didn't tell me what year that was. The key opto-electrical guy noted that ~1.38" was the centerline, and that 1.375 rings were "close enough". (From SOCOMs perspective rings are cheap and easy to swap, pricey scopes and NV gear is not).
For the Stiller / imuns- you want 1.5”Great responses - especially the reference pics - that is too cool.
I ordered A107s (1.125) NF rings for my NXS 5.5-22x56. Both are in the mail.
I guess I won't really know until I test it out how the objective bell will sit above the barrel - I can always return the rings for a higher set if this doesn't work out on this rifle:
...I may ping him next week about the obscure engineering topic of centerline daytime scope + NV optic alignment, just out of curiosity...
...vs their LT111 mount:
I think Gould might be associated with the Special Forces, so a replica with the LaRue mount is an option, assuming that is correct inference re his Combat Command. My 2cts.
I think you might be right, based also on the pics by 0812guns of PSR rings. Maybe that was a typo and he meant to write 1.125 instead of 1.25.
@0812guns helped my friend source a thumb screw for his cheek riser. He can help you get one. McMillan didnt have the hardware in stock at the time.
very generous of you.
