Re: USO > Simmons > rock (USO torture test)
Testing results:
Simmons: Once broken into two pieces, the Simmons Prohunter actually becomes indestructible. I really feared that the USO would not have been durable enough to destroy the back half of the Simmons. Seriously, it broke the rock! Sure, at the end of the test it was like looking through an ice cube, and the reticle was broken as well, but the housing was unbelievably tough.
Bushnell: The Bushnell Taiwan exceeded all of our expectations and then some. Hell, it even made it to final death with the USO. We all expected failure right from the start, since we’d pulled it apart a few days before and saw the pathetic construction firsthand. We were surprised when it did fail though, since it wasn’t where we were expecting it to.
USO: The USO was, as everyone here already would have thought, extremely tough. It was the sole survivor, and was used later that day to help zero a couple of rifles.
Even with its triumphant victory, I do have a few complaints:
-The sunshade threads are far too weak. There isn't enough material underneath them, and a serious hit from one side will bend the threads in, and the sunshade will fall off. You may notice that the second half of the video was shot with only the solid screw on caps in place, and no sunshade. The threads should be reinforced with another millimeter or two of material underneath where they screw into the objective.
-The parallax/focus settings should be labeled (I had to label them myself with paper and clear tape), and there should be a stop which prevents focusing past infinity, since it’s pointless to do so anyway.
-It would be nice to see some spotting scope specific reticles, such as the one found in the Zeiss Spotter 60, in addition to the current assortment of riflescope reticles offered.
-The option of a shorter eye relief eyepiece would be nice, to help improve the poor FOV. I understand that this was done for a USMC contract in order to clear the issue gas masks, but couldn’t the design have been tweaked a bit before selling to the civilian market?
-The image produced by this scope is not very good at all. I can see that USO does use quality glass and coatings, evidenced by the color, contrast and low light performance observed through the scope, but something about this particular design seems to result in a fog of chromatic aberration, which makes accurate ranging and target identification very difficult. I’m not kidding when I say that I can more easily identify objects, trace, and any hits/misses with the $85 Barska Blackhawk (shown mounted next to the USO at the end of the video) than I can with the USO. I have seen one other example of a USO field spotter, and was equally unimpressed.
Rock: Well, what can I say? We didn't have to pay anything for it, but it was somewhat lacking in resolution, contrast, color rendition, and reticle choices. In the end, it fell to the Simmons, so I can hardly recommend it for anything.
The aftermath:
The USO did sustain some damage, but it's still functional, and I will continue to use it. It appears that the objective lens (or maybe one right behind it) has suffered a large crack. This doesn't seem to affect the image in any way that I can tell. If anything, the image is slightly better.
There are also a couple of small dents in the objective bell which makes adjusting for parallax a little... difficult. It now requires the strength of four men and a child to turn the focus past 200 yards, and if you actually get it past 200, it has a tendency to jump past infinity, where you can pretty much forget about turning it back the other way.
Overall though, it sustained a surprisingly small amount of damage, considering what we put it through.
I think I’d give the USO Field Spotting Scope a ‘C plus’. While not perfect, it does fill a couple of important roles, providing a means of accurately calling shots, and acting as a backup ranging device. In addition to those things, it is fairly compact and easy to pack, and I now know that I can absolutely count on it to survive any field mishaps.
I’m certainly looking forward to the release of the “real” spotting scope John III says is in the works, since it should be correcting some of the problems with this one. While I haven't heard anything about it, it is supposedly planned for release at the end of 2009 (Referenced in this thread:
http://www.snipershide.com/forum/ubbthre...4371#Post954371).
