Its great to have warranty when your suckin down tag soup on the side of a mountain because your Vortex wouldn't hold a zero.
Vortex lht 4.5-22 durability test
- Thread starter 762 ULTRAMAGA
- Start date
who knows if he's bullshitting the groupies
but it's a lot easier to buy something then it is to actually test it.
to be completely fair tho 10 shot zero's, drop testing, not just shooting from prone, and reticle that make sense are definitely a movement in the right direction.
but it's a lot easier to buy something then it is to actually test it.
to be completely fair tho 10 shot zero's, drop testing, not just shooting from prone, and reticle that make sense are definitely a movement in the right direction.
Super common with NF. They make great optics but when they shit the bed, they will blame everyone but themselves.
I completely agree. Whether the individual is to be believed or not should not be the takeaway from this discussion.
It should be the expectations of the consumer for a reliable zero (what western hunter hasn't taken a spill on the mountain?), reliable tracking, and a useable mil hunting reticle.
While I agree with the premise of your statement and desire to be focused on scope reliability, the reality is this discussion was started with said individuals testing and claims being brought up, not only of this Vortex lht razor in the 4.5-22x50 flavor failing his test miserably but all Vortex LHT scopes he's tested in the past failing as well. To get where you are suggesting we are going to have to discern whether the original individual is legitimate/to be believed as well as draw from the experiences of others who have used this scope and the Vortex LHT line in general to get a broader more full picture of whether we can trust this scope to hold zero with normal use.
I have not posted here very much over the years, however enough misinformation and total falsehoods have been written that they need to be addressed.
Ilya, is a shame that that you “know” so many things that are completely false.
For everyone-
1). I have never been paid or compensated any way, shape, or form from any optics company whatsoever.
2). I have never been paid or compensated in any way, shape, or form from any forum.
3). I have no bias for or against any company.
4). My vocation has changed over the years, and is not being used as an appeal to authority- I’m a nobody. I shoot and hunt a lot. That’s it. If you require, or believe that someone’s background has any bearing on pressing a trigger without flinching or dropping a rifle, there are plenty of paid and sponsored social media accounts for you. The goal here is data, not personality.
5). I did not ask Ryan or Rokslide to do this. He asked me quite a while ago if I would be willing to do it and I did not agree until a couple weeks ago. I do not want to do this, but no one else is looking at what matters in a scope and trying to quantify it. There will be no YouTube channel, no Instagram, no optic sponsors- nothing.
6). So far for the Evals posted, every scope has been privately purchased, all ammunition has been privately purchased, etc. There has been no compensation or incentive from anyone.
7). The results are exactly as they are presented for each scope.
8). We did not have a TACTACAM/through the scope video recorder until now. From now on, each scope will have the video (there are plenty of videos if companies want to dispute the current results).
9). Does anyone really believe that Ryan Avery (Rokslide co-owner) would rig results against a paying sponsor/advertiser for his website? Especially for ones that aren’t? I get that people have a hard time thinking that there aren’t ulterior motives these days, however Ryan wants to do this solely because it needs to be done.
10). No matter how much data/proof/video is given, people and some companies will do whatever they can to discredit the person/people instead of the information. The point isn’t that Ryan or formidilosus said so- the point is to show what’s happening so others can replicate and make informed decisions. The exact manner of eval is posted so that others can replicate- it’s open (do you believe it’s coincidence that the couple of people that have tried similar- one in this thread, had nearly identical results?)
11). Does anyone actually believe that image quality is the most important function of a scope?
12). Does anyone actually believe that all scopes are equal in reliability, durability and longevity? Do you believe that if one were to take 100 samples of 5 different top level scopes that one scope make/model won’t come out to be measurably better at those three things than the others? And that one won’t be the worst in those things?
13). The drop eval is absolutely repeatable, at least to the level required to check zero retention, and absolutely shows differences between scopes. I have laid out exactly how it’s done, and every person that has tried has seen the same results and issues.
14). A sample of one does not mean much if the scope works. It does actually mean something if it does not work. If the vast majority of a make/model are reliable, and failures rates are exceptionally low- what are the odds that the “one” sample is the bad one? What about if there are two samples that fail back to back? What do you think the odds are that most/all of them have issues at that point?
15). The goal is to get as many scopes as possible through the eval. That is as many differing makes/models, and as many samples of each make and model as possible to show results.
16). Some results will be no surprise at all to some people. Lots of results will surprise a lot of people because they have been fed a line of BS from marketing, writers, and reviewers that all scopes of the same general class are mostly equal.
17). There is no effort whatsoever to disparage any company. The results are what they are. The effort is to provide information about differences in function and zero retention in field use between scopes. If -insert scope- fails or loses zero in any way, it will be shown regardless of manufacture. If -insert scope- works correctly and holds zero it will be shown regardless of manufacture.
People generally believe that companies are genuinely testing the products before they are released for sale. But other than a couple companies, when they are asked “so how many live rounds were shot during testing and proving the scope works”, and/or “so did you test zero retention in live fire from drops/impacts”- you get blank stares.
Ryan Avery and I, as well as a whole bunch of others that hunt heavily each year have seen repeated and consistent failures with loss of zero and total failures in use. We’re going to video the entire process from now on and show the results. Then people get to decide whether it matters or not, to believe it or not. But the idea that there aren’t scopes that lose zero from very little use, and that there aren’t scopes that hold zero through virtually any legitimate use is not only incorrect, it’s dishonest, disingenuous, and so easily proven wrong.
Ilya, is a shame that that you “know” so many things that are completely false.
For everyone-
1). I have never been paid or compensated any way, shape, or form from any optics company whatsoever.
2). I have never been paid or compensated in any way, shape, or form from any forum.
3). I have no bias for or against any company.
4). My vocation has changed over the years, and is not being used as an appeal to authority- I’m a nobody. I shoot and hunt a lot. That’s it. If you require, or believe that someone’s background has any bearing on pressing a trigger without flinching or dropping a rifle, there are plenty of paid and sponsored social media accounts for you. The goal here is data, not personality.
5). I did not ask Ryan or Rokslide to do this. He asked me quite a while ago if I would be willing to do it and I did not agree until a couple weeks ago. I do not want to do this, but no one else is looking at what matters in a scope and trying to quantify it. There will be no YouTube channel, no Instagram, no optic sponsors- nothing.
6). So far for the Evals posted, every scope has been privately purchased, all ammunition has been privately purchased, etc. There has been no compensation or incentive from anyone.
7). The results are exactly as they are presented for each scope.
8). We did not have a TACTACAM/through the scope video recorder until now. From now on, each scope will have the video (there are plenty of videos if companies want to dispute the current results).
9). Does anyone really believe that Ryan Avery (Rokslide co-owner) would rig results against a paying sponsor/advertiser for his website? Especially for ones that aren’t? I get that people have a hard time thinking that there aren’t ulterior motives these days, however Ryan wants to do this solely because it needs to be done.
10). No matter how much data/proof/video is given, people and some companies will do whatever they can to discredit the person/people instead of the information. The point isn’t that Ryan or formidilosus said so- the point is to show what’s happening so others can replicate and make informed decisions. The exact manner of eval is posted so that others can replicate- it’s open (do you believe it’s coincidence that the couple of people that have tried similar- one in this thread, had nearly identical results?)
11). Does anyone actually believe that image quality is the most important function of a scope?
12). Does anyone actually believe that all scopes are equal in reliability, durability and longevity? Do you believe that if one were to take 100 samples of 5 different top level scopes that one scope make/model won’t come out to be measurably better at those three things than the others? And that one won’t be the worst in those things?
13). The drop eval is absolutely repeatable, at least to the level required to check zero retention, and absolutely shows differences between scopes. I have laid out exactly how it’s done, and every person that has tried has seen the same results and issues.
14). A sample of one does not mean much if the scope works. It does actually mean something if it does not work. If the vast majority of a make/model are reliable, and failures rates are exceptionally low- what are the odds that the “one” sample is the bad one? What about if there are two samples that fail back to back? What do you think the odds are that most/all of them have issues at that point?
15). The goal is to get as many scopes as possible through the eval. That is as many differing makes/models, and as many samples of each make and model as possible to show results.
16). Some results will be no surprise at all to some people. Lots of results will surprise a lot of people because they have been fed a line of BS from marketing, writers, and reviewers that all scopes of the same general class are mostly equal.
17). There is no effort whatsoever to disparage any company. The results are what they are. The effort is to provide information about differences in function and zero retention in field use between scopes. If -insert scope- fails or loses zero in any way, it will be shown regardless of manufacture. If -insert scope- works correctly and holds zero it will be shown regardless of manufacture.
People generally believe that companies are genuinely testing the products before they are released for sale. But other than a couple companies, when they are asked “so how many live rounds were shot during testing and proving the scope works”, and/or “so did you test zero retention in live fire from drops/impacts”- you get blank stares.
Ryan Avery and I, as well as a whole bunch of others that hunt heavily each year have seen repeated and consistent failures with loss of zero and total failures in use. We’re going to video the entire process from now on and show the results. Then people get to decide whether it matters or not, to believe it or not. But the idea that there aren’t scopes that lose zero from very little use, and that there aren’t scopes that hold zero through virtually any legitimate use is not only incorrect, it’s dishonest, disingenuous, and so easily proven wrong.
Funny thing a bout science is you can repeat the experimental data
We already know the a scope brands / Companies tried to shut down mark and Frank from posting similar data on lack of reliability in mainstream optics...
Same thing in this thread, dudes have money invested and dont want bad results published...
I dont care to yell at the messenger, id rather see more testing to confirm or reject
Different hypothesis of causality
Small testing lots, random errors, certain trivialities of experimental design...
Stuff washes out in large enough data sets, and likewise real info starts to stand out...
Im all for more testing and more discussion, and wish mark and Frank could still participate but they've been shut down by the industry and for them its not worth the fight
afaik they dont even gather data anymore...
Anyway, carry on
We already know the a scope brands / Companies tried to shut down mark and Frank from posting similar data on lack of reliability in mainstream optics...
Same thing in this thread, dudes have money invested and dont want bad results published...
I dont care to yell at the messenger, id rather see more testing to confirm or reject
Different hypothesis of causality
Small testing lots, random errors, certain trivialities of experimental design...
Stuff washes out in large enough data sets, and likewise real info starts to stand out...
Im all for more testing and more discussion, and wish mark and Frank could still participate but they've been shut down by the industry and for them its not worth the fight
afaik they dont even gather data anymore...
Anyway, carry on
Spicy! I repeated my cold weather test of the controls and it came out the same as before for me. No mush, worked fine. The mag ring is stiff but didn't seem to get measurably worse after four hours in freezing temp. That is, of course, my sample size of one scope. Hopefully tomorrow or next Tuesday I can try to replicate the drop test. I hope it does not fail because I like the scope. If it is going to fail though, I'd rather find out now than at some very inopportune juncture.
I am in for results. I have posted on Rokslide. There needs to be a written procedure. There should be a consistent media that the drop is performed to, compacted snow to earth has a different rebound and could cause different internal moments (g’s).
I also think it should be considered with the use of an internal laser bore sighting tool. This could reduce the personal expenditure of this effort and increase turn around times, it might aid in the videoing of the results after impact.
We as consumers with considerable money on the line deserve to know which products perform.
I also think it should be considered with the use of an internal laser bore sighting tool. This could reduce the personal expenditure of this effort and increase turn around times, it might aid in the videoing of the results after impact.
We as consumers with considerable money on the line deserve to know which products perform.
Well, you yourself have staked out a unique position which has elevated yourself (and Ryan Avery) to the (tiny) world stage of rifle scope durability testing.
Given that, it shouldn’t be surprising that people analyze everything you’ve said previously (about anything) in order to figure out how credible you are. It’s a natural human instinct and should be expected.
Why is your background absolutely relevant? Well, imagine a fine fellow who shows up on your doorstop for a date with your daughter, whose name is Credibility. Say the fellow’s name is Bob. You don’t just take Bob’s word as final regarding his character, his background, his motives, how he tests scopes, and what he cares about.
No, for background on Bobarini you ask others, your other kids, your wife, maybe parents of kids at the same school, or your daughter’s friends. Can anyone you know vouch for Bobster?
And maybe you also ask one of the many dudes that hang out at the bar you visit, a bar named the Sniper’s Hide? And due to an abundance of street cred, maybe one of the dudes you rely upon is named @koshkin?
Importantly, you watch how Bob acts vs. what he says. Does Bob show up at the door with a hood over his face, obscuring his identity? Does Bob seem prickly? Does he say he doesn’t care, but obviously does?
After all of this, you consult your blessed daughter, Credibility. What does she now feel?
This stuff matters.
If Bob says nothing about his background, well, whoa! If almost no third party has heard much of anything about Bob save for his exhortations upon scopes and barrels, double-whoa! My daughter, Credibility, isn’t dating this fellow long.
As far as a YouTube channel or Patreon page, don’t think of them as selling out or as a promotional channel for your ego. Use it to fund tests and scopes, to video each drop test and shoot test in order to bolster your creds. For if you have no or mixed creds, the results that you care so much about are like dust in the wind.
In other words, the above deeds are done in service for the task (not ego). Doing those things do NOT mean you’re cozying up with the scope manufacturers, for Pete’s sake. You’re doing them so you don’t have to cozy up to anyone! (Edit: accept no free scopes or anything and use $$$ you make on social media like YT/Patreon to design/build test equipment, scopes, pay for your time, etc)
You may say on posts on Rokslide that you don’t care what people think. If so, why bother to defend yourself here?
Caring about one’s honor is not a weakness, and neither is caring how others view your test.
I did have one question about the Loctite and a a few suggestions on the test itself.
- I see you use Loctite on the rings. Do you adjust torque up/down/neither when using Loctite?
- Suggestion: detail the torque driver used, torque specs used per scope, (and rings used, but I seem to remember you may have spec’d the rings somewhere).
- Suggestion: it may be informative for you and your audience to increase the abuse until you knock the zero off the toughest model Nightforce. Sort of like reverse Mythbusters. Instead of taking the failed myth and cranking it up to 11 to try to have the myth “pass”, you take the most passed scopes and make them fail.
- Pardon my ignorance if you already do this, but increase the standardization of the drop test. Use the exact same pad, make sure the pad if of the type that does not wear out quickly, replace the pad at intervals, detail how many drops the pad has already taken before the test, the ground under the pad should be the same hardness across the tests. Heck, take the human and nature out of it entirely…I’m sure there’s many engineers here that would help.
But I can hear people wondering what myths Formidilosus might disprove by breaking a Nightforce? I mean, he’s already said no scope is unbreakable. Actions speak louder than words, however.
Testing until failure would help lessen the feeling that:
- Formidilosus might be a Brand X shill (NF, SWFA, it doesn’t matter)
- Brand X is well-neigh invulnerable
Imagine if Brand X (NF?) fails just above the test’s torture threshold. Not saying that it would, but data is data. How much tougher is meaningful?
Imagine if you say you dropped Brand X off of the Empire State Building and you said it held up fine.
Finally, imagine if there was no unedited video of the above two scenarios. Credibility goes up or down?
You put yourself in the arena, and it’s above mere forum posting. You’re suiting up with the bigger dogs. Look at that PRS testing guy and take notes on how he establishes his creds. I mean…he’s building an underground 100yd test facility for himself! The rest of us are all chumps in the peanut gallery.
You might say that you do not care what I think. Back at ’cha. But you are the one with something to prove, and you are the one that cares the most. Your actions are speaking louder than your words.
Instead of a single Caesar that grades your performance in the Colosseum, the partially unwashed hoard does the grading instead.
The coin of this public realm is credibility.
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Hi, occasionally lurker and first time poster. Not sure if this makes you feel better, but it kind of dispels #1.
As an aside, I don’t understand why people are using the Razor HD Gen II as the standard for determining Vortex reliability. It weighs over twice as much as the LHT. If they could make durable, reliable scopes that weigh 2# or less, why wouldn’t they? Why is the Gen III another 3# brick? Clearly this is not an apples to apples comparison.
I’m no expert, but it sure looks like something has to give between weight, features, and reliability. This is pretty much constant across all scopes, regardless of brand.
I’ve edited my above post a bit to make some points clearer and to correct grammar (in case someone is just now composing a response).
Regarding the NF shill thing…I’m not saying Form is a shill. But if he is or not, it’s not mutually exclusive to be a shill of two brands, a shill of one and just likes the other, etc. Edit: or a shill of nobody, but dislikes scope brand A.
My whole screed is about the importance of credibility in service to one’s goal, not that Form is a fool, a shill, or anything else. To me he’s just some rando that seems to be doing something interesting and I’m trying to help.
Regarding the NF shill thing…I’m not saying Form is a shill. But if he is or not, it’s not mutually exclusive to be a shill of two brands, a shill of one and just likes the other, etc. Edit: or a shill of nobody, but dislikes scope brand A.
My whole screed is about the importance of credibility in service to one’s goal, not that Form is a fool, a shill, or anything else. To me he’s just some rando that seems to be doing something interesting and I’m trying to help.
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I have no idea if he has any relationship with either company, I just know I’ve seen him say multiple times he’d take an SWFA over NF for a general purpose hunting scope multiple times, and wanted to share. You can dig around on the slide and make your own determination.
@Formidilosus , I wouldn't expect you to say anything less then you did in your reply. It neither validates nor invalidates you or your testing. I really don't know if you are to be believed or not, however; I do agree with others who have said if your going to do these tests that will so greatly affect whether people buy or do not buy a scope you should have more open documentation. Having a YouTube or something like that would definitely help people not just believe the tests but know you and get a feel for you. I get that you may just not care that much and want to invest that time, but at the same time, you already are investing significant time and the nature of what your doing and who it's going to effect and the gravity of the claims being made are not small. My advice that you can take or leave is document in a more full way and also to bring yourself forward so that people can know whether you are trustworthy or not, I think the optics/gun community deserves that atleast, with the level of claims being made. My 2 cents.
Just noticed this in your screenshots of Form’s Rokslide posts:
Take a long look at that last sentence. Take all the time you need.
For me, -1 cred is removed from the big board in the sky.
Perhaps there is some great explanation, like he finds them in the trash? Receiving NF NXS scopes FREE from buddies would look bad, getting them in the course of his job would look worse, and getting them straight from NF would be the hardest hit on his cred. All this EVEN IF HE HAS NEVER TESTED A FREE NF SCOPE.
Free things are powerful. Just ask big Pharma why they pay millions for pretty little gal drug reps to visit doctors and take him and his staff out for lunch.
I’ll bet chick drug reps hate hetero female docs.
In all those “free scope” situations, getting free scopes would not necessarily negatively impact a test’s “truth”. But, my friends, credibility isn’t just based on what the facts are, but it also takes into account how and when those facts emerge.
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People trying to shoot the messenger are retards...
Even ilya has un disclosed conflicts of interest here
He has worked for march and meopta and had some kind of feedback/influence with vortex on the lht gen2 design...
He has stated so much...
None of those scopes are priced or engineered for drop test survivability...
Vortex had 1 scope with good tracking in mark and frank test... the 48 oz g2 razor
Fun fact about that scope is the turrets are specially reworked for reliability by vortex.
Its also double the msrp of lht g2
Its pure fantasy land to infer 22oz lht g2 light hunter turrets or housing will perform on par with 48 oz g2 razor heavy tactical etc
Like major clown world levels of crazy...
Even ilya has un disclosed conflicts of interest here
He has worked for march and meopta and had some kind of feedback/influence with vortex on the lht gen2 design...
He has stated so much...
None of those scopes are priced or engineered for drop test survivability...
Vortex had 1 scope with good tracking in mark and frank test... the 48 oz g2 razor
Fun fact about that scope is the turrets are specially reworked for reliability by vortex.
Its also double the msrp of lht g2
Its pure fantasy land to infer 22oz lht g2 light hunter turrets or housing will perform on par with 48 oz g2 razor heavy tactical etc
Like major clown world levels of crazy...
It remains an open question if we can make 22 oz scopes that are as tough and resilientad 30-40 oz scopes.
We have all been asking for such a form-factor as lht gen 2
i dont think people are trying to trash the idea or vortex for bringing the product to market.
But its a fair question: does it work as delivered?
FYI this is not any diffrent than nx8 nightforce 2.5-20. Looks good on paper, but in the field how do you like it?
Well, not everyone loves the optical tradeoffs...So we keep asking for things like a zco 2-16 to fix those problem...
We have all been asking for such a form-factor as lht gen 2
i dont think people are trying to trash the idea or vortex for bringing the product to market.
But its a fair question: does it work as delivered?
FYI this is not any diffrent than nx8 nightforce 2.5-20. Looks good on paper, but in the field how do you like it?
Well, not everyone loves the optical tradeoffs...So we keep asking for things like a zco 2-16 to fix those problem...
Do you see the problem above? The way you’ve constructed your argument?
I have no opinion on durability. I am not a brand fanboi. I am not arguing about the underlying facts (durability).
I am saying to Form, look, this is hard. Be open, transparent, disclose everything (like free NF scopes on his first Hide post, at least under the name “Formidilosus”).
This is the way.
What he’s doing could be important. Don’t jack it up.
I get what your saying, the problem is knowing the reliability of the messenger matters, otherwise their not just the messenger of objective information, it may be a subjective messenger. Yes Ilya is open about his working relationships and has a history of being open about it and also has a history of saying what he does and doesn't like regardless of manufacturer. So in turn he has gained respect in the community. This other guy should do the same IMO if he's going to continue to do what he's doing. I own an LHT but I personally don't care whether FORMS passed or did not pass his test as I'm going to test it to my own standard and to the degree that makes it reliable for my own use. However, FORM is being asked to do these and post his reviews and it is being used as some sort of standard, atleast at rokslide. So, that being the case, he should come out of the wood work and build his reputation like an Ilya or others who have for the sake of the optics community. His testing does affect more than just him and will affect where a lot of people put a lot of money (potentially). Again, my opinion, but it's hard to say "don't shoot the messenger" when the messenger isn't known or proven, all that's seen is what is typed on a keyboard. I honestly think doing this would help FORM and if everything is legit might help all of us, so I'm not coming at this even negatively or challenging but with the potential of the positive side for us all who spend a lot of time and money on these decisions.
What’s the skinny on what went down? I’ve read the same in many places but haven’t seen the initial explanation (if there is one) from the horse’s mouth. It’s a bummer for sure.
Rifle Scopes - 150 Scopes tested, Results Posted !
The SWFA are solid I use them ( my old ones ) as loaner scopes in class. They are dependable Athlon is the time tested standout in terms of repeatability You can get a flash of brilliance from any brand it’s the trends you have to watch I would be interested to see your test results with the...
www.snipershide.com
Sure seems like people here could find something wrong with sunny day. I'm more involved over on rokslide and have been following this closely. If nothing else it was an eyeopener for me as to a way of testing things that I've been concerned about for years. Also being friends with Ryan Avery I know that some manufacturers and sponsors on rokslide are not happy about these tests. I'm hopeful that it will drive some of them to building better scopes. To those of you who are continuing to try and find something wrong with @Formidilosus or his credentials, you missed the point.
Sigh…
TL;DR summary:
A) For maximum impact, have Formidilosus copy something like Cal Zant’s disclosures, tone, and test methodology over at his Precision Rifle Blog. Or at least comport oneself like a koshkin/ILya/Dark Lord of Optics.
B) For much less impact, have the exact same set of test data as (A) but act mysteriously, be slightly off-putting, and just generally behave kinda weird.
I wish him the best in his endevour. I really do.
/end
To be clear: the reason you know which manufacturers I have done something with (like reticle designs, for example) is that I disclose that. I do not have to and you would not know it if I did not.
I also always give a speech to the manufacturers that none of this has any impact on how I evaluate riflescopes. Some did not take me seriously and were very surprised when they did not get a glowing review. Well, that's not my problem. Others took the long view and were rather pleased with getting constructive feedback on what to do better. My reviews are not paid for or sponsored by anyone. I do not accept advertising on my website. My Youtube videos are not sponsored by anyone. To be fair, if an ammo or hunting clothing company wanted to sponsor me, I'd be fine with that, but I will not accept sponsorship or advertising from any gun or optics companies.
As far as free scopes go, some are mine to keep and some are loaned to me. It costs me exactly the same to test any scope, regardless of the manufacturer. If you want impartiality, they all have to be free or all have to be paid for.
If you wonder whether I pay for any of the optics, I do occasionally, but very rarely. Essentially, I can use anything I damn well please and it all costs me the same. Here is a fun fact though: I wanted another HD-LHT 4.5-22x50 for my 280Rem, so I ordered one from Liberty Optics. It is going to be the first time in a long time when I actually pay for a scope.
Now, impartiality or bias are strongly influenced by our personal preferences. Everything I tell you about scopes goes through the prism of my personal preferences. That is one of the reasons why I can't make a short review for the life of me: I end up explaining why I make certain decisions and have certain preferences in all sort of detail simply because I assume that your preferences might be different. Given that, simply telling you: I really like this scope and you should buy it would be deeply counterproductive. I have to explain the why of it to make my advice actionable for the rather sophisticated audience that I seem have. There is now a new portion of my audience that is not quite as sophisticated as many serious shooters on this forum. They will be much better educated by the time I am done with them.
ILya
In reference to the post about Frank and his tracking test, there always seems to be a character assassination attempt because the results hurt. No one wants to pay $3k+ dollars for a scope just to have an inherent flaw even if it is <=1%.
To Franks point of everyone else taking accountability and testing their own scope instead of brining it to his class and his team having to diagnose the issue, there’s some merit to that. Obviously beginners will be astray and rely on the instructors but that is not the point. Frank did the test and showed the results to help others out and got burned for it.
Now imagine someone else not having Frank’s credentials, credibility, etc. They will have character assassination to a worse degree.
The tragedy here is letting emotions cloud one’s judgement. Read the methodology, results, and conclusion. There should also be a section that explains biases or conflicts of interest. Test it yourself if you’d like.
To Franks point of everyone else taking accountability and testing their own scope instead of brining it to his class and his team having to diagnose the issue, there’s some merit to that. Obviously beginners will be astray and rely on the instructors but that is not the point. Frank did the test and showed the results to help others out and got burned for it.
Now imagine someone else not having Frank’s credentials, credibility, etc. They will have character assassination to a worse degree.
The tragedy here is letting emotions cloud one’s judgement. Read the methodology, results, and conclusion. There should also be a section that explains biases or conflicts of interest. Test it yourself if you’d like.
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X2. All the banter of “you did it wrong, you dropped it to far, you dropped it on something hard, your shooting mat has a lump in it” etc is kinda crazy.
If you want to really factually know something then don’t take some random guy online word for it.
Doing this doesn’t take a lot of specialized equipment, your literally dropping a rifle. There isn’t anything scientific or controlled about it, just like when you take a fall crossing an icy hillside. Take a guess on how you carry the rifle normally and drop it from that height if you really want to make this more complicated then it needs to be.
No matter how you slice it I’m guessing it takes less then 2 minutes out of your busy day to do it yourself. Typing this took longer then It takes to drop a rifle a few times.
Since you have that particular scope, how about replicating a similar drop test and report the results
Confounders are a mfer and they exist in the real world. It sounds like most people in this thread understand the difficulty in making a test where every confounder is characterized. Looking at the results should be from that very lens of understanding.
I’m just not a fan of character assassination. Someone could be all kinds of things and still correct in their assessments or utterly wrong with the greatest character traits. We see this in politics all the time. We have been trained since we were little kids to discredit someone’s character in an attempt to be more correct about something. We see grown adults do it all the time even when they’re completely wrong.
If we’re going to talk about being scientific then remove as much biases as possible and what can’t be removed then at least acknowledge it so the reader understands. If one cannot do that then they do not respect the scientific process. But there’s always caveats. If the evidence matches the crime then present evidence.
You don't seem to get the stupidity of your own statement.
You blather on about "undisclosed" and then say "he has stated so much"
Well DUH! That's called clearly disclosed.
Watch his videos or read his longer posts and you'll see he freely talks about how he worked with scope companies to improve things or design reticles or suggest product specs or do pre-production testing.
Ilya is probably the person I give the most credence to of all the active scope reviewers out there.
I've bought 3 different optics that I wouldn't have bought without his positive reviews and have been very pleased.
He's not just some blow hard, in it for the views youtuber who likes to find faults and rant, he actually wants to improve things and work with scope companies to help improve their product lines when they wish his help.
Unlike most of the others, Ilya actually knows optics and how to test them as that is his professional business.
I may be wrong, but I heard somewhere Nightforce apparently hates him with a passion...
As I heard it, some company making scopes that started with a V tried to pay for a "revised" review, and that didn't go over well at all..
If you are an intelligent person in charge of testing for a scope company, you WANT Ilya to review your scope because if he says it's good, and recommends it, that carries a lot of weight. If doesn't like it, he'll tell you exactly why, how and what might be better and you can use that criticism to go back and resolve the issues.
For me, when Ilya mentions he had some involvement with a specific scope or reticle, it makes me more interested in that model as it means that the manufacturer probably did a better job of the design than they would have otherwise.
Dropping a rifle is far from scientific. I have done it mildly several times. I have had guns on bipods tip over, I have had friends lean my guns up against vehicles and they fell over, and I have had my kids climb in the back of the car and stand on my scope while the gun was in a shitty soft case. None of these instances resulted in any damage or loss of zero.
I have dropped rifles hard where shit was clearly broken twice. Once I slipped on ice hunting with the gun slung. The gun went in the air and landed on the elevation turret. It had a boyds stock and it cracked the stock. I filled the stock crack with super glue and put 6 shot in a 1inch paster with a gun that was barely 3/4 moa and thought all was good. Over the course of a couple months that gun became a 2.5 moa gun. The scope was broken.
The second time I was shooting prone off the top of a picnic table. One of the boards came loose and as I was crawling off the back of the table the loose board catapulted my gun. It bent the sunshade and scratched the shit out of the stock and action. The zero moved, but after rezeroing I continued to shoot and it seemed like things were working. I sent it in to get the bent sunshade removed.
The ice incident was a Burris XTR2 and the picnic table an AMG. Those and an xtr3 have taken multiple little hits that have not effected them. I'm sure there is a certain amount of force that will bend/break any scope on the market.
I have dropped rifles hard where shit was clearly broken twice. Once I slipped on ice hunting with the gun slung. The gun went in the air and landed on the elevation turret. It had a boyds stock and it cracked the stock. I filled the stock crack with super glue and put 6 shot in a 1inch paster with a gun that was barely 3/4 moa and thought all was good. Over the course of a couple months that gun became a 2.5 moa gun. The scope was broken.
The second time I was shooting prone off the top of a picnic table. One of the boards came loose and as I was crawling off the back of the table the loose board catapulted my gun. It bent the sunshade and scratched the shit out of the stock and action. The zero moved, but after rezeroing I continued to shoot and it seemed like things were working. I sent it in to get the bent sunshade removed.
The ice incident was a Burris XTR2 and the picnic table an AMG. Those and an xtr3 have taken multiple little hits that have not effected them. I'm sure there is a certain amount of force that will bend/break any scope on the market.
The Frank and Form (and Koshkin) situations are different in some important ways.
First off, the definition of character assassination is to provide deliberate lies, exaggeration, half-truths aimed to destroy credibility. There’s more to it and it’s actually a field of study (weirdly enough). I hope you don’t think I am guilty of this.
This is a way that I figure out if someone is worth listening to. I'm doing this in the spirit of helping Form.
First, Frank and his scope tracking testing
Reading Frank’s description of the matter (that’s all I have), there was indeed character assassination coming from some angle, or multiple angles. It is unclear exactly why Frank’s tests stopped.
How he conducted his tests didn’t damage his credibility with me or with members of his site. (Edit: if it isn't clear, I think the test was done perfectly). Any potential hit might have occurred afterwards due to a bit of uncertainty as to why he stopped testing. He doesn’t strike me as someone who gives two shits about what others think.
But overall, Frank’s cred is pretty unassailable. This is not meant to be all-encompassing list.
- Background (who is this guy?)
- Marine sniper
- We know his full name
- We see his face
- May or may not get free stuff from manufacturers (probably?)
- Contributions (what has he done?)
- Creator of Sniper’s Hide
- Provides voluminous training material on shooting, including video
- Runs in-person shooting clinics
- Has a podcast
- Has hosted shooting competitions
- Inferred Purpose & Motive (why is he doing this?)
- Foster community of shooters
- Raise the awareness of shooting fundamentals
- Make some money in the process
- Accuracy of information
- Others: Nobody seems to have valid objections
- From me: His info I’ve used just works
- Seems to tell it like it is and doesn’t seem unduly influenced by any free stuff or industry connections
- Reputation
- His site is very popular with serious shooters, especially with mil, leo, and prs
- Manufacturers like Hoplite esteem his audience enough to partially run their biz model off of a Hide thread
- Can be cantankerous and outspoken
- Some semi-competing shooting competition orgs do not like him (he says)
- Compared to?
- His advice seems to line up with other advice out there, only Frank makes it easier to obtain and digest
- Review
- Class-leading field-shooting information and instruction
- A stand-up guy
Formidilosus
This is also not meant to be all-encompassing list:
- Background (who is this guy?)
- Hazy
- Says he hunts a lot, shoots a lot
- Posts on Rokslide a lot
- Gets free NXS scopes
- Contributions (what has he done?)
- Started doing drop tests on scopes to test durability
- Asked by Ryan Avery of Rokslide to present findings
- Says questionable things occassionably (doesn’t believe in cleaning barrels i.e. 8000rds no cleaning without proof). Might be true, but?
- Inferred Purpose & Motive (why is he doing this?)
- Says he doesn’t really want to do this, but…
- Says this info is not out there and needs to be
- Says he and his friends notice a lot of scope tracking failures in real-world hunting conditions
- Accuracy of information
- Hard to analyze accuracy
- A work in progress
- May hate Vortex as evidenced by never finding a durable model. Or are all Vortexes actually bad?
- Never finds a bad SWFA or Nightforce (as far as I’ve read, I might be wrong #3&4)
- From what I’ve read (I haven’t read everything) his methods seem a bit odd (Loctite on ring threads? Does he compensate torque for wet threads?) and undetailed (Brand torque driver? Exact torque per scope ring and ring base on each scope?)
- No video of tests (that I’ve seen)
- At this point, info is presented in a “Just trust me, doing this for science, ignore me, just look at the data” sort of way. A bit like “Ignore the man behind the curtain.”
- Basic premise: take known accurate rifle/base/rings as test bed. Shoot it, then drop it from measured distances and shoot it again to see if tracking/zero holds
- Premise may be sound, or may not be. Optical engineer (koshkin) says it’s not sound, but there is history between the two.
- My take: might be close enough, but the devil is in the details, and the details (like videos, more detailed info, etc.) are lacking. The ground under the pad might not be the same per test.
- Reputation
- Rick Avery, owner of Rokslide, esteems him enough to ask him to do scope durability tests
- Many Roksliders seem to adore him
- My take: Right on the knife edge of clown/expert. Contains elements of both. Highly unusual position.
- Compared to?
- Hard to say
- Similar to Military Arms Channel’s real-world mud testing, only without seeing the test nor knowing who this fellow is
- Review
- Potential to have a big impact on public’s impression of scope durability
- Too many questions remain at this time for full-endorsement, but interesting experiment and I wish him success
- If interested in having a lasting impact, he needs to focus on increasing his personal cred and testing creds. One theoretically could perform credible scope durability testing without revealing who he is, but then will need absolutely impreccable proof & testing protocols, replete with unedited video, a solid way to demonstrate that he’s not favoring NF/SWFA plus many endorsements from known quantities
His opinions on Form come from interactions that are not verifiable by others at this time.
Koshkin is a self-described ass.
But here’s the kicker on how he overcomes what for most would be an insurmountable “wall-of-shill-ness” in order to be taken seriously: we see his face, know something of his profession and national origin, he really goes out of his way to detail his analyses, he offers much help to solve problems or educate (either for wide audiences or personally) through a variety of media.
And Koshkin’s criticisms don’t seem to have a pattern of bias. He dislikes Sphur and avoids all opinions of their performance, but says so because of the company’s history etc (edit: he has detailed some technical problems with Sphur designs. He writes below: "Conical screw caps prevent ring halves from self-aligning on the scope tube."). He seems calm, evenhanded, is thick-skinned, and avoids overarching opinions.
His advice always checks out.
Either he’s a genius-level-10 master bullshitter making gobs of Russian scope-coin by forcing Americans to ignore superior Russian optics in order to support his harems or he’s simply interested in helping out and likes to be seen.
I, like Koshkin, too seem to be unable to write a short article…hmmmm. Anyway, I’m just telling you how I see it, torpedos be damned.
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I do not rant very much on here. That is usually restricted to my own website where I have a somewhat different purpose, but this is an irritating lack of reading comprehension, so here we are.
To answer your question: for several reasons, primarily because from the standpoint of figuring out anything about the scope, it is a mind-numbingly stupid thing to do. I have sort of implied that earlier, but didn't want to spell it out concerned that a bunch of people will get their panties in a wad and that this is going to become a long discussion I would rather not get into. With this drop test you can not decouple the effect of the rifle, the mount, the torque on the screws, the wear on the interface between the mount and the rail and a few other somewhat subtle, but important factors. It is an uncontrolled and meaningless test that can only be done out of sheer incompetence or out of bad faith. Pick whichever one appeals to you the most.
However, it you are really curious, the scope in question sits on a rifle I shoot the most out of all my centerfires and that I hunt with. It has been dropped, bounced around, occasionally dragged and frequently bumped all over the place for almost a year now (I got it in February of last year) and it never shifted zero. I checked it last month with the last few rounds of the hunting ammo I originally zeroed it with. I am going to switch to different ammo shortly though, so I will note the change in zero when I switch and keep it logged.
What do you think that means for the entire product line? Very little, because it is a sample of one and because it is an uncontrolled test. Just as uncontrolled as that nonsense on Rockslide that started this thread.
There is, however, an entity out there that tested for zero retention in a controlled manner on a statistically significant number of scopes. That entity is the manufacturer. I know for a fact that Vortex does it. I know how they do it. I know why they do not want to have a public discussion of how they do it: because some nincompoop is going to go and try to replicate it, fail to do so in a controlled way, get all up in arms about completely meaningless results and start a forum thread on the subject where other well meaning people who can't tell their ass from an elbow when it comes to scope testing will go up in arms. Why does that sound so familiar?
And rant off.
ILya
I'll take that as a compliment, whichever option it is.
A couple of comments:
-Frank's tracking test was actually done in a pretty controlled way. About as controlled of a way as you can do with what he had on hand. I would go about it a bit differently, but I have lab equipment that they can not have with them at a shooting school. I suspect that people started replicating it in a less controlled way, finding non-existent problems and harassing the manufacturers. I sure as hell got a lot of questions from people who tried to replicate the test, did so badly and asked for advice. That took an insane amount of time. So much so that my basic advice to people is to focus on whether the scope is tracking consistently when they check tracking. If it tracks consistently every time and you keep good records on dope, you'll be fine.
-On Spuhr: there is a technical problem with Spuhr design and I have gone over it in the past. It manifests itself occasionally, but I do have a problem with the company founder, so I generally avoid talking about anything Spuhr a whole lot.
ILya
That is a hell of a lot of words to say you are not confident it will pass the test
It was definitely meant as a compliment (for you AND Frank). Even more of a compliment if you are a Russian scope-coin-harem-owner.
I did this exercise to show Form that all people have elements of credibility & suspicion. Shoot, look at me…like, zero credibility? Wtf is anyone reading a word I write?
If he wants the results of his task to be taken seriously, it is simply not enough to say "trust me, trust the data." I gave him a template to add cred…if he wants to remain anonymous, he has to boost other elements that form cred to insane levels.
(edit: I missed your info on Sphur tech problems. Edit again: see koshkin's explanation below.)
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This, I think many are missing this point. I'm not and others have not said his testing is for sure not legitimate(maybe some but not all) all we are saying is that we need more than just a "take my word for it" if his tests are going to be taken seriously and have proper effect. If he is legit he puts a lot of time and effort into the tests, to act like he doesn't care if they are taken seriously doesn't jive. Equally, the gravity of the tests do have an effect. I maintain that for the good of all he should by some baseline prove himself to be a reliable individual then the tests WILL speak for themselves and they will be trusted atleast for the sample size he has. FORM could be an awesome dude for all I know, I'm not saying he isn't, but if he wants to be a name in optics testing shouldn't we atleast KNOW his first name? I don't think that's to much to ask or character assassination. Carry on
i used to be surprised that people don't drop test their kit.
then i realized parking lots are full of 4x4 without a scratch on the paint.
a lot easier to buy shit then it is to properly use it.
then i realized parking lots are full of 4x4 without a scratch on the paint.
a lot easier to buy shit then it is to properly use it.
Why do I have to scratch up and drop my stuff to qualify as “proper” use?
Why are you talking about character assination?
The issue we're discussing is credibility, I don't trust the test or the results because I've interacted with the tester, and read many of his posts.
I can't stress this enough, he says some really really stupid stuff and comes at it from a professionals perspective, but does not have any professional credibility.
Don't take my word for it, read the stuff he says about not cleaning his barrel in 8000 rounds, or claiming a 223 is a great elk round.
It goes on and on with that guy, I'm not a professional in the shooting industry but I'm very serious about it, and have professional experience courtesy of uncle Sam.
Formidilosus is full of shit and that's a fact, I respect the hell out of guys like @koshkin and sincerely appreciate his input because it's backed up with facts
I thought I was clear about who I was referencing but I guess not.
The OP has zero credibility to talk shit about mark and frank's tests.
And when he talks shit about tests on another forum, he doing the same thing.
Just reread Franks post, its word for word the same bullshit arguments.
Attack the messenger, emotion wrapped up as logics, self interest dressed up as doing you a favour etc.
Ugh...
And when he talks shit about tests on another forum, he doing the same thing.
Just reread Franks post, its word for word the same bullshit arguments.
Attack the messenger, emotion wrapped up as logics, self interest dressed up as doing you a favour etc.
Ugh...
Im not talking shit about Frank's test dude...The OP has zero credibility to talk shit about mark and frank's tests.
And when he talks shit about tests on another forum, he doing the same thing.
Just reread Franks post, its word for word the same bullshit arguments.
Attack the messenger, emotion wrapped up as logics, self interest dressed up as doing you a favour etc.
Ugh...
I asked the Hide community if they've had any issues with the LHTs holding zero after reading a questionable review on another forum from a guy who himself is questionable based on some of the ridiculous stuff he posts..
If you don't like this thread then take it somewhere else
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