I had considered getting a spotter from a sports optics company, then I thought, "What about the telescope MFGR's?" Those guys have to have nice glass to see planets and shite. I found a couple that Meade and Celestron makes, most of em under $600, with the "badass" ones a hair over 600. Those are like the ones you see folks use to watch the space shuttle launch. Some of them are not variable power, you control the MAG by using different size eyepieces. Depending on your setup, you could have a 200x scope! Not that you would need that much, but hey. Besides spending the money for one of those, and one from a sports optics MFGR for comparison, does anybody have any info on em?

Unertl 20x with a Freeland stand is my old tried and true spotting scope. I also have a Leupold 12-40 spotting scope with a Premier Reticle Gen II mil-dot reticle that I use frequently, but the old Unertl is my favorite.

I guess I couldve mentioned that this is more for looking out past 100yd. You use those spotters for past 100yd Rick?

quote:

Originally posted by gixxer:
I guess I couldve mentioned that this is more for looking out past 100yd. You use those spotters for past 100yd Rick?

Certainly do! I don’t use them for gazing at the rock formations on the moon, but I can clearly see things with either of them waaaaaaay beyond any distance I could ever hope to accurately fire a rifle.

quote:

Originally posted by gixxer:
I had considered getting a spotter from a sports optics company, then I thought, "What about the telescope MFGR's?" Those guys have to have nice glass to see planets and shite. I found a couple that Meade and Celestron makes, most of em under $600, with the "badass" ones a hair over 600.

I never consider that,but I have looked at the moon with my Swarovski AT-80 it works fairly decent.

Well if you are talking about actual telescopes, the optics are great everything else is not. I have a pretty good quality 80mm refractor for astonomy. Excellent glass and coatings. Whichever eyepieces I am willing to pay for. View is good. It is a short tube, pretty cmpact, I thought I might use it for spotting at least when target shooting.

But it just isn't convenient. Swapping eyepieces, watching not to get dust stirred up on those lenses or in the tube when I have the eyepiece off is no fun. And while not lots bigger than some spotters, it was enough unhandy to be a bother. No more range trips for my star scope.

If you are talking of actual spotters, those might be okay, but you don't get something for nothing in optics. So you might come out a bit better, or not. I don't think you are going to get any huge advantage that way.

once upon a time i had one of the mirror scopes, it just wasn't my cup of tea.

The Celestron Ultima spotting scopes are as good as anything in their price range. The Celestron Ultima 80ED is particularly good, but only comes in an angled eyepiece. Celestron's warranty is better than most.

Any Celestron spotter with the Schmidt or Maksutov-Cassegrain optical design will have good optics but because of their size are really not well suited to huffing it across the prairie or up the mountain.

Two thumps up for Celestron Ultima 80 for under $200. The ED version(great for color photos) may not be available in straight eye piece but others can be had for sure with straigth veiw. Mine is a straight eye piece weatherproof 20-60X spotting scope. 30 cal holes can be seen at 300 yards and 17 cal holes can be seen at 200 yards. Save the 60 power for the moon and stars at the range 20 to 30X will probalby be most useful.

What is often overlooked is image stability...as magnification goes up, so do the effects of image "shake". Try this: go to a good store and compare any of the most expensive non-image-stabilized(Swarovski, Zeiss, Nikon, Leica) binocular to a decent image-stabilized binocular that has twice the magnification. You'll be amazed at how much more detail you can see for a lot less money. Of course you need one that can be mounted on a tripod for range work. Plus you have the ability to use them in the field.

I bought a celestron ultima 80 yesterday,seems pretty darned clear from 20-45 and then not quite as nice as the power goes up,at least while wearing glasses.It should work great for the range.it was a cloudy dreary day here today and I am very impressed with the view,..Scope is very big and would not be that convenient for hunting but at the the range should be ideal!!!

FWIW, I haven't checked the Ultima against big name spotters yet. But it's optics has seen, hands down, better than a half dozen other spotters. A couple of weeks ago at the Manatee Range, about all the RO's and other shooters said was WOW. Best-o-Luck