quote:

Originally posted by 416Tanzan:
RIP
That is exactly the strategy that has kept my eyebrow clean for all these years. However, you are implicitly agreeing that longer eye-relief is desirable. Four inches is probably a nice DG rifle standard though there is nothing wrong with 5" over 6000 ftlbs.

416Tanzan,

You are confused.
Your "eye relief" is a precise optical specification of inches distance between scope's ocular lens and shooter's eyeball that allows a maximized field of view for that scope power setting.

My "eye relief" is the maximum distance physically possible between eyeball and scope ocular for a given rifle, scope, and ring set-up, and to heck with what the field of view width is,
as long as I can see the cross hairs in the middle, in focus.

Your "3.8-inch eye relief" scope might actually provide me with 5.8 inches, or maybe even 6.8 inches, if I add a 1"-thick slip-on recoil pad to the butt.
Yep, no scars on my forehead.
Knock wood!

If I want to see more through the scope, I can crawl the stock while using it as a spotting scope,
with empty chamber and finger off trigger, of course.

When shooting time comes, my scope is more like a peep sight.

Hey RIP

Give me the benefit of the doubt. I understood you perfectly.

That was my point--the scope's optical eye-relief plus pulling back from the eyepiece an extra inch or two is exactly how to maintain smooth skin and implicit creates greater distance between scope and shooter. (Three inches behind focus, though, is stretching things in a hunting situation.)

In any case, as the scope provides more eye-relief, the vision gets a little better, too. I've always been reticent of full pictures, especially back in the 80's with some of the shorter styles (3.0-3.5"). I thought the Leupold 3.6" in the 2.5-8 was the height of luxury. But that was on light calibre like 270, 300, and 338. The old "fixed 3-power" usually had longer eye-relief for 375 and up.

quote:

Originally posted by whelenite:
RIP, I see you mentioned Sightron scopes. Have you seen their 1-7x24 illuminated scope? Fabulous optics (it's an SIII) with an illuminated dot, 4.8-3.9" of eye relief, and 91 feet of FOV at 1x. I saw one at the NRA convention, and I can't imagine a better dangerous game scope, provided it holds up like the Nikons.

Right now I have a 1.5-5x Slughunter on my 458, and a 2-7x VX-II on my 416, but if I was gonna buy a new one, it would be the illuminated 1-7x SIII.

Just yanking 416Tanzan's chain, "the eye-relief chain."

whelenite,

Have not seen one, but I surely need one. A Sightron 1X-7X, sounds like the best possible power range for a variable scope for hunting DG or PG.
Perfect scope for a .416 RemMag.

I do like Sightron, and consider them at least the equivalent in quality to Leupold:

http://www.midwayusa.com/produ...d-ir4a-reticle-matte

Lots of ring-spacing options with this 30mm-tubed scope, enough room for 3 or 4 rings instead of the usual 2.

Weighs 20 ounces, is pretty heavy for a hard kicker, but might be as good as it gets with all those features:

Sightron SIII Rifle Scope 30mm Tube 1-7x 24mm 1/10 Mil Adjustments Red and Green Illuminated IR4A Reticle Matte

Lavaca,'
for the 458 Lott and larger big bores I would only use a 2.5X Compact Leupold, it has the adjustments placed to void recoil problems..It works..

Your choice for the .416 is well thought out. The 416 of any kind has never trashed a scope for me..

I still prefer iron sights or a receiver sight on big bore guns from the 458 Lott up..I strictly view them as short range calibers for big ugly mean animals..

I have used Leupolds my whole hunting life and that's many years and I have no complaints and will never change..I sent two 3Xs back as the Lott and 505 broke them..They sent them back repaired..I sent them one of the 3X back again as the the 505 trashed for the second time and they sent me a new 2.5 Compact and my repaired 3X.. That was 10 or so years ago and the 2.5 compact is still working and been on a 458, 458 Lott, 450 Rigy and a 505 IMP that weighed less than 7 pounds with scope and loaded. The scope held up to the recoil, but I did not, had to sell it. I have several of those compacts today. Use them on the big guns.

Had a horse roll on a 2x7 Leupold and broke it in half, sent it back and told them what happened but asked it it could be fixed..They sent me a new scope..Had a hunter twist the adj on a pair of binocs and sent them back, they sent me a new pair and two weeks later they sent me my old ones fixed..I called them and they said Merry christmas don't mess up our book keeping.
I like the way they do business.