2-7x32 and 3-9x40 scopes. Not what they use to be. Ha ha ha.

[NDAR15MAN]

Sighted my 11-87 12 gage deer slug gun in today with Leupold 2-7x36. And muzzleloader Nikon 3-9x40. Wow. Not like it use to be. Ha ha ha. At 59 my eyes are very tired. Thinking about putting some kind of 4-16x50 scopes on both. I did not shoot that good today with either guns. Just not enough power for me.
I have a 8-32x50 weaver grand slam that is not on a gun right now. Thinking about putting it on the 50 cal muzzle loader. Would I regret it ?
Thanks. Marty

 

[timeout]

Sighted my 11-87 12 gage deer slug gun into day with Leupold 2-7x36. And muzzleloader Nikon 3-9x40. Wow. Not like it use to be. Ha ha ha. At 59 my eyes are very tired. Thinking about put some 4-16x50 scopes on both. I did not shoot that good today with either guns. Just not enough power for me.
I have a 8-32x50 weaver grand slam that is not on a gun right now. Thinking about putting it on the 50 cal muzzle loader. Would I regret it ?
Thanks. Marty

Depends what type of shooting you do. May be fine from a stand taking shots at deer standing. IMO 8x may be a bit hard to get on a moving target. I had a straight 6x on a hunting rifle and loved it, so possibly you would be fine. I just prefer a variable now for deer hunting that has a 3 or 4X bottom. 3-15 or 3-18 would be slick for you. BTW, I had one of those 2-7 X 36 Leupolds on an 1187 several years back when my eyes were a lot younger. I really didn't like it all that much then. Pretty sure I would hate it now. I did mount it to a Savage 510 hand cannon in 243 Winchester caliber for a couple years. Shot a nice 11 point buck at 300 yards with it while I was laying on top of my wood pile. As soon as we were allowed rifles for deer hunting, I sold the hand cannon. It was miserable to carry.

 

[jr600yd]

A long long time ago an old hunter told me 4X east of the Mississippi 6X west of it. Worked for me.

 

[dolek]

I am having the same issue . I tried a couple scopes at dusk to see just how bad my hunting vision is . 6x and 6.5x for the low end on these scopes . I could pick out a leaf down to 25 yds and it was getting too dark to legally shoot . Both scopes have adjustable objectives and go down low . Only issue I had was the fine hairs/dot on the Leupold were very hard to see in low light ,it would be fine in good light. So all that to say,6 is fine for me and I have no clue about 8...never know till give it a try,you will know fast enough.

 

[hogpatrol]

Sighted my 11-87 12 gage deer slug gun into day with Leupold 2-7x36. And muzzleloader Nikon 3-9x40. Wow. Not like it use to be. Ha ha ha. At 59 my eyes are very tired. Thinking about put some 4-16x50 scopes on both. I did not shoot that good today with either guns. Just not enough power for me.



I have a 8-32x50 weaver grand slam that is not on a gun right now. Thinking about putting it on the 50 cal muzzle loader. Would I regret it ?
Thanks. Marty

How tight can you hold either firearm? Higher power scope means less eye relief. I put a 4x14 Sightron on a 20 ga slug gun and at 14x, I came close to a scope eye. Went back to 3x9 Leupold and most shots are on 4x.
Aside that, for deer, consider downsizing to a 20 gauge. It's got more than enough knockdown power.

 

[NDAR15MAN]

yes. I would want to be careful of scope eye. My shooting eye had bad detached Retina 1 1/2 years ago. Did not turn out good. I might not have enough eye relief on a big power scope for shotgun and muzzle loader. What brand and model of scope with power over 12x do you guys think has the most eye relief ? Marty

 

[ImBIllT]

yes. I would want to be careful of scope eye. My shooting eye had bad detached Retina 1 1/2 years ago. Did not turn out good. I might not have enough eye relief on a big power scope for shotgun and muzzle loader. What brand and model of scope with power over 12x do you guys think has the most eye relief ? Marty

They’ll list the actual eye relief in the specs on the manufactures website and you’ll have to go from model to model to find the one with the most eye relief. It’s all a trade off. Whatever they give you comes at the expense of something else. An email to 4-5 manufactures might be a short cut to which models have the longest eye relief.

I’m not entirely certain exactly what you’re looking for in a scope for your “weak eyes”. If it’s brightness, then fixed power scopes are brighter than variables. The 98-99% light transmission numbers that you see are PER LENSE. Variables have more lenses than fixed power scope and side focus scopes have more lenses than A/O and non-parralax adjustable scopes. Sort of on the brightness front is actual color rendering. The European manufactures have some really great color rendering for game hunting and low light. Leupold has screw on filters for the same purpose and frankly I fell in love with one of their amber filters on a 6x42 FX-III last year. Some scope manufactures transmit tons of light, but the color has very little contrast and still leaves me struggling in low light. Lastly on the light front is powerXobjective diameter. That ratio controls the diameter of the exit pupil, which is correlated with your perceived brightness. Somewhere in the 6-7mm range is where you generally want to be. That’s why 6x42, 7x50, 8x56 is so popular.

Another issue with “weak eyes” ,especially in dim lighting, is the reticle itself. Fine reticles disappear in the back ground enough with young eyes and just shouldn’t be on a hunting scope. A duplex reticle can be a big help, as well as most reticles with “German” in the name. Lots of Euro hunting scopes have huge thick reticles that are GREAT for hunting and downright horrible for paper punching. Lots of people don’t like them, but they have their place, especially hunting at close range or in low light.

Other considerations in a hunting scope regardless of how good or bad your eyes are would be field of view, recoil handling, and ease of use. I’ve noticed that many scopes with large fields of view have less adjustment range. If you’re not trying to go from 100yds to 1000yds on the same scope, then you really don’t need much adjustment range. You do need field of view, especially if you’re wanting to use a higher power range. Lower power settings always have a larger field of view, so on a shotgun or muzzle loader you really don’t want to go with something that won’t crank down low. variables often have a smaller field of view than a fixed power. A/O vs side focus vs a scope that isn’t powerful enough to need it- on a shotgun or muzzle loader you will often be close enough that it’s going to be difficult to work an A/O fast enough to keep a moving target in focus at high power, and if you keep the scope powered down, just buy a lower power scope. Side focus scopes are a lot quicker to work with, but of course a 3-9 that doesn’t need it is even faster. Recoil- A/O scopes have to allow the movement of the objective lens, so they use a spring to hold it against the outer ring. While they usually function fine under heavy recoil, they can shift and fail to return leaving you with an impossibly fuzzy sight picture until you jar your scope causing the stuck lens to return. This is fairly rare, but on a shotgun or muzzle loader it’s probably more common than on a rifle. I’m not entirely certain how side focus scopes work in this regard. Scopes with no prralax adjustment simply have fixed lenses and cannot suffer from this malady as far as I’m aware.

How far are you shooting at deer with a shotgun and muzzle loader? I cannot imagine looking at a deer in what I would have guess was shotgun range through a 12X scope and being able to tell what part of the deer I was looking at. Even if the whole deer was visible if it began to move I would imagine that it would become very diffult to follow. No matter how blurry the image is, if you can tell it’s shaped like a deer, then you can tell where it’s shoulder is. If you need more power to judge the quality of the deer, then that’s where a good pair of binoculars comes in. I can’t look through your eyes, but I can’t imagine a Leupold FX-III or Meopta in a fixed 6x42 could really be improved upon for deer hunting at any ranges for shotgun or muzzle loader use. If I was going to do it, I’d even drop down to a fixed 4X. If you feel the need for more power A good 3-9 seems like the obvious answer. Of course there are variables with bottom ends in the 3x-6x range that offer a lot more top end, but those wide swings of power range come at the cost of clarity, light transmission, weight scope size, requiring a secondary focus adjustment for you to fiddle with, and of course price. They are worth it for very long range shooting, but not for muzzle loader and shotgun range. Perhaps if you could find the chance to look through a European 3-9x in the evening you’d be more pleased than with your Nikon. I know my Japanese glass is excellent for target shooting, but in spite of its excellent brightness and clarity, it just doesn’t make things “pop” in low light. The contrast afforded by lense coatings intended for hunting is much better experienced than described, but it is undeniable.

 

[NDAR15MAN]

ImBIllt.... thanks for the good post. For me I would just like to have more maginfication. I would like to put my sightron lll 10-50x60 on my 11-87 12 gage. Ha ha ha. Just kidding. I need to keep in mind through this target shooting today at range I was aiming at a 2 inch bulls eye at 50 yards and 100 yards with the shotgun and muzzle loader. So I was trying to shoot for good groups. I have to remind myself that Marty you are not trying compete in a match shoot , your trying to meat on the table and maybe horns on the wall. So I don’t have to shoot moa which would be very hard for me with shotgun and a muzzle loader to do anyway. Ha ha ha.
1 in the wheel house is what i need.
Not a moa group ha ha ha. It would be nice thou to have a 4-16x50 on both guns. Now a days a deer slug is accurate out to 150-200 and muzzleloaders to 300. I have to do more thinking.
Wanting and needing is 2 different things. Ha ha ha. Marty

 

[hogpatrol]

For deer, low light conditions, I like lit reticles. The scope I have on my smokeless muzzleloader is a Leupold 3x9-50 with Multi-Fire Dot LRV reticle. They have been discontinued but sometimes come up for bid on ebay. All of the ballistic dots are lit on this scope. Slug gun has a 2x8 Leupold.

 

[sawcarver]

In lower Michigan for years we could only use shotguns or muzzleloader. I ran a 4-16x50 vortex PST FFP on a TC Encore for five years with no issues. I'm hunting mainly farm fields, but even on the occasional push through woods it's wasn't a problem.

Now we can use some straight wall cartridges so I run a 357 max. At first I put a Burris XTRII 3-15x50 FFP on it, great scope I love it, except the fine reticle sucks in low light. I have to turn on the lit reticle to see it, not a huge deal but just something to be aware of.

 

[fredo]

Hunted with a slug gun long enough to realize its effective distance limitation. Even with today's snazzy sabots, 150yds is a long shot to pull off. And, 200yds is really stretchin' it...

Given that mediocre distance, ya really don't need lots of magnification to shoot a big bodied animal like a deer. 10x max should be plenty, and ya could prolly get by just fine, with half that much to engage an 8-10" vital zone...

To expand upon post, above...

What your aging eyes really want are two things:
1. Clarity
2. Brightness

#1 is covered easily by purchasing quality glass, with quality coatings

#2 is assured by the scope having an adequate 'exit pupil' value. Simply stated, the larger the exit pupil a scope allows, the more light is 'transmitted' to your eye. Subsequently, the image thru the scope is brighter...which is what lots of deer hunters appreciate in those waning minutes of shooting light...

Exit pupil is easy to solve for, just divide the scope's objective diameter by the magnification power. So, a 2-10x50 scope will have a huge 25mm exit pupil on lowest (2x) power, but decreases to 5mm exit pupil on max power. (50 / 10 = 5) See the easy math?

According to most things I've read, 5-7mm is about the most the pupil of a human eye can open, so anything beyond that value is 'extra'. So, if your scope allows that, you're getting about all ya can outta that scope/mag setting. Whereas, if the exit pupil of a scope falls much below 5mm, then the scope image will appear darker than ideal...

So, ya basically want to pick a scope that'll allow at least a 5mm exit pupil at a magnification setting that you're comfortable shooting at. Do some quick math, and you'll see that going UP in max mag isn't always the best answer for hunting with 'aging' eyes. Give your tired eyes what they need...more LIGHT! When choosing a scope, remember how objective diameter factors into the 'easy math' for exit pupil. The bigger the objective, the better...as it relates to magnification...

Oh yeah, a lit reticle is a nice touch, if the reticle is too thin and/ or lacking in contrast. I just put a Minox 2.5-10x50 back on the smoke pole for deer season. It allows the same 'ideal' exit pupil @ max mag, so it's very useable & bright thru the entire range. And, the center part of the duplex reticle is lit, too...

 

[ImBIllT]

ImBIllt.... thanks for the good post. For me I would just like to have more maginfication. I would like to put my sightron lll 10-50x60 on my 11-87 12 gage. Ha ha ha. Just kidding. I need to keep in mind through this target shooting today at range I was aiming at a 2 inch bulls eye at 50 yards and 100 yards with the shotgun and muzzle loader. So I was trying to shoot for good groups. I have to remind myself that Marty you are not trying compete in a match shoot , your trying to meat on the table and maybe horns on the wall. So I don’t have to shoot moa which would be very hard for me with shotgun and a muzzle loader to do anyway. Ha ha ha.
1 in the wheel house is what i need.
Not a moa group ha ha ha. It would be nice thou to have a 4-16x50 on both guns. Now a days a deer slug is accurate out to 150-200 and muzzleloaders to 300. I have to do more thinking.
Wanting and needing is 2 different things. Ha ha ha. Marty

You hit the nail on the head. A 2” bull is not really representative of the vitals of a deer. Being able to shoot MOA out to 100yds is not really that important for 50-100yd deer hunting unless perhaps you can’t shoot 1 MOA with a .1 MOA bench gun, in which place you have some sort of serious problem. Your target will be the size of a pie plate, and attached to a reasonably large animal in such a way that you know where it is according to the rest of animal. Not to mention, if your shotgun or muzzle loader are capable of MOA, and you shot 1.5 MOA because of your scope, that’s only .5 MOA of sighting error. You’re probably concerned about a non-issue, but could certainly end up with some new issues chasing more power in a hunting scope. I shot my first mule deer at over 400yds with a 4X, and had to pick him out with binos, then count over from the right in my scope because at most angles I couldn’t even see antlers, let alone judge them. Then the deer would move and I’d have to figure out which one he was in the binos again and count over a new number in the scope. It was anything but ideal, and I’ve upped the power since then, but the point is, you do not need a perfectly clear and up close view of the animal to hit it. You do need to be able to see your reticle and keep him in the field of view.

 

[ImBIllT]

Hunted with a slug gun long enough to realize its effective distance limitation. Even with today's snazzy sabots, 150yds is a long shot to pull off. And, 200yds is really stretchin' it...

Given that mediocre distance, ya really don't need lots of magnification to shoot a big bodied animal like a deer. 10x max should be plenty, and ya could prolly get by just fine, with half that much to engage an 8-10" vital zone...

To expand upon post, above...

What your aging eyes really want are two things:
1. Clarity
2. Brightness

#1 is covered easily by purchasing quality glass, with quality coatings

#2 is assured by the scope having an adequate 'exit pupil' value. Simply stated, the larger the exit pupil a scope allows, the more light is 'transmitted' to your eye. Subsequently, the image thru the scope is brighter...which is what lots of deer hunters appreciate in those waning minutes of shooting light...

Exit pupil is easy to solve for, just divide the scope's objective diameter by the magnification power. So, a 2-10x50 scope will have a huge 25mm exit pupil on lowest (2x) power, but decreases to 5mm exit pupil on max power. (50 / 10 = 5) See the easy math?

According to most things I've read, 5-7mm is about the most the pupil of a human eye can open, so anything beyond that value is 'extra'. So, if your scope allows that, you're getting about all ya can outta that scope/mag setting. Whereas, if the exit pupil of a scope falls much below 5mm, then the scope image will appear darker than ideal...

So, ya basically want to pick a scope that'll allow at least a 5mm exit pupil at a magnification setting that you're comfortable shooting at. Do some quick math, and you'll see that going UP in max mag isn't always the best answer for hunting with 'aging' eyes. Give your tired eyes what they need...more LIGHT! When choosing a scope, remember how objective diameter factors into the 'easy math' for exit pupil. The bigger the objective, the better...as it relates to magnification...

Oh yeah, a lit reticle is a nice touch, if the reticle is too thin and/ or lacking in contrast. I just put a Minox 2.5-10x50 back on the smoke pole for deer season. It allows the same 'ideal' exit pupil @ max mag, so it's very useable & bright thru the entire range. And, the center part of the duplex reticle is lit, too...

Back on brightness. More lenses means less brightness and variables have extra lenses. If you feel the need for more brightness you should definitely consider a fixed power.

 

[fredo]

Back on brightness. More lenses means less brightness and variables have extra lenses. If you feel the need for more brightness you should definitely consider a fixed power.

Maybe, 20years ago.

Nowadays, scope technology has advanced to a level where a fixed power has precious little/no advantage over a quality variable...

 

[ImBIllT]

Maybe, 20years ago.

Nowadays, scope technology has advanced to a level where a fixed power has precious little/no advantage over a quality variable...

The difference is less dramatic today, but it’s there. If you have a coating that transmits 98% per lens then a scope with three lenses will transmit 94% of light and a scope that has five lenses will transmit 90% of light. That was a lot worse 30 years ago when good scopes transmitted 95% of light per lens, but the effect is still there, and side focus adds yet another lens.

The very best fixed power scopes in production today transmit 92-94%. When you see 98% light transmission in an add that is per lens.

Exit pupil is not light transmission, that is your ability to use that light. It’s important, but you still need high light transmission.

 

[fredo]

The difference is less dramatic today, but it’s there. If you have a coating that transmits 98% per lens then a scope with three lenses will transmit 94% of light and a scope that has five lenses will transmit 90% of light. That was a lot worse 30 years ago when good scopes transmitted 95% of light, but the effect is still there, and side focus adds yet another lens.

Light transmission %s have been marketed to death, which has de-valued them as a valid comparison.

Take a quality variable out the the field, and set mag to where exit pupil is constant with whichever fixed power scope you like. I can pretty much guarantee that there are several variables that can match & even beat the fixed power in a 'real life' brightness test...

Caveat is, you gotta pay for that quality. So, if you're on a budget, I could agree that a fixed power might gain ya something. But, if you're spending more than a few hundred bucks on glass, a variable will meet & exceed expectations. Plus, you've gained the versatility to dial down/up, to maximize field of view, or aid in shot placement...

 

[ImBIllT]

Light transmission %s have been marketed to death, which has de-valued them as a valid comparison.

Take a quality variable out the the field, and set mag to where exit pupil is constant with whichever fixed power scope you like. I can pretty much guarantee that there are several variables that can match & even beat the fixed power in a 'real life' brightness test...

Caveat is, you gotta pay for that quality. So, if you're on a budget, I could agree that a fixed power might gain ya something. But, if you're spending more than a few hundred bucks on glass, a variable will meet & exceed expectations. Plus, you've gained the versatility to dial down/up, to maximize field of view, or aid in shot placement...

A Meopta 6x42 will be brighter than a Meopta 6.5-20x50. The 6.5-20x50 has at least two extra lenses.

I own a Meopta 6.5-20x50 as well as Doctor and Leupold 6x42s.

 

[hogpatrol]

My eye doc told me when it comes to scope optics, money buys you light. When buying a new, unfamiliar scope, if variable, I turn it to the max power and look at a dark area. Comparing scopes in this manner will give you a good representation of light transmission.

 

[JRS]

You don't need that kind of magnification on a shotgun or muzzleloader. You need to have your eyes taken care of.

 

[fredo]

A Meopta 6x42 will be brighter than a Meopta 6.5-20x50. The 6.5-20x50 has at least two extra lenses.

I own a Meopta 6.5-20x50 as well as Doctor and Leupold 6x42s.

Cherry picked to prove your point, and an apple to oranges comparison at that. I could easily do the same, to prove my point...

Fact is, there are any number of quality variables that'll be just as bright, or brighter. Specifically, those within a similar objective size, and corresponding variable range...

I'd submit my 'low-mid level' variable Minox up against your fixed 6x42 for brightness, any time. No extra lens for an AO, just for mag zoom. Also, have a baby Kahles 3-9x42 that has an AO, and is still phenomenal in low light. And a 2-10x50 AO, that's even better...

Again, not disagreeing that a fixed lower has merits, it does for sheer simplicity. But, technology has allowed shooters to enjoy variables that don't suffer optical 'shortcomings' of yesteryear. We're loooong past that, now...