Any new production 8-32x type mid-priced scopes any good???

[Herzo]

Look at the Arken 5-25x56. 34 mm main tube with guaranteed accurate turrets and a steal at about $550. They only sell direct online. Another is Bushnell Match Pro 6-24x50 for $500. Again this model is only sold directly from their website. I have both as well as a Leupold 8.5-25x50 LRP which is another solid scope under $1000.

I just picked up a Cabelas store brand, Covenant 7, 5-35X 56 FFP with a 34 mm tube for my 260 Remington prone/bench rifle. At $400 I had to give it a shot. So far, it seems to perform well, though I haven't really wrung it out. My only complaint so far is that the focus/parallax over 150 yards is pretty coarse. Optically it is substantially superior to the Mueller 40X56 and on a par with the Vortex Venom 5-25X56 for similar money. (I know I'm a bottom feeder, but when you're retired....).

 

[Herzo]

Took the rig to the club for our bi-monthly 400 yard prone match, 20 shots in 30 minutes:
Covenant 7 on my Savage 110 rebarreled with a 24" heavy varmint ER Shaw 260 Remington 1:8 in a Choate stock with a Witt muzzle brake, a GGG bipod & rear bag. Dialed in 7.5 minutes from my 100 yard zero, first 3 shots on the SR target produced a 2" group at 2 o'clock in the nine ring. 2 clicks down & 3 left brought it into the "X".
We use the 12" Shoot-n-see's which correspond to the scoring rings of the SR, I had no problem seeing my hits at 35X. The 10 ring is 1.5 MOA at 400.
Managed a 197- 8x with 3 - 9's called flyers. Bulk of shots were within 4" vertical & 2" horizontal. Probably need to work on my load 140 grain Barnes Match Burner ahead of H4350.
Scope performed well, well worth the price.

 

[SBS]

Al...I had a few of these in the past, and I think its a hell of a scope for the money.

And on sale ending today for 390.99!

 

[Ackman]

The best bang for the buck in a mid priced scope like this is the Athlon Argos BTR Gen 2 10-40. I have a couple of them...they track like they're on rails, return to zero every time, are well made and built like tanks. It's a large scope. The w/e adjustments are the worm gear type which makes them very positive. Optically, they're not a NF or Sightron ED for optical quality but are very decent up to about 32-36, depending on lighting conditions. The MOA style reticle looks busy but it's actually not... and the center dot is perfect for precision shooting. I brought one as a backup to the NBRSA Score Nationals last week and the several shooters that looked through it were pretty positive with their comments.

Yes...they are a Chinese produced scope. Athlon is a U.S. company based in Kansas that has a different approach to having scopes produced off-shore and a QC program that is done in house whenever a new shipment arrives.

Doug at Cameraland has some great pricing on them and is a solid guy to deal with. Here's some pics of mine along with a link.

Good shootin' -Al

Product Description

Product Description | Camera Land NY

cameralandny.com

Not a match or target shooter, just varmints, but your review aroused my curiosity. Never owned an Athlon but these scopes on sale for less than $400, ?? And the Argos gets good reviews online, definitely worth a try. My 8-34x came this morning, $391. Neighbor at about 100yds has a plastic owl on the roof to keep banded doves and magpies away, makes a nice boresight target. Bagged on the truck hood, there's a 90deg. sweep out to a few miles.....houses both log and plank, cars, trees, weeds, highway signs, all kinds of stuff at all different distances. I've never used whats considered top end glass, Sightron is my best. I'm amazed at how sharp and clear the image is. Sacrilege perhaps, but at 24x compared with a Sightron at 24X, to my eye they look the same. I'll put it next to a Sightron 8-32 and Arken 5-25 also. But really, this thing so far is very impressive, don't know how they can sell these things at such a low price point.