Login Signup
DarkLordOfOptics
Politics • Science & Tech • Sports
Guns, Optics, 2nd Amendment and resisting the Left in everything they touch.
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?

Learn more first
HET, Part 7: The War of the 50mm glass. Setting the stage.

The title of this post is my attempt at theatrical exuberance. If that was not clear before, this should really clarify why I never had a snowball's chance of a career in performing arts. Some people are just born to be nerds, I suppose.
I have mentioned here and elsewhere that I am kicking of a new High End Tactical (HET) comparison. Interestingly, although very few people are actually willing to spend this much money on these, quite a few people want to know what the pecking order at the top is and whether one is significantly better than all the others.
I'll try to rank them in some sort of a reasonable way, but the choice between the options is usually not the same for everyone. Barring some potential surprises (and those are usually not good surprises), everything on the high end is very good. However, riflescope design is an art of compromises and different manufacturers make those compromises in different ways. As is most often the case in real life, the answer is more nuanced than a simple ranking from best to worst. The biggest driver for the comparison is the introduction of March 4.5-28x52 and Zeiss LRP 3-18x50. I am really curious to see how they stack up against the competition.
I originally decided to put this together because I was curious how the new March 4.5-28x52 stacks up against the competition. 52mm objective is sort of an "in between" size, but it is closer to 50mm than 56mm and since the scope is compact, it really fits better with 50mm designs.
I have spent quite a lot of time with a near production prototype of this scope and I know it is very nice. What I do not know is how it stacks up against the competition.
While we are talking about nuanced answers, if you were to ask me what the best precision oriented high end scope out there for everything across the board is, I can tell you right off-hand that this March is going to be in the top 3, simply on the strength of it having very wide FOV broadest magnification range of the group, reasonably compact size and light weight. I also have the background knowledge of what they changed compared to the prototype I looked at. However, if you were to ask me whether you should get this new march or the ZCO 4-20x50, I would really struggle with the answer. The easiest would be to find out whether you often use magnification above 20x, which reticle you prefer and how much value you put on locking turrets. Based on answers to those recommendations I can make a perfectly reasonable recommendation, but the dirty trick here, so to speak, is that since I know these two are really nice scopes and whichever one I recommend, you are not going to be disappointed. What I can't yet offer is a sufficiently nuanced answer on how they compare optically and optical comparison will be a really significant part of this effort.
I will obviously carefully look at the mechanical quality, both objective and subjective, but I really do not expect anything within this price range to give me any objective mechanical problems. That is definitely something to check though. Feel will be different, of course, and that is another potential differentiator.
Normally, when I do these, I make the announcement, then vanish into my "dark lord lair" for a few months only to emerge with the results.
I plan to do it differently this time. There will be supporter-only updates as I go along, so that I can get some feedback here and there and make sure I dig into the details that matter to you. Also, if any of you are within a reasonable driving distance of me, we can potentially arrange a meet somewhere for you to look at the scopes yourself.
Here are the contenders:

March 4.5-28x52 with FML-TR1 reticle (on its way here) https://bit.ly/32qOUhj
Zeiss LRP 3-18x50 (should be here in a couple of weeks) https://bit.ly/3nNYZNx
ZCO 4-20x50 with MPCT3x (already here)
Tangent Theta TT315M 3-15x50 (has been here for a few years) https://bit.ly/3p22gs0
S&B PMII UltraShort 5-20x50 with P4F and DTII+ turrets (has been here for a bit). https://bit.ly/3CKequw
Steiner M7Xi 2.9-20x50 with Tremor3 rerticle (got here last week. They only had it with Tremor3, so I had no choice) https://bit.ly/3r5sw7t
US Optics 3.2-17x50 with JVCR (I already reviewed this one, so it will only be here for the optics part of the comparison; I know the mechanics work) https://bit.ly/3l9u9gJ

I also have a mystery contender, of sorts, that I had not mentioned before. I do not think it belongs in this group in terms of features or price, but optical and mechanical quality are very good. One of the things I am looking to figure out while I am doing this is where it fits between these $3k+ scopes and $1500-ish designs that I consider to be the best bang for the buck, like Vortex Razor HD-LHT 4.5-22x50 and Element Nexus 5-20x50.

Reply
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?

Learn more first
What else you may like…
Videos
Posts
Articles
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
August 10, 2025
Vortex Defender XL Green

This is the second time Vortex' Defender XL crosses my path. I was very impressed with the original red dot version, so I was curious to see how the one with the green dot works for my eyes.
To get the details, see the attached video.
The cliff's notes version is that I am just as impressed with this one. In terms of collimation quality and parallax control, it is quite exceptional.
https://alnk.to/881BEV1

00:10:20
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
August 08, 2025
Primary Arms HTX-1 US Made red dot sight

I've had this RDS for a bit over two months now and I am beyond pleased with it.
Despite some spirited abuse, it keeps soldiering on.
https://alnk.to/1C9z5dw
It is a very nice RDS and being fully made in the US does not hurt either.

00:13:03
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
July 23, 2025
Delta Stryker 3.5-21x44 Wrap-up

This scope comes up a lot since I really like the configuration. It is time to do a final wrap-up of it.

It is one of my favourite scopes on the market today, especially for the money, since I naturally lean toward general purpose-ish designs. Still, while the 3.5-21x44 Stryker is relatively compact and light, it still clearly leans toward the precision side of things, which suites me very well.

https://annexdefense.com/optics-and-optic-accessories/delta-optics/

00:10:25
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
September 08, 2025
Something to consider

I had an interesting conversation earlier today that made me think. I was approached by a company called TourHero.

Apparently what they do is organize various tours, trips, etc in partnership with different influencers.

The influencer does the marketing, i.e. convince his/her audience to buy this customized tour, while the company does all of the logistics.

The idea is that they get several people to pay extra for a tour package which pays for the influencer in question to come along and, apparently, make some money on top of it, depending on how much the influencer is able to get out of his/her followers.

How I got on their radar is very unclear since they are very focused on the Instagram crowd and I have a very small Instagram channel. https://www.instagram.com/darklordofoptics/

My best guess is that they saw the picture of my daughter and me after her antelope hunt and made some sort of an incorrect conclusion. Frankly, the types of the things that they push require levels of narcissism that I ...

Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
September 14, 2025
Uncooled Thermal with a little bit of history

There is, as always, an entertaining discussion happening in the Hide, but I do not feel like getting into another protracted argument about comparative merits of different uncooled cores with people who do not know a whole lot about them. I mentioned that BAE is getting out of the uncooled core business. The responses were interesting.

Still, I thought some of the background on uncooled cores is worth rehashing since I was around for most of it and involved in some of it. Hopefully, you'll find it informative. If not, this post will fade like many others before it.

Here is a little history on uncooled cores from an eyewitness.

I was working at Raytheon when it was starting out and one of my first projects over there was trying to figure out how to calibrate early uncooled cores for a military project that eventually ended up going into ENVG.

The uncooled technology was first developed by Honeywell and after a while they licensed it to a bunch of people. Honeywell developed the technology, but did not ...

Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
September 07, 2025
Another G&A Article

For the few of you who still pay attention to print magazines, I have an article in the latest Precision Rifle Shooter, called "Optics For NRL Hunter". For those of you who have been following my stumbling and bumbling match shooting exploits, there isn't going to be anything new there. You know what I think on the subject.
However, I still get some sort of a weird nostalgic kick out of seeing something I write printed on paper.
When I was growing up in the Soviet Union, my room doubled as a family library. I think it is some latent aftereffect of spending my childhood with books. Gen-Xers have a reputation of spending their childhood outdoors doing whatever mischief came to mind and that is true in my case, to some extent.
However, that is largely because at some point my mother got sick and tired of seeing me in the apartment with my nose stuck in the book. Every once in a while she would just search me for hidden books then kick me out of the house to go do something active. It ...

post photo preview
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
August 25, 2025
Well, that was a doozy...

My original plan was to try to set up a hunt where my daughter will have her first memorable hunting experience without working too hard.

The choice of the pronghorn hunt was largely based off of my experience in that same area last year.

The way it went last year was quite straightforward.  We drove around until we saw a large pronghorn buck.  It was a solitary animal that decided to lie down in an open area to relax.  We made a short stock, crawled the last hundred yards or so, found a good spot about 350 yards away from the pronghorn and made the shot.

https://darklordofoptics.locals.com/post/6034347/well-that-was-a-nice-morning

This year, when I decided to take my daugher on the same pronghorn hunt on the day of her 14th birthday, I figured it will be somewhere along those same lines.  It kinda was, but not quite.

Still, it worked out nicely.

In the pciture:

Q Mini-Fix with 6ARC 16" Proof Research carbon fiber barrel

Q Jumbo Shrimp supressor

Gunwerks Elevate 2.0 bipod

Telson Toxin 3-18x50 riflescope

Leica Geovid Pro AB+ LRF binoculars

Pint-sized sticky Gamechanger bag

Unnamed pronghorn buck.  It will likely get a name once it's skull is euro-ed and is hanging on the wall.

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
August 23, 2025
Arming The Children
A couple of very specific children that is

In case you were wondering, no, I am not starting an underage militia.

I do have two kids though and I am teaching them to shoot.

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
Reply
ILya Koshkin@DarkLordOfOptics
August 08, 2025
post photo preview
Steiner C35 Gen2 Mount
from Annex Defense

The production version of the Annex Defense's mount for the Steiner C35 Gen2 thermal Clip-on is finally here.  At $1600 (when this is published), the clip-on is an absolute steal.

I've had it for a few days, but, me being the good old paranoid me, I spent some time shooting with it before posting anything.  I had a couple of days with it prior to last weekend's match in Montana and a couple of days after.  Another to pop it on and off a few times and get a couple of hundred rounds of 6.5Grendel through the gun to see if anything shakes loose.  So far so good.

The C35 Gen2 clip-on is sitting on my 6.5Grendel AR as a part of a long running "Only One" project that I have.  It pairs perfectly with the Steiner H6Xi 2-12x42 scope.

Here is what comes in the box from Annex Defense:

The order in which the whole thing comes togethe is pretty stragihtforward:

-slide the thermal washer onto the threaded interface extending out of the back of the clip-on

-spin the mount itself onto the threaded interface (the mount is threaded on the inside) until it can go no further

-rotate the mount so that the clip-on is properly lined up to the picatinny clamp

-once you are happy with the alignment, use the three nylon tipped set screws (you'll need an allen wrench for that) to lock in the position of the clip-on in the mount.  You need very little torque on the set screws.  They are there for one reason and one reason only: to keep the mount from spinning when you tighten the timing nut in the next step

-spin the timing nut onto the threaded interface of the clip-on to lock the mount in place.  You should not need the timing nut wrench, but one is in there just in case.

Here are the pieces laid out in the order in which you will need them.

When you are done, it should look like this:

Note that the mount normaly comes with two T20 screws.  I am using two thumbscrews instead, since I am popping the mount on and off all the time.  It seems to be staying put with the thumbscrews just fine.  I am hoping Annex will offer the thumbscrews as an option.

It is not quite an equivalent of a QD mount, but we needed something with an extremely low profile clamp to fit under scopes with fairly large objectives.  As is, the mount works with most scope that have objective lens diameter of 50mm or less.

I am using with with Steiner H6Xi 2-12x42 and the two work together exceedingly well.

Read full Article
Reply
Available on mobile and TV devices
google store google store app store app store
google store google store app tv store app tv store amazon store amazon store roku store roku store
Powered by Locals