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
Visiting Primary Arms

Primary Arms visit turned out to be quite surprising. I have been talking to the gentleman who runs PA on and off for a while now, but somehow I still wasn't grasping the entire scale of their operation. Now, to be fair, I am certainly still not aware of everything they do. However, looking back on it, I really shouldn't have been that surprised. They have a seriously substantial warehouse since they stock they stuff they sell and, looking at their website, it should have been apparent that requires space and manpower.

What I didn't know is that they have a pretty solid engineering group in-house and how much effort and resources go into the Primary Arms branded optics. When PA optics line started, what they had were just comparatively standard OEM scopes that stood out because of the ACSS reticles. As I have elaborated previously, some ACSS reticles I like and some I do not. A lot of it is just personal preference, to be honest, and some is just stylistically differences. However, all of the ACSS reticles I have seen to date are intelligently conceived and I can clearly see what the design goals were and how they went about achieving them. That's more than I can say about most reticles out there.

PA optics line still has the various ACSS reticles, but there is a lot more to them now which is how they ended up within my field of view, so to speak.
Many of their products stopped looking like "me too" designs with good reticles. The line of micro-prisms that I have been talking about is unique to them. Other small prismatics out there come from different OEMs.

The new PLxC 1-8x24 LPVO is just exceptional and easily clears the bar to make it onto my list of recommendations (with room to spare, frankly). Optomechanically, it is clearly going after scopes like Razor Gen3 and ATACR. Given the price, if they ever add a diffractive reticle to it, they will absolutely be in the same conversation.

The interesting part is that when I first saw that scope, it absolutely threw me for a loop. At this stage in the game, when I look at a scope, I can usually make a pretty good guess which OEM it is from, especially which Japanese OEM. This scope sorta looked like a LOW design, except I had never seen that exact version (and for a good reason since it turned out to be entirely new and likely proprietary to PA). The turrets, however, did not look like it and did not feel like it. Click feel was different and when I took the removable part off, the insides were kinda sealed. I generally do not take scopes apart beyond what is expected of a consumer (sort of a courtesy to the manufacturers; although there are exceptions to that), so I did not go further.

Now, that I got a chance to spend a little time with the team at PA, it all makes sense. There is a good size engineering group in-house and an increasing number of the PA optics have some elements of their own design, with turrets being at the top of the list. There are other things coming though. For example, they are a bit cagey about what is happening there, but they are building a cleanroom. You do not need a cleanroom like that for QC.

Now, one of the things I look for when I visit companies is the quality of the team. If you have a cohesive team, a couple of smart engineers and company support you can get a lot of stuff done. The gentleman who is in charge of engineering at PA looked strangely familiar. It turned out that we had crossed paths in the past (through my dayjob) a decade or so ago. More importantly, we have some mutual friends who speak highly of his abilities. That's the kind of stuff I pay attention to and that also explains why I am seeing increasingly sophisticated opto-mechanical designs coming out of PA, with more on the way. Also, I got a glimpse into the insides of one of his turrets designs (looking at the CAD screen over his shoulder) and it is a clever system that should be durable.

For another example, PA has a few red dot sights in different price ranges and the new one I got to play with is the SR-10. It is a part of their SLx line, so it is on the budget end of things. We'll see how it does, but offhand, it looks like a pretty straightforward Docter-pattern open emitter red dot sight for use on both pistols and long guns. However, for a couple of hundred bucks, it comes with a picatinny mount and a very slim Glock MOS adapter. I'll confirm, but I am pretty sure it will sit low enough to co-witness with standard Glock sights. Decent collimation quality with a 3MOA dot.

The product line I have been paying most attention to lately was probably GLx. Don't get me wrong, the new PLxC seems good enough to satisfy even my optics snobbery and the SLx are very good budget options (admittedly, I am mostly familiar with SLx red dots and micro-prisms). GLx, however, might be the best bang for the buck of the bunch, starting with the 2x prismatic I looked at a little while back. Then, I looked at the 2.5-10x44 that is very feature rich and just excellent mechanically (it also has their own turret design and, now that I met the engineering team, I understand why it is excellent). Optically, it is better than adequate, but not exceptional. It is good enough for me to recommend it overall, though. I knew they had new GLx scopes coming, and that is what I really wanted to see while I was there. They were refreshingly open about their upcoming products. A couple of them they asked me to not talk about yet, but there are several that are coming soon enough to discuss. There were four new variable scopes I saw. One was the 1-10x24 FFP LPVO made in Japan by JOL. Three were made in the Philippines, all with FFP reticles: 1-6x24, 3-18x44 and 4.5-27x56. I got a chance to see near-production quality prototypes of all four and I was, honestly, pretty impressed.

General disclaimer: there isn't all that much I can immediately say from looking at scope indoors, but there are a few things to look for and I did not see any glaring problems. Mechanically, everything had a good feel and all had PA's own turrets that I noted earlier. I am not entirely sure what the final pricing will be and I suspect they are still finalizing that. Once I know the specifics, I'll let you know.

The 1-10x24 is a bit on the heavy side of the LPVO world, but I have seen this optical system before and it really is quite good with a well designed eyepiece, so it is easy to get behind. It should play nicely against other LPVOs out there that are used in a DMR-ish role, i.e. on accurate AR carbines that have to work from up-close and personal out to a few hundred yards.

The 1-6x24 was completely new to me. I had no idea it was in the works. Of the two LPVOs, this one is probably the one I am more curious about since I have not seen that optical system before. It did look quite respectable. Reticle illumination seemed adequately bright, but I was indoors the whole time. That's something to check. The eyepiece, however, is done very well, so I expect it to be quite easy to get behind. We had a long warehouse to use, so I set the scopes up on a tripod and spent some time peering through them on different magnifications. The 1-6x24 had good detail and good flare control best I could tell.

The scope I was arguably most impressed with was the 3-18x44. It has the same excellent zero-lock and zero-stop turrets I liked on the 2.5-10x44, but a better magnification range for crossover use and likely better image quality. With this one, we are getting into magnification ranges where there isn't a ton I can really say indoors, but it looked promising. This scope should be a contender as a crossover scope for anything from accurate ARs to lightweight precision rifles. I'll post full specs once available.

Same goes for the 4.5-27x56 model. It appeared to have more or less the same mechanical features, so I have reasonable confidence it will work well. I did not see anything obviously wrong optically, so that is encouraging too.

All of these GLx scopes showed some commonality of mechanical design and eyepiece design, which is a good thing. GLx scopes seem to sit in that rough sweetspot where you can get a lot for your money, but these are not cheap scopes. That's roughly the same market where Vortex' PST Gen2 plays. Various Athlon Ares scopes are in there as well as several others. This is where you can find decent quality Japanese scopes and higher end Phillipine-made and Chinese designs. This is really where the battle of the OEMs is happening right now, I think.

Lastly, I wanted to look at how they do QC and it turns out that every PA branded optics that comes in, no matter how expensive, is looked at. Every single one is taken out of the box and checked. That, I did not expect. To the best of my knowledge, for the inexpensive chinese optics, noone else checks every single one. With higher end products that is pretty common, but checking EVERYTHING is pretty unusual.

Overall, it was an interesting visit. PA is located in the part of the country I visit with reasonable regularity, so I'll make it a point to check on them every once in a while. I kinda want to know what they plan to do with that cleanroom.

Interested? Want to learn more about the community?

Learn more first
What else you may like…
Videos
Posts
Articles
Blast From The Past: Millett ZoomDot RDS

I dug this thing up purely by accident. It has been a long time since I used it for anything, but I am thinking I should, especially as I work on a magnifier video.

MIllet's ZoomDot was a unique red dot sight that had auto brightness and variable dot size from 1MOA to 10MOA.

Early ones, like mine, were made in the US. Millett had some aspirations of selling these to the US military.

I do not think they got very far, then the company was bought by Bushnell and essentially shut down after a little bit. At some point, the manufacturing for the ZoomDot moved to China and it was not really the same.

00:05:44
Scout Scopes: Burris 2.75x20

Scout scopes are almost like a forgotten art form these days. There is an occasional discussion either on how they are the greatest thing since sliced bread because 1) THE colonel said so 2) if you do not think they are, refer to rule number 1.
Alternatively, the prevailing thought is that they are completely useless and if LPVOs existed in Jeff Cooper's time, there would never be such a thing as scout scopes.
The truth, as is usually the case, resides somewhere in the middle.
Scout scopes do have their place, but they are definitely a niche product. It is, however, an interesting niche.
Scout scope pickings are relatively slim in terms of what's on offer.
Leupold makes a 1.5-4x28 https://alnk.to/gKSibYj
Burris makes a 2-7x32 and 2.75x20
Vortex has a 2-7x32 in the Crossfire line
There are also a few out there from UTG, Aimsports, etc.

I strongly lean toward compact fixed power designs, so Burris 2.75x20 https://alnk.to/cSJCBQx is probably my favourite and is the subject of this ...

00:11:58
Integrix M1 MRAD Reticle in the 3-18x44

Wind was really making things difficult, but at least this gives you a look at the reticle.
It is a respectable design that is conceptually closer to SKMR reticles than to the ones I usually gravitate to. They also have an M2 that is, I think, a little better.
In the grand scheme of things, the M1 did not take me long to get used to and it is not giving me any real issues.
https://alnk.to/9TaI2kH

00:06:33
Father's Day Deals

It looks like all the different retailers have sufficiently recovered from the Memorial Day to swiftly transition into Father's Day.

Telson optics offer a 15% site-wide sale on everything that is stackable with my DLO6 discount code that gets you additional 6% off.
https://www.telsonoptics.com/?coupon_code=dlo6
To date, I have looked at the Toxin 3-18x50 very carefully and like it quite a lot. I have had a little bit of hands on time with the 5-25x56 and 5-32x56 as well, but not enough to form strong opinions. They do seem like nice scopes.

Opticsplanet has 13% off with "TYDAD" coupon plus 2% bonus bucks. https://alnk.to/90B3faG

Primary Arms has a pretty extensive list of discounted items posted already https://alnk.to/2uJ0X2f They usually add something new to it as they build to the actual holiday, so if you are looking for something specific, it sometimes pays to check a couple of times on different days. The first batch of PLxC 1-8x24 FFP scopes with day bright diffractive reticles...

Riflescope Mount recommendations

We have had enough discussions on riflescope mounts that I figured I should have at least a small number of the ones I recommend summarized among the riflescope recommendations.
There is a huge number of mounts out there with many very serviceable ones.
This will be more along the lines of the ones that I actually use, rather than an exhaustive list of the good ones.
https://opticsthoughts.com/?page_id=3282

Still working on the recommendations

The next price category to look at was the under $3k riflescopes.
I faithfully went over everything, considered my options, checked prices and then got completely stuck on trying to figure out whether Burris XTR PS 5.5-30x56 and its HUD integration offer enough to be my top choice here.

After a good amount of soul searching, I still do not know. I have not yet completed my review of the XTR PS, I suppose, but I would like to wrap up with it this month.
https://opticsthoughts.com/?page_id=86

I do know that I like it enough to add it to my recommendations.

A morning with a chronograph

When I tell people that I am using Hornady's factory ammo for matches, I get occasionally surprised looks.  Occasionally.  Most of the time, I get fairly condescending looks from handloaders who would not let a factory round pollute the chambers of their precision rifles if their lives depended on it.

To be fair, if I had the time, I might be reloading as well.  I might be able to do better than modern factory ammo, but the truth is that I am not a quarter MOA shooter, so a lot of that would be lost on me.  The UKD matches I fidn most interesting can be done by a competent shooter with a 1MOA gun.  I am working on that first part.  I reload when I have to, but if I can get factory ammo that's not outrageously expensive and that shoots well, I will go with that every time.

I looked around and realized that I have about 600 rounds of Hornady 147gr 6.5CM factory ammo from two lots.  400 rounds from one that I will use during the match later this month.  The remainder I will likely use up practicing prior to that.

I woke up early and snuck out to the range while my family was still asleep earlier today.

I set up in the 100 yard tunnel we have.  I took my four shots to zero with the lot I plan to use for the match.  Then I fired a six shot ~0.7MOA group.  That's accurate enough for my purposes.

Here are the chronograph results:

It is slow, but accurate and consistent.

Then I shot a five round group of Hornady 147gr ammo from the other lot.

Both of those lots are not too shabby for factory ammo.  POI was within 0.2mrad between the two lots, all laterally.  

 

I had some other ammo on hand, so I fired two five shot groups with Berger 144gr hybrid target ammo and Sako TRG 136gr.

Here is what I got for five rounds of Berger:

That's not a ton of statistics, but it is a data point.  The group was ~1.1MOA

 

Here the data for the Sako TRG 136gr ammo:

This ammo showed some mild pressure signs, but not too significant.  

Again, this is not a ton of data, but Hornady is looking pretty decent here.

I'll repeat the zero retention and consistency tests a couple more times between now and June 18th when we head to Wyoming.

I might pick up a couple more boxes of Hornady 147gr from a different lot to get some more data.

More to come.

 

Read full Article
First PRS Match is behind me
High Noon at Del Norte

My first PRS match is officially behind me.  It was, I think an officially sanctioned regional PRS match at the shooting range called Del Norte about an hour from me (just east of Rio Rancho).
As I discussed previously, rather than using the rifle I originally prepared for it, I ended up having to change gears at the last moment and slapping a 5-25x56 Tangent on my daughter's 6ARC MiniFIx.  A lightweight 16" Proof barreled 6ARC is not an ideal set up for PRS competition, but, in the grand scheme of things, the rifle did hot hold me back at all.  I had a couple of weights that fit the Q-cert handguard, so I slapped them on there as well, which got the rifle to right around 12lbs.  The balance point was almost where I want it, but not quite.  In all other ways, this was a very handy rifle to shoot.  I am actually thinking of getting a couple more weights that I can stack on it (Sawtooth weights are stackable), so that I can shoot some future local matches with it.  It shoots Hornady's Black 105gr ammo very well (it also shoots 108gr ELD-M and 103gr ELD-X well, but I had a larger supply of Hornady Black ammo on hand).

It chrono'ed pretty consistently for factory ammo.  Here are the measurements for a 20 shot group.

If I were to take out the fastest shot, SD drops down to 8fps.  

In terms of wind performance, it is a 5mph rifle, so slightly better than the 308 ammo I was going to use originally, but not as good as the 6.5CM that was my intended match rifle for this year (we make plans, but then life happens).

I do have to admit that I really enjoyed shooting the match with the MiniFix.  So much so, that I am seriously thinking of building another one for myself, since this rifle is technically my daughter's.

The closest shot we had was a bit over a couple of hundred yards.  The furthest was around 1150.  That was a bit challenging for the 16" barreled 6ARC, especially since the terrain there is tricky and wind is doing strange things.  Morning was relatively quiet wind-wise, but then the wind becamse gusty with changing directions.

It was a one day match with about 30 shooters (six squads) and ten stages.  The 17 year old kid who won the match was in my squad with his dad.  Apparently he is on the US team, so it should not be surrpising that he won.  He was very good.

Overall level of the shooters in the match was quite good.  I really was not sure what to expect.  Somewhat paradoxically, the only matches that I have shot in so far are the much larger two day NRL Hunter matches.  In those, I am just out of the bottom third in terms of skill level.  In this match, it was pretty much in the same spot, I think.  

The terrain was a little bit like Cameo, I think (I have been there, but not shot there), with some angle changes and sufficient vegetation to make getting on target occasionally troublesome. 

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
post photo preview
Updates
Getting back on the horse, little by little

My original plan was to do a livestream on Thursday of this week, but I think I'll push it out to next week.  A few days at home is doing wonders for my recovery, but my voice is still not quite there.  I do not think any of you are looking to listen to me cough for two hours straight.

Also, I am going to try to shoot that local PRS match this coming Saturday, so doign a livestream next week after the match is likely to be more productive.  It is my first one, so I fully expect that I will screw it all up.  It should be a good learning experience.  I do not have a dedicated PRS rifle and I am not looking to set one up jsut yet.  If I like it, I'll put something together, but as far as competition goes, my focus is really on UKD matches like NRL Hunter, Competition Dynamics, etc.  My 6.5CM is not back yet, so I'll just shoot it with my 308 FIx.  It is not ideal, but it will do just fine for my purposes.  I am in no danger of winning anything either way and this will stress my ability to read wind.  A secondary purpse here is that I am not 100% certain what rifle I will take on a mule deer hunt with later this year, but it will be either something new to test or this 308.  Now that I think about it, the 308 is going with me regardless either as a primary rifle or as backup.  The rifle shoots, so if I miss, I know it is on me.

For the match, I have Burris XTR PS 5.5-30x56 scope on the 308 Fix.  I think the way they did the heads up display in these is a meaningful improvement over conventional riflescopes.

https://alnk.to/d3EjPHC or https://alnk.to/8iVRlGN

Optically, I think XTR Pro is a little better, but the EO integration in the XTR PS is, I think, in advantage.

In parallel, I am looking at the replacement AAC ammo (they replaced the faulty ammo and I have chrono results on it) and testing the optics of the 40mm scopes in parallel.

 

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
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