Precision Rifle Gear New Athlon Rangecraft Chronograph-Garmin Xero Killer?
- Thread starter Steel+Killer
- Start date
They haven’t shipped yet so nobody knows how they perform.
You heard wrong. The first batch made it in before the tariff increase and will be shipping from dealers in the next couple weeks according to Euro Optic.
Sure, but 145% tarrifs make it practically an Unicorn you can't buy any after initial batch , at least till they rebrand it to made in Philippines or Vietnam
Or maybe it fits into new exemptions on most electronics with just 20% tariff
I will have one to test tomorrow or Thursday. I'll report back once I've been able to use it a bit. I am hoping I am able to at least let everyone waiting know that the chrono is worth waiting for.
I believe only a few have been brought in to allow for content creation/reviews before the bulk of them arrive.
I believe only a few have been brought in to allow for content creation/reviews before the bulk of them arrive.
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Waiting on my pre order, anxious to see how this thing works. Used a friends Garmin at the range and loved it but for the price difference if this is close I’ll be happy. Magnetospeed has worked fine but I’m ready to update!
I’m curious to see if the speeds are close/same as the Garmin. Also if the athlon picks up other peoples bullets when shooting next to them. Look forward to your info!
We tested them side by side today and even added a second Garmin to the mix. Some quick hits…
-Both performed very well/similarly
-Garmin units were within 1 fps of each other over about 20 rounds. (I’ve always wondered how much disparity the was between units and apparently it’s not much)
-The Athlon unit registered shots more quickly than the Garmin. Picked up 18/20 shots fired pretty quickly from an AR vs the Garmin’s 15/20
-Both units require you to be approximately 24” away before they start to register shots. ***Interesting side note, the Garmin knew when we took shots from farther away as it mush have a sound trigger component to it. After 3 shots that were too far it popped up a message telling us to move it closer to the muzzle***
-The Athlon read about 8-10fps slower than the Garmin units across many different velocity ranges. From bows around 300fps to handguns at 1150, up to a 22 creedmoor at 3100fps. This consistent 100rds makes me wonder if it isn’t a simple calibration issue that could be solved with firmware?
More testing and video to come.
-Both performed very well/similarly
-Garmin units were within 1 fps of each other over about 20 rounds. (I’ve always wondered how much disparity the was between units and apparently it’s not much)
-The Athlon unit registered shots more quickly than the Garmin. Picked up 18/20 shots fired pretty quickly from an AR vs the Garmin’s 15/20
-Both units require you to be approximately 24” away before they start to register shots. ***Interesting side note, the Garmin knew when we took shots from farther away as it mush have a sound trigger component to it. After 3 shots that were too far it popped up a message telling us to move it closer to the muzzle***
-The Athlon read about 8-10fps slower than the Garmin units across many different velocity ranges. From bows around 300fps to handguns at 1150, up to a 22 creedmoor at 3100fps. This consistent 100rds makes me wonder if it isn’t a simple calibration issue that could be solved with firmware?
More testing and video to come.
For crying out loud!
Any self - respecting shooter knows it’s spelled “muscle,” as in “muscle break!”
If a magneto speed and garmin show similar velocities and the rangecraft is proven to be inaccurate I hope they can recalibrate them through a firmware fix if not they are really going to be stepping on their own dicks right out the gate.
But not everyone is as rich as you and able to pay $1000 for some "made by the USA company" RDS that uses 10 year old technology.
The rest of us know the moment anything happens to not being able to get optics from other countries those "virtuous corporations" you and others love so much will do exactly what they did in the past. Totally screw over citizens buying market and try to force us to beg them to sell us some way outdated overpriced junk that they had left over from other contracts, or pay insane prices for anything new. (Or simply say we don't think you should get anything new).
I remember the NV and thermal markets and even the rangefinder markets before the Chinese got involved and how those "wonderful corporations" that your type love so much treated us and how much they despised the citizens.
Competition was the best thing that ever happened for the 2A loving citizens in this country.
You confuse new gimmicks with better and more useful.
That's OK.
1000 bucks for an American-made RDS, you say? Hard to take you seriously when you don't even know what these things actually cost.
And GBPSE.
I have a pretty good idea I think of what the public facing prices directly from the manufacturers is and has been:
And let's stick with how much the average citizen taxpayer would be charged buying it directly from them, not with how much of a discount a "special person" would get from them.
Last Trijicon I bought back before competition came strongly on the market, cost me almost $700 at the time, back when money was worth more.
Sure you can hunt around and find a deal on something (perhaps) but then so could you on the foreign competition.
If you paid $700 for an RMR your an idiot. You don’t pay full MSRP unless for anything unless you’re an fool and that’s what you people who compare Holosun to Trijicon pricing always do. Trijicon doesn’t even have MAP anymore so the pricing is very competitive amongst most dealers who actually want to move product. I usually pay around $425-$450 for new adjustable RMR’s. My RCR’s cost $550. Five years ago RM06’s were under $400 new. That’s a far cry from $700.
Price aside the Trijicon shit is way better and I own both Trijicon and Holosun.
No, it does not. Its an always on Doppler system and there is absolutely no microphone in the Garmin.
So assuming your statement is correct and you are getting about 50% off of the public facing list MSRP price with Trijicon, then how much do you think the other competition such as Holoson is by the the time you get all the best discounts you can. probably 30% to 40% off their public facing pricing as well.
The reason you can get discounts on stuff like Trijicon these days is because they and their dealers have stiff competition from other brands.
You artificially take that away and you'll see the return of things like minimum selling prices and punishing dealers who give discounts and such like we used to see with certian optics (like PH).
MOST of the people buying RDS or similar optics for their pistols or ARs or shotguns or whatever are never going to be putting anything to "extreme use" except in their dreams. Those that do, probably also have some that they actually care about for "extreme use" and "ultimate reliability" and others that well if it has to go back for warranty service, no big deal.
When I'm buying a $300 .22 target pistol for fun at the range, I'm sure not interested in finding "a great deal" on an RDS at $450 for it, I'm looking to find a good deal on something that works at a low price, I'm looking to find a $400 Factory priced Holosun for like $200
I also own both Trijicon, and Holosun like you. Along with Leupold, Vortex, Aimpoint, in the RDS market and have also owned the ancient Insight brand and cheaper stuff such as Ameriglow and such over the past years.
Same things with scopes, S&B used to be what I bought then they decided to jack the prices "because they can" and so I went to other brands as well, Vortex used to be my go to brand for anything not S&B/ZCO/March level (still don't have a TT yet), but they started hiking their prices hugely so stuff from PA or Athlon started filling the gap for all the low end stuff where things didn't make sense.
My point is NOT that Holosun or others are "the same as" or "better than" Trijicon or whatever folks think is the greatest or whatever.
My point rather is that the stiff and increasing competition over the past 7 or 8 years has helped us all by driving innovation and putting a cap on how much can be charged before people swap to the competition.
Innovation and responding to market demands has been the biggest outcome regardless of what you buy and has helped us all have more and better stuff.
Spoke to an Athlon Software or Electrical Engineer at the NRA show last weekend and he didn't seem interested in finding a way to restart existing strings. So I'm not interested in it at all. I told him if they add that feature I'd easily get rid of my Garmin for it.
Nobody cares about what Trijicon's MSRP is. Quit showing your ignorance by constantly bringing up some irrelevant number.
I (and anyone else) can buy SROs all day for $500 to $550 and RMRs for $100 less.
Or you can buy a Steiner MPS for about the same price as an RMR. Pretty sure those are US made as well either in Greeley or at Steiner Electro Optics in Miamisburg Ohio.
I bought my first Trijicon reflex sight (RMR) in 2020 for about $450 from Euro Optic. Your failure to shop wisely is no one's fault but yours.
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LOL I’m not reading your novel dude. I made it through your first paragraph of rambling and you’re not getting 30-40% off of Holosun shit, there’s not that much markup in it. Dealers will do 10-15% off at the most and many won’t do any discount. Regardless you’re still comparing MAP to MSRP because you don’t understand how shit works.
Companies play all kinds of games with what they call things.
The suggested price the factory / manufacturer / brand publicly lists
The minimum price they let their dealers advertise it for publicly
The minimum price they let their dealers sell it for to anyone
The minimum price they will sell it to for "special groups"
The "open box", "demo", "returns", "overstock" game
The special sales and discount coupon game
Many resellers under some MAP scheme are always happy to show what they are listing it for MAP as compared to how much you are saving with them over MSRP.
Yeah, I understand there is nothing scientific about that, and lets even throw in (insert another type chrono here) are all reading close to the same velocity and this new Rangecraft is consistently reading way lower, I think most people are going to go with the group that is reading the same and consider the Rangecraft the one not correct.
They had the chance to differentiate from Garmin by adding a SD Card to easily move data to a PC ... and like Garmin, they missed that one. I'm starting to wonder ... am I the only guy that feels like a SD Card is missing from all the latest offerings? It's frankly, what I liked the most about my now gone Labradar.
Sadly removable media has gone the way of removable batteries. In some ways that's good, in others bad.
We've been using chronographs for 40 years+, and even companies like Garmin etc. and their product research can't identify and implement simple features that end users want. Like being able to restart a shooting string, or save shooting strings to cartridge and rifle profiles etc. Hardware has improved leaps and bounds, but the end user interface software is still by far the biggest weakness.
Kludgy data export is another thing Garmin has struggled with for 30+ years. Garmin has probably gotten too used to leveraging/having huge software/website interfaces by third parties that their devices connect/download to for end users to record/view/store their data.
The Garmin works great as a chronograph showing speeds and such, but it's handling of data and collating and tracking that data leaves much to be desired, it seems to be that way for most of the chrono products.
We've been using chronographs for 40 years+, and even companies like Garmin etc. and their product research can't identify and implement simple features that end users want. Like being able to restart a shooting string, or save shooting strings to cartridge and rifle profiles etc. Hardware has improved leaps and bounds, but the end user interface software is still by far the biggest weakness.
Kludgy data export is another thing Garmin has struggled with for 30+ years. Garmin has probably gotten too used to leveraging/having huge software/website interfaces by third parties that their devices connect/download to for end users to record/view/store their data.
The Garmin works great as a chronograph showing speeds and such, but it's handling of data and collating and tracking that data leaves much to be desired, it seems to be that way for most of the chrono products.
Great assessment. There are times when I look at a user interface and say to myself ... "What moron thought 'that' was a good idea?".
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