Night Vision Focal plane choice for a clip on

[Prebanpaul]

So I am thinking about buying a clip-on Thermal scope.

My question is this. Most people are saying to run the day scopes from 2-6 power.

I usually will only run an FFP scope. However, even at 6x most have then reticles.

My question is, Would it be better to run a second focal plane scope in low power to get a bigger reticle (picture)

 

[wigwamitus]

I have 5 scopes on my 5 rifles, two are SFP and three are FFP. They all work for me.

T3 reticle in L&S Mk6 3-18x behind UTC-x on 3 power. Click on the pic to make it larger.

So, even in the crappy thru lens pic, you can see the cross hairs fine and with mk1eb I can see the 1 mil hold lines fine. Can I see the .2 mil hold lines ? No.

The way I usually operate is with the scope on lowest power for scanning, then if I see a target and there is time, I dial up the magnification to maybe 6x. Don't want to dial up too much and loose FOV for other targets that might be out there. That said, the vast majority of shots have been on lowest power and inside 300yds where the critter is the reticle and I'm just aiming with the crosshairs. Holding up a little if necessary, using the critter as the reticle. Like at 300yds holding up on the top of the back of a yote with 308. I memorize my DOPE at 50yd increments from 250 to 500yds and use radius or raptar range finders.

==
Scopes I use with thermal clipons

NF 7-35x T3 (FFP)
NF 4-16x T3 (FFP)
L&S mk6 3-18x T3 (FFP)

NF 2.5-10x MIL-R (SFP)
Zeiss 4-16x MOA (SFP)

They all work fine for me.

==
The reason I got the SFP scopes was weight, not reticle.
NF 2.5-10x is 20.5 oz
Zeiss 4-16x is 21.5 oz
The lightest FFP I have is the Mk6 at 23.6 oz ... the ATACRs are a good bit heavier.
So weight savings and forcing myself to dial for longer distances, so I don't loose the skill, are the reasons I got the SFP scopes. But the market for SFP scopes with zero stop (which I require) and parallax (less necessary, but still useful for groups at 100yds) and illumination (good idea to have) squeezes the SFP market down quite a bit. But the NF and Zeiss I have, have all those features.

 

[deersniper]

The ffp NF 1-8s have a easy to see reticle. I imagine the vortex 1-10 will be similar.

What clip on are you looking at and what are your uses?

 

[Prebanpaul]

I am looking at Pulsar FXQ50 , I can get one for a pretty reasonable price. I already have a pulsar xp50. Like wig, I will not be taking shots over 300 yards. I don't know if I really need it. I just figured if I ever did it would be handy and I do have open fields where i can see stuff at 1k or further.

 

[wigwamitus]

In theory, I'm now capable of yote shots out to 500yds. But opportunities are few and far between. Partly because of exactly what I'm doing. I'm overwatching my calving cows and we already have 16 calves out there running around. And they are not so different in size from the yotes and they "bounce run" like the yotes do sometimes also. And at 300-500yds out ... I have to be 10x careful I don't shoot a calf. That would be $1k to $1.5k down the drain. Now if a yote was sitting out there howling with its snout up in the air, then I could PID and take the shot. But if it ran away when I shot its partner and then turns around to look ... there might be calves out that far as well near their bedded down moms ... and then I'm still mostly in a "no shoot" scenario.


==
If you're an FFP guy, then get an FFP. If that FFP just happens to have a nice, tiny red dot in the middle when the illum is on ... then that's a big plus.
I've never used illum with thermal in the field. But there are times when the day scope reticle (being black) and the background (having lots of black in it) might make the reticle hard to see. I can invert the thermal, but that takes greater than zero nanoseconds. If I had the Illum already on, then I wouldn't need to spend the greater than zero nanoseconds to invert.
So, I require myself to get illum.
So far, I'm using the illum to help zero lasers and range finders though ... using a 14 behind the day scope with the day scope illum on min power and aligning say a radius aiming laser at a target out 400+ yds away. The illum is useful for that!

 

[deersniper]

Illum can be nice for quicker shots in my experience. But it isn’t necessary if the reticle has decent size bars at 3 and 6

 

[wigwamitus]

... I am looking at Pulsar FXQ50 ...

Beaware that most thermal clipons will bottom out on FOV before you get down to 1x on your day scope. Yes you can keep dialing down, but you will see the outer edges of the TV screen/display and once you see those, dialing down further just makes the box smaller, you don't see more terrain in the image.

Like the UTC-x is 6 degrees FOV, so between 3.5x and 4x you see the edges of the TV screen. Above 4x and the edges are gone and dialing more magnification drops more FOV. Dialing down from 3.5x and you are already seeing all the edges and the box just gets smaller. So, with the UTC-x 4x is about the minimum magnification. Other clipons will have lower minimums. So just be aware of this aspect. Just because you put a 1-8x scope on your rifle, doesn't mean you'll get benefit from the 1x with a given thermal clipon.

 

[deersniper]

LWTS is a awesome optic with wide Fov. I highly recommend them. There’s one in the for sake section for $7500

There’s a Utc too which would support higher magnification but with narrower fov.

I like the LWTS controls betwr.
So LWTS for shorter range multiple targets.
Utc for longer range.

Might be blowing your budget to heck tho

 

[DownRangeThermal]

I personally like sfp for the short range clip ons (lwts cratos pulsar etc) that will keep your day scope down around 3 to 6x. Most small frame supersonic ar calibers( 556 6.8 etc) with a 50 yd zero will be back on close to 200. ...so pretty much no dialing or holding required to 200 yds which is pretty far for most hunting scenarios at night. I'm really liking the steiner 1-8x24 DMR as a clip on host. True mils at 8x and easy multiplier at 4x.

Roughly 2x through a Cratos thermal


*edit to add....for all of the longer range stuff lwts-lr utc pvs30/24 I definitely prefer ffp.

 

[Forrest84]

After running a PVS 30 for a couple years I’ve come to the conclusion that for me it’s all about having a short FFP optic with a reticle I’m comfortable being able to do all holds and no dialing so that I can do whatever I need to do without trying to jack with the turrets.

 

[Markhammett]

Second focal for me