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Vortex Razor HD Gen III 6-36x56

Universally it sounds like, as far as the glass being an upgrade, they nailed it. The other stuff, maybe not so much...

I'm in the camp who use a Razor HDG2 because you can beat the crap out of them, like lots of people do and have been for years now, and there are lots and lots of them out there. No surprises. The Gen 2 is sort of like the Glock 17/Spyderco Para 2 of scopes, not fancy, gets it done.

I have the money and want the better glass, but I don't want to have to trade the durability and bomb-proofness I'm used to with the Gen 2.

Reminds me, years and years ago I was an early adopter of the Glock Gen4's and they were a shit-show when they first came on the scene. It happens.
 
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Vortex must be too focused on their Billion Dollar Army contract to worry about the quality of their commercial products.

3-5 years ago,. this would have NEVER happened. I still can't understand how a new scope has worse turrets then your previous generation that is almost 10 year old tech.
 
Vortex must be too focused on their Billion Dollar Army contract to worry about the quality of their commercial products.

3-5 years ago,. this would have NEVER happened. I still can't understand how a new scope has worse turrets then your previous generation that is almost 10 year old tech.
Best part they don't make jack. LOW makes the scope in Japan. Yup my Gen 2 was a better unit.
 
Just got a g3 6-36 yesterday. It came with the basic Vortex scope caps.
Those are just shipping covers for the objective and ocular lenses.

See below, apparently they are now shipping with flip caps.
 
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No worries man. The first 6-36 I got didn't have caps either. Thats why I already had MKM caps for the one that just came in. So these are now just gonna sit in a box.
Hence why I don’t play the lotto… ☹️
 
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I just got my 6-36 in today, and it came with both the Defender caps and the standard crappy cover ones. The clicks feel good, but the turrets don't really lock that well. Going to give them a call in the morning to see if I can send it in.
 
Note on the Defender caps, you can push them all the way flat.

When you open them, they usually are somewhat angled open at a 45 degree angle, a slight nudge downward and they will lay flat.

Anyone have advice on making them pop open less easily?
 
Interesting, Vortex has worked hard at improving supply on release, but just like the Gen II 4.5-27 before it, the Gen III has a wait time. I guess that is indicative of the popularity
 
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Mine was June 6th. Kicking myself for not ordering a few weeks earlier. Just didn't think it would be 3 or 4 months. Thanks for the replies.
Consider yourself lucky. I ordered mine through Vortex in January and it was supposed to be delivered in June and I got with them a couple weeks ago and they have no idea on time frame for delivery so just going to wait.
 
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Consider yourself lucky. I ordered mine through Vortex in January and it was supposed to be delivered in June and I got with them a couple weeks ago and they have no idea on time frame for delivery so just going to wait.
THATS CRAZY I called Vortex before I ordered and they said 7-8 months. Crazy they didn't have enough for the supply to keep the hype going and keep reviews and new videos on YouTube. I'm going to assume u ordered from vortex for a discount just incase you didn't know euro optic honors that discount to.
 
It's ordered so just going to wait. Hopefully it will fall into the ordering line somewhere soon.
 
Damn I feel lucky, 11 weeks from order till it was in my hand. Giant shout out to @LibertyOptics, Scott you rock!

Also came with defender caps as others have noted. Turrets feel fine expect no real locking detent, they just push down with a hydraulic feel, no click. I have shot 1 NRLX and 1 LRBRS match, verdict is I still suck and the scope isn’t holding me back.
 
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I received one of the earlier releases without defender caps. I wonder if Vortex would ship me out some.
 
If it's vortex and not a distributor just sending them with the scope I bet they would. There customer service is great.
 
That is one fugly reticle. Vortex is wayyy too heavy and the quality is not there. The only Razor worse than this is the 1-10x Fisheye special. Add that to “in bed with Chyna” and yea it’s gonna be a “No” from me bro.

You got something against scopes made in Japan?

Everybody's low end scopes are made in China, if you see something that has an MSRP of like under $600 it's made in china (or possibly the Philippines).

You might notice very few high end scopes are actually made in the USA.
Or is like Germany and Austria fine but no Japan?
 
That is one fugly reticle. Vortex is wayyy too heavy and the quality is not there. The only Razor worse than this is the 1-10x Fisheye special. Add that to “in bed with Chyna” and yea it’s gonna be a “No” from me bro.
This thread is now complete with this info. Thanks for what you have added to the conversation.
 
You got something against scopes made in Japan?

Everybody's low end scopes are made in China, if you see something that has an MSRP of like under $600 it's made in china (or possibly the Philippines).

You might notice very few high end scopes are actually made in the USA.
Or is like Germany and Austria fine but no Japan?
He's just trolling, clearly has an issue with Vortex so doubtful you'll be able to have a reasonable conversation.
 
I don't understand the connection with Chyna. And I'll be calling Vortex on Tuesday because my 1-10x doesn't have the "fisheye" feature. So frustrated.

Chyna_Full.png
 
I had asked them if they were getting any in soon, and they said there was a small batch coming in August. I must have just missed the cut.
Same here when I ordered at the 1st of June. Last I heard they are just trickling in a little at a time now. If you don't mind shoot me a PM when you get yours. I have some comps coming up.
 
Universally it sounds like, as far as the glass being an upgrade, they nailed it. The other stuff, maybe not so much...

I'm in the camp who use a Razor HDG2 because you can beat the crap out of them, like lots of people do and have been for years now, and there are lots and lots of them out there. No surprises. The Gen 2 is sort of like the Glock 17/Spyderco Para 2 of scopes, not fancy, gets it done.

I have the money and want the better glass, but I don't want to have to trade the durability and bomb-proofness I'm used to with the Gen 2.

Reminds me, years and years ago I was an early adopter of the Glock Gen4's and they were a shit-show when they first came on the scene. It happens.
I don't have a Gen 2 but looking through my Gen 3, I feel the clarity is about the same compared to the Mark 5HD 5-25. I admit I am new to high end scopes. But looking side by side between those 2 and a NF ATACR 7-35, I am having a hard time distinguishing the glass quality. The Mark 5HD does have a bigger eye box though. Am I missing something?
 
I don't have a Gen 2 but looking through my Gen 3, I feel the clarity is about the same compared to the Mark 5HD 5-25. I admit I am new to high end scopes. But looking side by side between those 2 and a NF ATACR 7-35, I am having a hard time distinguishing the glass quality. The Mark 5HD does have a bigger eye box though. Am I missing something?

IDK, IMO the Gen3's glass looks better than the Gen2, but how much better or what pops out is hard to quantify since we all have different eyes.

For me, the last time I looked through a Gen3 was a couple of weeks back when a guy at my club had one on the line and he let me get behind it for a minute... after I had just spent nearly an hour (~50rds) behind my Gen2, so same conditions same lighting, dude's rig is similar enough to mine, and right away it was like "damn, wow, it's nicer". I shoot at ~18x so I put his on ~18x and it just looked better all around, "more clear", "more detail".

If I didn't already have and trust my rig the way it is with the Gen2 and was buying new I would definitely go with a Gen3, but there's not enough of a difference for me to switch right now. I can suck just fine with the old glass for now lol.
 
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FWIW, I've been running mine for about a month now. While I've never really been a fan of Vortex optics, having had a few and ditched them, this 6-36x is a winner. The glass doesn't seem to be much of an improvement over the Gen II from what my old eyes can tell, but the turrets are outstanding.

Just my unsolicited $0.02
 
Idk I guess everyone's eyes are different but I ran 2 Gen2's for yearsss and have been running a Gen3 since it was released with another on the way.

Gen3 has much clearer, crisper glass over the Gen2, better low light clarity. Not even a comparison for my eyes. Definitely a step up in glass....not a single complaint on the purchase and will add a 3rd here shortly to standardize.
 
I've been running two of these all summer.

Turrets
My primary scope, has been pretty darn good. The turrets are great, not TT or ZCO good but good. There is a definite and audible locking detent. I'm not sure where the lack of quality. comments come from, the one on my primary rifle has taken a beating and just keeps going.

The second one is on my back up rifle. Turrets aren't quite as good as my primary but still not bad. The locking detent isn't as noticeable or audible but it's there.

Both turrets are infinitely better than Leupolds MK5. Not to mention they are 10 mils per rev instead of 10.5, the windage isn't capped, the windage "zero" line location makes sense, they lock and did I mention the windage isn't capped.

Zeroing and zero stop
The zeroing procedure is the best out there, other than the Tangent's. Anything short of a toolless zero, won't live up to Tanget. The G3 is pretty damn easy.

The zero stop is set when you set the zero. It doesn't get much easier than that.



Glass and reticle
The reticle is a little busier than I'd like but I use tree reticles less and less every year. F.o.V is great. Depth of field, clarity, contrast are all great. Not quite ZCO level but I'd say close enough not to notice 95% of the time.

Parallax knob on both is a touch stiff and the parallax isn't quite as forgiving as a ZCO or TT. I found that I don't need to adjust it very often over the course of a match.

Magnification ring is butter smooth.

Overall Value and Comparison
After having owned several ZCOs, TTs, MK5s and ATACRs I'd say the Vortex stacks up pretty favorably. Is it as good as a ZCO or TT, no. But a ZCO isn't $1000 better and the TT isn't $2000 better, especially for the PRS type games. I do feel it's noticeably better than a Mk5 is several areas, other than weight. I'd say it's on par with the 7-35x ATACRs in terms of glass.

TLDR
These are pretty damn good scopes.
 
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So I called Eurooptics today to see if they had a clue on lead times as I wanted to backorder one before my cert expired. The guy I talked to said they had no idea when it would ship.
 
So I called Eurooptics today to see if they had a clue on lead times as I wanted to backorder one before my cert expired. The guy I talked to said they had no idea when it would ship.
I waited for 4 months and finally got my cert back last week and bought one off of the forum.