TLM asked that I remove the Text from Hunt TXHog's thread where he has his own review on the 3x version of the scope. That thread has excellent information and beautiful pictures to which you may wish to refer...
http://www.lonestarboars.com/threads/another-thermal-weapon-sight-ir-defense-ir-hunter.1472/
My review...not as fancy, but hopefully informative...
I had an IR Hunter 2x, 19mm lens for the weekend. Here is my review. I have edited some of the comments per feedback with Ben (Hunt TXHogs) on his unit.
These are my notes. I realize some of the issues won't be perfectly clear if you haven't seen or held the scope. Sorry. In some cases, you can refer to Ben's pics for issues related to locations of the power switch and battery compartment/cap.
1. Don't need an adapter to use with an ACOG to be functional, though a hood of some sort of hood to join the two would be good. An adapter is supposed to be available, but I did not have one to try.
2. Rubber eye cup is quirky, a bit to unstable in that it can be knocked off the unit fairly easily with a forceful brush by the body. The aperture depression (to open it) assures that the shooter's eye will be fairly far forward which I would anticipate really being an issue with more significantly recoiling rifles. That is a stiff-sleeved eye cup and the cup is pushed into the sleeve to open the aperture, meaning that during recoil the stiff sleeve will push into the eye. So basically, it is a short eye-relief scope with a pressure activated eyecup aperture and a stiff eye cup sleeve. I can see this causing problems. By contrast, the Pulsar Digisight has a longer eye relief and a longer sleeve/eye cup that is more flexible. It does not have the aperture for stealth, but won't be pushed rudely into the eye either.
3. The on/off switch is apt to move if carried in a sling against the chest by a right handed person or carried with the left side of the scope/rifle against the shooter's body. It can be inadvertently switched when the unit/rifle rubs against the shooter's body/gear during normal handling.
4. NINETEEN times so far, I have turned on the scope and it has not come on. It only came on after toggling the switch back and forth will it eventually come on. I am working to figure out the circumstances through which this happens. Mostly, this seems to happen after it has been sitting for a while. Seems to mostly be a problem when the unit has sat for several minutes. Am waiting up to 10 seconds for the screen to start to come on before declaring the startup a failure as either the screen flickers and comes to life when powered on or nothing happens regardless of how long I wait (up to 1 minute tried so far). On the last sequence, it took up 5 attempts before the scope came to life on attempt 5. Changed batteries with the fail-to-boot counter at 19. First few turn-ons with new batteries have not been a problem.
5. Batteries (original set) appear to be draining AWFULLY fast. Went from approximately 3/4 battery power according to the meter to the red "BATTERY CRITICALLY LOW" warning in less than 30 minutes. Am now on Set 2 (first new set for me). Maybe set 2 will work better? It did initially. However, after using the scope at the range and running the battery for a while, I have now had 7 failures to boot up when the switch was turned on. The power meter shows more then 3/4 full and I estimate that the unit has not been running for more than an hour total time on this set of batteries.
6. Changing batteries is a b____ (problem) even with the unit not on a rifle. The spring tension and little screw cap are not terribly user-friendly. Trying to do it with gloves on is a nightmare. It can be done, but it took me multiple tries to get the cap back on...and I can only imagine what it would be like trying to do with freezing fingers in gloves or freezing fingers out of gloves.
Ben noticed on his scope that it was difficult or impossible to change the batteries with the scope mounted, something about a conflict with the mount. On the LaRue mount, it would appear that the lever may be in conflict with the video-out port. That will depend on the cable.
However, Ben was right. When mounted, the position of the battery compartment cap and the switch above it along with the scope body and barrel/mount rail is such that there are just barely two opposing cap surfaces to grasp in order to twist off the cap. So you can get fingers on opposite sides, but you can't turn the cap because travel is blocked by the switch, scope body, and barrel/rail. Combined with the heavy spring tension and the whole battery change becomes a nightmare in the field in the dark, especially if it is cold.
continued....
http://www.lonestarboars.com/threads/another-thermal-weapon-sight-ir-defense-ir-hunter.1472/
My review...not as fancy, but hopefully informative...
I had an IR Hunter 2x, 19mm lens for the weekend. Here is my review. I have edited some of the comments per feedback with Ben (Hunt TXHogs) on his unit.
These are my notes. I realize some of the issues won't be perfectly clear if you haven't seen or held the scope. Sorry. In some cases, you can refer to Ben's pics for issues related to locations of the power switch and battery compartment/cap.
1. Don't need an adapter to use with an ACOG to be functional, though a hood of some sort of hood to join the two would be good. An adapter is supposed to be available, but I did not have one to try.
2. Rubber eye cup is quirky, a bit to unstable in that it can be knocked off the unit fairly easily with a forceful brush by the body. The aperture depression (to open it) assures that the shooter's eye will be fairly far forward which I would anticipate really being an issue with more significantly recoiling rifles. That is a stiff-sleeved eye cup and the cup is pushed into the sleeve to open the aperture, meaning that during recoil the stiff sleeve will push into the eye. So basically, it is a short eye-relief scope with a pressure activated eyecup aperture and a stiff eye cup sleeve. I can see this causing problems. By contrast, the Pulsar Digisight has a longer eye relief and a longer sleeve/eye cup that is more flexible. It does not have the aperture for stealth, but won't be pushed rudely into the eye either.
3. The on/off switch is apt to move if carried in a sling against the chest by a right handed person or carried with the left side of the scope/rifle against the shooter's body. It can be inadvertently switched when the unit/rifle rubs against the shooter's body/gear during normal handling.
4. NINETEEN times so far, I have turned on the scope and it has not come on. It only came on after toggling the switch back and forth will it eventually come on. I am working to figure out the circumstances through which this happens. Mostly, this seems to happen after it has been sitting for a while. Seems to mostly be a problem when the unit has sat for several minutes. Am waiting up to 10 seconds for the screen to start to come on before declaring the startup a failure as either the screen flickers and comes to life when powered on or nothing happens regardless of how long I wait (up to 1 minute tried so far). On the last sequence, it took up 5 attempts before the scope came to life on attempt 5. Changed batteries with the fail-to-boot counter at 19. First few turn-ons with new batteries have not been a problem.
5. Batteries (original set) appear to be draining AWFULLY fast. Went from approximately 3/4 battery power according to the meter to the red "BATTERY CRITICALLY LOW" warning in less than 30 minutes. Am now on Set 2 (first new set for me). Maybe set 2 will work better? It did initially. However, after using the scope at the range and running the battery for a while, I have now had 7 failures to boot up when the switch was turned on. The power meter shows more then 3/4 full and I estimate that the unit has not been running for more than an hour total time on this set of batteries.
6. Changing batteries is a b____ (problem) even with the unit not on a rifle. The spring tension and little screw cap are not terribly user-friendly. Trying to do it with gloves on is a nightmare. It can be done, but it took me multiple tries to get the cap back on...and I can only imagine what it would be like trying to do with freezing fingers in gloves or freezing fingers out of gloves.
Ben noticed on his scope that it was difficult or impossible to change the batteries with the scope mounted, something about a conflict with the mount. On the LaRue mount, it would appear that the lever may be in conflict with the video-out port. That will depend on the cable.
However, Ben was right. When mounted, the position of the battery compartment cap and the switch above it along with the scope body and barrel/mount rail is such that there are just barely two opposing cap surfaces to grasp in order to twist off the cap. So you can get fingers on opposite sides, but you can't turn the cap because travel is blocked by the switch, scope body, and barrel/rail. Combined with the heavy spring tension and the whole battery change becomes a nightmare in the field in the dark, especially if it is cold.
continued....
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