New ATN 336 owner-few questions

[Avetjx]

Good evening,

I bought an atn 336 3x recently and have taken it to sight it in at the range and out to the hunting lease a few times for some night time fun. Saw two does and a buck the first night out, unfortunately no hogs. I have a few questions for those in the know.

1. When sighting it in, cannot get it to save reticle adjustment to a profile spot. I followed directions in manual and sent/received email from ATN and still cannot get it to work. Get all the way to the part when I click the arrow to save the setting to a profile icon, press "enter" and it still won't save. Can someone post the button sequence they use??
2. In regards to using different color patterns, I generally scan in black hot until I see movement and follow the game with white hot. Is anyone getting any use out of any of the other color palettes?
3. how do you deal with ranging to target in the field or woods
4. Any other suggestions for a new thermal user?

Thanks in advance for your replies

 

[Brian Shaffer]

I use an Armasight so can't help you with #1.

2. For open terrain, I like to use black hot for hunting (as do a couple of others here), but for scanning purposes, I actually like white hot better. Do what you like best is the best advice I have. You may find that your set of colors works best for you. I like just the opposite. There isn't a right answer.

With that said, I think most of the other color palates are a joke with the possible exception of Sepia which I don't know if you have on the ATN or not. A couple of the color palates may be as functional as white hot or black hot, but are so weird as to be distracting. Several of the palates are just too bizarre or too subtle to be all that useful for hunting.

3. ATN, Armasight, and a couple of other brands do not have ranging reticles. For most people, they will find a zero that will work for them out to about 200-250 yards. For example, on my scope and with the ammo I shoot beyond about 50 or 60 yards, the reticle dot will be the point of impact out to 235 yards (if I don't have the scope zoomed). You can do the same sort of setup with most centerfire hunting calibers and certainly be close to the reticle at distance. Inside 50-60 yards, the impact will be below the reticle, but no more than about 2" low at the muzzle and about 1" low at 35 yards.

The bottom line here is that you can find a good zero and it will be a functional zero out to 200 yards or more just like may hunters do with daylight scopes and 200 yards (or about 235 for me) is more than enough for most of your hunting.

Are you planning on long range night hunting beyond 250 yards?

4. Deer with their heads down in tall grass can look a lot like hogs. Calves can sometimes look like hogs. It can be very difficult to tell the difference between a coyote and your neighbor's dog through thermal. It can be difficult to tell the difference between a hog that is quartered away from you versus one that is quartered toward you. This can be very important in regard to your shot placement. With time and practice, you will learn to be able to recognize animals based on their behavior combined with the shapes that you see. Remember, that the shapes you see are very two dimensional (flat) and so visual identification from odd angles can be tricky. Don't get in a hurry to shoot a critter until you are certain that it is a valid target.

 

[TEXASLAWMAN]

I do not have very much time behind the ATN scopes so I can not help you with the zeroing in problem.

For the color pallets I prefer black hot to shoot and scan with. Only use I have found for the wild color pallets is for show and maybe to find a slight difference in a heat signature. But 99.9% of the time I use black hot.

Ranging I usually know the places I am hunting and have ranged the different fence lines land marks ect. Other than that it is just time behind the unit the more you use it the easier it becomes.

 

[Avetjx]

Brian, thanks for the thoughtful replies.

Are you planning on long range night hunting beyond 250 yards?
Not even close. I hunt in very dense forest/scrub/planted pine in NE Fl. 60 yards is a super long shot where I am.


4. Deer with their heads down in tall grass can look a lot like hogs.
Funny that you mention this as I discovered this the first night out. Was scanning out of my ground blind and was positive that I was looking at a hog. A minute later, the doe's head pops up. As in other places, it's a big no-no to shoot deer at night in Florida.

 

[Brian Shaffer]

If you are shooting inside 100 yards, then ranging really should not be a problem (assuming you aren't on a crossbow, LOL).

I spend a goodly amount of time "looking for necks" on those dubious hogs.

Here is sort of what I was talking about on quartering toward or away. This is a severe case, but is the hog facing toward you or away from you?

Turns out, he was facing away.

 

[Brian Shaffer]

Got a call about my post and I wasn't quite clear.

For example, on my scope and with the ammo I shoot beyond about 50 or 60 yards, the reticle dot will be the point of impact out to 235 yards (if I don't have the scope zoomed). You can do the same sort of setup with most centerfire hunting calibers and certainly be close to the reticle at distance. Inside 50-60 yards, the impact will be below the reticle, but no more than about 2" low at the muzzle and about 1" low at 35 yards.

What I meant to say is that the size of the reticle in the Zeus is such that it pretty well covers the POI from 50-60 yards out to over 200 yards when I have not used digital zoom.

The bold faced comment made it sound like that there may be reticle shift when zooming (a problem noted for some models, especially early production models in multiple brands). Zooming does not affect the zero at all, but when you digitally zoom the image, the reticle remains the same viewing size though the down range image has doubled in magnification. For example, say you were sighting in on a chem hand warmer for your target and noticed that with no digital magnification that that the reticle covered the handwarmer exactly. If you zoomed to 2x with the digital zoom, the handwarmer would become double its previous size in the ocular, but the reticle is unchanged in size. So instead of covering the whole handwarmer, with 2x zoom, it will now just cover 1/2 of the handwarmer. If you go to 4x digital zoom, the handwarmer will double in size again and the reticle will cover just 1/4 of it.

I zero'd with no digital magnification as that is how I normally shoot.

So, because I zero'd without any digital magnification, if I use the digital zoom, a shot that would be under the reticle dot under no magnification may be outside of the dot when zoomed because the reticle is covering much less area of the target. Make sense?

It might be a better idea to zero under digital magnification to get a more refined zero. In fact, I will probably be going back and doing just that.