I just purchased a new varmint rifle and topped it with a Nikon Monarch 6.5-20X44 scope. I was sighting it on the sky to get the reticle focused, and then sighted in a tree about 50 yards away. On the lower magnifications of 6.5X through about 12X the tree was clear and sharp, but any magnification higher than that would case the image to blur. I don' t have much experience with high mag scopes, but I do know that a 3-9X scope will be blurry out to about 25 yards at 9X.

My question is, is blurring to 50+ yards normal for high mag scopes or is there something wrong with mine? I wasn' t about to view anything at a longer distance to see if the image cleared up, but I' m a little worried my $400 scope is messed up.

Thanks,

Mike

I have to ask is it a A.O. scope and are you adjusting it for the different yardages . I have also noticed that the nikon scope I have is not as clear on high power as it is on low . but its a 3X9X40 and not an A.O. scope .

Halcon is right on.....but maybe you don' t know what " AO" is
It' s adjustable Objective which means there' s a ring on the foreward end of the scope to adjust for distance.

Halcon,

Oops, forgot the A.O. part. Its full description is 6.5-20X44 A.O. I did adjust the objective as well, but it didn' t seem to help. I think that I' m not focusing the eyepiece correctly. The reticle looks pretty clear to me, but it' s not supersharp right away. All of my walls are patterned so I can' t focus it against a wall in my house because my eye instantly changes focus to the background. I tryed to sight it on the sky out the window, but the window and screen was a problem. Unfortunately I live in town and can' t just take the rifle outside for fear that the neighbors who don' t really know me might think I was a terrorist trying to shoot down a plane or something (I live about 5 miles from the airport and the traffic pattern takes jets within a couple miles of my house.)

I know that I should sight the scope on a bright but plain background and then look through the scope quickly to see if the reticle is sharp. The problem is that my eye adjusts so fast that I can' t tell when it' s just right. Maybe one of you guys can suggest a better way to get it focused in. Other than (likely my) being unable to focus it right, the Nikon is an awesome scope. At low mag everything is camera quality (it is Nikon after all). It' s just that the high mag is messed up, but what good is a target scope with a poor high mag image quality?

Mike

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not an expert,but did you adjust the eye focus to your eye with the ao at 50 yds or so on 6.5 power?scope mfgrs suggest adjusting your eye to the scope while mounting then sight in on hightest power.highest power on all my scopes appear fuzzy inside 50 yds.good luck!

My Weaver V-24 is the same way.Lower powers it' s very clear. At the high powers it' s blurred some.That was using it on a 100 yd range.I haven' t tried it at a longer distance.This is the first scope I have bought with this high a magnification.All my others are 3x9' s or 2x7' s. It must be the characterists of these scopes.

Ruger Redhawk

It is not a characteristic of high powered scopes to be blurry at 100 yards.On hot days however mirage and heat waves can cause distortion.

Thanks SJ. Like I said this is my first experience with these' s high powered scopes.I' m going to check it out again. If I see it' s Blurred again,I' ll send it back to Weaver.Other then that I' m staisfied with this Weaver scope.On low powers is very clear.
Ruger Redhawk

Well, I took it out to the range today for the first time. First of all, this is a pretty accurate rifle right out of the box. I was shooting the fairly cheap Winchester White Box 45gr JHP varmint rounds, mostly because I want the Winchester brass, but my best 5-shot group was 1.28" and there were three shots in the same group that measured 0.47" . It was a pretty windy day with variable crosswinds as high as 10mph. Which made the groups open up a little. Those tiny little 45grain .224 bullets just don' t like the wind much. I shot one group where the wind was really whipping back and forth and the group had all 5 shots within .75" of the horizontal center of the target, but they were strung out in a straight line horizontal about 3" long. I was also very happy to see that the click adjustments on the scope were right at 1/8MOA as advertized. Makes it really easy to accuratly adjust the impact of the group. I guess it pays to buy a high-dollar scope.

Anyway, as for the scope, I found that the objective setting DOES make a difference in the whether the scope is in focus, but mostly the effect is only at higher madnifications. When I shot my first group at 25 yards to do the initial scope adjustments I found that is I didn' t take the objective all the way down to the minimum the target would be fuzzy. And at the 100 yard objective setting the 200 yard birm would be blurry. Otherwise, except for the bad mirage from the hot ground, the scope is crystal clear at 100 yards at 20x but only it the objective is set within 50 yards of the true range.

I can' t wait to see what this rifle will do with handloads on a calm day. Should be a sub- 1/2MOA rifle easily.

Here' s a pic of the best target group. The shot out on the right was wind and the high one was me jerking the trigger.

Mike