Thermal Optics: Any Footage from Pesting?

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Well I just too a road trip to MidwestThermalOptics. It was a bad decision and cost me about $1500 more than I wanted. The guy brought about $40k worth to the outdoor viewing area(he has one heck of an indoor display). He offered to bring more stuff, some in the 10k range. I didn’t even want to look over the $4k range. Then he brought out his favorite scope the Iray(infiray) bolt 50c and I was blown away by it. I asked the wife which one of the scopes she liked best, we set them all in order. We both picked the bolt.
I have a helion2 handheld it’s a 640 unit. Im picking up birds and mice further and clearer with the bolt. Plus the bolt has a 5year 5day warranty.
I also feel the infiray app is much easier to use than atn, sightmark, pulsar, agm or Bering optics.

So basically if you can find a shop go looks before you buy. I had my heart set on a super yoter but was blown away by the bolt.
 
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Ezana4CE said:
@Cranky1 Any explanation as to why they won’t carry ATN poducts?

@AirGunShooter Lovin the clarity of that video. Great shot!!
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Well both of the dealers I’ve dealt with said atn had way too many issues and customer service (for both them and customers) was horrible. Both have actually steered me from one product to another due to personal experience.
Like a certain model with range finder only worked about 10% of the time under 100 yards.
Or another was prone to shutting off after the shot, even on 223. It’s nice to walk in a shop and neither tried to push straight to the most expensive thing.
They actually give advice and flat say, if you want this model I’ll sell it to you, but I don’t recommend it. They are working on a fox for said issue so when they get them fixed I’ll push them.
It is priceless walking into a shop and putting your hands on products. Good shops will steer you to what they think will work best in your price range. Midwest thermal optic in walnut IL was an awesome shop to walk into. They had tons in stock and I got to play with way too much stuff.
 
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AirGunShooter said:
I purchased an ATN first. Don’t remember the model, but it was one of their best. It left a lot to be desired for resolution and clarity. Same with an ATN thermal monocular viewer I had tried earlier this year.
I then went with Pulsar. Much more expensive, but vastly better!
I now own a Pulsar Helion 2 XP50 Pro thermal monocular and the Pular Digex 50 scope.
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I’ve got the helion2 xp50 (non pro)and now an iray bolt 50c. Had a superhogster and it was really good and light.
 
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Huntnhumans said:
I have the ATN Thermal scope, with the one shot zero, How are you guys sighting them in?
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I use aluminum HVAC tape on a target, and I tilt it up slightly towards the sky. This reflects the cold of space back towards the scope. So in a White Hot mode, you'll see black. This works even when it's cold outside, because it's not as cold at the target as it is in space.

Just tape up the entire target, and that should be able to see your shot. Probably should sight in at 25 yards, and use the Ballistics Calculator for other ranges.

Here, you can see I added 4 pieces of tape to a target at 50 yards and at my max extended magnification, it got quite pixelated, but even with that, you can see holes in the HVAC tape.

Edit: The poor quality is because I'm using extended magnification of 12.5x instead of the max regular magnification of 5x.

ATNX0001 (4).JPG
 
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I recently sighted in a friends AR with a Bering Hogbuster. Did it in daylight. Instructions said to use a chemical handwarmer as a target for obvious reasons. You look through the eyepiece and WOW, there it is. I sighted in at 50 yards and then look down to 100 yards, I see the handwarmer but beyond the dirt backstop up in a tree a squirrel or coon is moving around. Absolutely no question there was a critter up there. Very impressive. And it’s a fairly compact unit.
 
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cmatera said:
I have used HVAC tape and hand warmers. Only problem with the hand warmers is the image tends to bloom and look bigger than it is. Sometimes it helps to put a hole in cardboard and put the hand warmer on the back side of the cardboard. When shooting small critters, you need a more precise aiming point.
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That is one of the biggest issues with thermal scopes and small critters. My scope only has 14 MOA resolution. That's massive.
 
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WOW i realize that i must have the most wonderful wife and she does not care what i spend ,AND she does all the bills. Sometimes she ask's if i bought this and that but only to make sure it is not someone else stealing ID .

Edit : I am not one of the latest/greatest must have guys so really not a huge spender .
 
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Everyone please bear with me as I switch over to day job mode and explain my findings.

I've looked at the AGM, Burris, ATN and several other brands over the pond, in both monocular and scope configurations. And something eerily familiar instantly popped out:

They get their Thermal Electronics from someone else, and repackage it with various plug and play options, like Wi-Fi in different housings.

The ATN OTS-XLT has the same screen icons as the AGM Taipan 10-256, but it's lower resolution, has no Wi-Fi and has a custom case with their own optics. Everything else is the same.

Sometimes, it's more overt. The AGM Rattler and IRay Saim SCP19 look like identical scopes physically using different firmware for branding purposes. This is even more evident when you go to the manufacturers websites and try and download manuals, and you only see images of the scope mounted on a weapon, but no images of the resulting thermal image.

This is kinda like a Buick/Oldsmobile and Audi/VW situation.

It seems like ATN tried to do the most customizations to theit invite

Then you go look at Pulsar and Trijicon seems to have different and original thermal tech.

Rebrands in technology are common. There is no reason to think that this is necessarily a bad thing, as it reduces cost to the end consumer. But it's just something to think about as we compare different thermal scopes with reviews taken under very different environments.

Edit: Not all of the ATN, AGM or IRay line is a rebrand. IRay has a 1280 pixel thermal scope and AGM has some fusion monoculars which are very, very nice.
 
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cmatera said:
I have used HVAC tape and hand warmers. Only problem with the hand warmers is the image tends to bloom and look bigger than it is. Sometimes it helps to put a hole in cardboard and put the hand warmer on the back side of the cardboard. When shooting small critters, you need a more precise aiming point.
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I know what you mean. Good idea about the hand warmer behind. Fortunately the guy I sighted it in for was using the gun for deer (.350 Legend caliber).
 
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