Day/night Vision add on….

[Antonyweeks]

I know this subject crops up again and again so apologies but tech options seem to change almost monthly these days and I can’t really keep up being the pleb that I am. I have a Swaro z8 on my main rifle. Recently I’ve cursed the fact it has been just too dark to see the deer that I’ve picked up in the thermal at both ends of the day. By the time I could see them with the naked eye (through the scope!) they’d cleared off. I don’t want to get a specific day/night scope and change over. However I gather there are issues attaching a rear adaptor to the z8. Are any of the front NV add ons any good? Swaro do their own add on and it’s also a spotter but it’s ludicrously expensive. Just wondered if there was anything cheaper that was decent and coped with the z8 lenses?

 

[mealiejimmy]

Front add-ons don't have any problems with lens coatings and parallax that cause issues for rear add-ons and Swaro scopes because the scope is just "looking at" the display on the rear of the add-on
However, the scope needs to have a low base magnification (x2.5-3) to be able to see all of the display and don't expect it to produce a usable image above around x8 magnification
The biggest problems with front add-ons is getting them zeroed and then getting them to retain zero when removed and refitted to the scope
To save costs, the scope adaptors supplied with many front add-ons are designed to work on scopes with a range of objective bell diameters, but if you want a front add-on to have any chance of retaining zero you need a scope adaptor that is an exact fit for your particular scope
IMHO, The only two NV front add-ons worth considering are the Pulsar Forward F455 and the Digistalker from the Night Vision Store and for either of them I strongly recommend a Rusan scope adaptor that is an exact fit onto the objective bell of your Swaro

Cheers

Bruce

 

[JosephKelly]

I’ve a Swaro Z6i and recently bought a Pulsar F455 for the exact reason as yourself. They are a good tool but have their limitations.

- I use it up to a maximum mag of 5x, after that image becomes pixelated.
- The above will limit what range you can shoot out to. I’ve knocked deer at 150m but bullet placement isn’t what it would be through your normal day scope. Generally I don’t go past 100m.
- Species ID is fine but sexing is difficult. For example I wouldn’t shoot any Roe over last few months with bucks having cast. Ideally they need to have a shared season or be in antler.
- Don’t accept when they say zero will be fine once it’s lobbed on the day scope. Both me and a friend have them and they both needed calibration (easy enough to do) to zero. I’d also recommend regularly testing zero to make sure it’s maintained.
- Get a good attachment, I got a Smartclip from these lads. There’s one called something like Rusan that’s also meant to be good. info@optics-trade.eu They’ll tell you what clip you need based on your scope.
- To get the most out of it they best in conjunction with a thermal. Thermal locates, NV id’s and places the shot.

We do a lot of fallow culling so it’s a useful tool for me, somewhat shared season and they’re fond of coming out of the timber when there is legal shooting hours but not shooting light.