First handgun scope ....

[bigjeepman]

Okay GBO members ... I need your opinions. I have had a Ruger New Model SBH Hunter in .45 lc for about a 2 years now. I have run about 50 rounds through it at the range. My intention has been to use it on a boar hunt and possibly deer hunting. I have never scoped any of my handguns (in .357, .45 lc) as I always just used them at the range for fun. I now have the urge to scope it and I am new to handscopes. I have a price range from about $225 to $275. I have many rifle scopes including Elite 4200's, Sightrons, Swifts, Muellers, and a few others.

I know my boar shots would be 25 to 75 yds. Since I have never used a handgun hunting before, I am not sure what range for deer hunting with a .45 lc I will be comfortable with until I practice a lot at the range. I am guessing 50 to 100 yds.

I have looked through all of the above scopes and liked all three. Any helpful thoughts, ideas .... ?

[Graybeard]

I've always considered 2X to be adequate for use on a .44 Mag revolver and most all of mine when scoped have worn fixed 2X scopes, for the most part the Leupold 2X even tho I've really never liked that 20mm objective. I've recently picked up a Bushnell 2X with the 28mm (I think, might be 32mm) objective and it will go on the next gun I scope to see if I like it better than the Leupold.

Now for range work more is better generally speaking but I don't agree with that logic for hunting. But then I have used those Leupold 2X scopes on TCs for years and way back about '93 I think it was I had a long range shooting day at the range and was able to turn in several sub MOA groups all the way out to 250 yards at which distance my best for the day was 1.5" for three shots. Yes that was all done with a Leupold 2X on a 14" TC factory barrel in 7-30 Waters.

Most of my hunting with .44 Mag revolvers have resulted in kills welll inside of 50 yards and I can recall only two that stretched to about 100 yards. I'd rather have a wide FOV than more power for such shooting.

[bigjeepman]

Thanks Bill ...

That is just the kind of info I'm looking for. Even if I used a higher power to sight in at the range, I should just use it as a say "2x" in the field. FOV is always important to me too as I have the years of buying big powerful scopes behind me. Oh well ... live and learn. That is some excellent shooting you have done. I am not very good with handguns right now but I am going to change that.   

[Graybeard]

The Burris 2-7 is likely the largest and heaviest of the scopes you've listed. I've used several of them and they do have the widest FOV at 2X of any of the variables. BUT Burris scopes are prone to getting trash in them really badly. I'm not sure I've ever owned one that didn't have that problem at least at times. It moves around and might be in just the wrong place at any given time or not even visible but you can almost count on it being in there some where. I've stopped using Burris scopes at all as a result.

I've used a lot of the Bushnell 2-6 scopes both Trophy and Elite and they are both solid well made products but FOV is really small on them. I use them more on longer range single shot handguns like the TCs now than on revolvers.

[Redhawk1]

 Get a Bushnell trophy 2x6X32mm. I have one on my S&W 460 Mag and love it. I use the 2 power for hunting about twice as much field of view over the Leupold 2.5 X 8. At the range I use the 6 power out to 200 yards without a problem. I have shot deer with the power setting on 6 before, but that was at a further distance and off a shooting rest.

I have over 2000 rounds of 460 Mag down the tube and the scope is still holding strong.

[bigjeepman]

Thanks for helping Bill and Redhawk1 ...

I appreciate your time. I normally do not ask questions like this or do a poll ... but when I am getting into something I do not know very much about, I will ask. Oh, I have handguns ... but I have never scoped one of them because I always liked shooting open sights. I will be using this for hunting purposes and now have need for a scope. I will head down to the gunshop this weekend to take a look at the Trophy 2-6x32mm and some other 2x scopes.

Thanks for helping ....