Basics A Novice Hunter Should Know about Riflescopes

There are many novice but enthusiastic hunters out there who want to get some adventure out of life from hunting. But most of the times they are not aware of the right tools they need. Most of the times, they look out for the costliest rifles but settle down with the cheapest scopes. This is where most of them make mistake and learn only after their first few hunting expeditions. However, they can't afford to spend thousands of bucks just to learn their mistakes. To help novice hunters learn about basic aspects of riflescopes, this article has been written.

Basic Parts of Riflescopes

While choosing a scope, a hunter must check the quality of lens used. Objective lens is present farthest from stock of the scope and its function is transmission of light back to ocular lens, which is present closest to the eyes of the user. Objective Bell is the section which houses objective lens and the one that contains ocular lens is called eyepiece. Most of the quality rifle scopes including Nightforce NXS, Swarovski Z5, Vortex Viper PST, and other great quality scopes are all waterproof. So, it is better to rest with the good quality optical devices that enable hunters to hunt even when it rains. Most of these devices are fogproof too.

One of the most important specification is the reticle, which is also called crosshair. This is basically a marker that helps a shooter determine the exact spot where the bullet will hit. While buying a device, one must check the magnification range. While a target can be seen at 3x magnification, the same object can be seen at 9x magnification too. This means the shooter can watch the target three times to nine times larger than seen through normal vision.

Power Ring is an important feature of these devices which helps in changing magnification setting. Magnification switching may introduce parallax error as most of the manufacturers set focus of their scopes at 91.4 meters or 100 yards. This comes up as a potential problem in case of high magnifications. To correct this, some of the companies have built their devices with adjustable objective lenses that help in correcting this error.

What does the Number 5-12x42 mean in a Riflescope?

The first two number, i.e. 5-12, is the range of scope. Any rifle scope which comes with 5-12 range is capable of getting magnification anything from 5x to 12x. Therefore, the target will look 5 to 12 times larger than normal eyesight. This also means that this scope is a variable one, which enables users to change magnification settings. There are many optical devices where change of magnification is not possible.

The last number in 5-12x42, ie. 42 refers to the 42 mm size of objective lens. This tells the shooter amount of light that can be transmitted through the ocular lens. Larger the size of objective lens, more the light that will be transmitted.

Final Words

These are the few basic things that a novice hunter should know before buying a riflescope or other hunting tools.