DarkLordOfOptics

Now that I made it home for a couple of days, I fished two mounts out of the mail that I plan to test. Here are first impressions. The mounts discussed were: Sig Alpha2: https://alnk.to/7BeynX3 Daniel Defense: https://alnk.to/44VoLF4 The scopes shown were: Leupold Mark4HD 2.5-10x42 FFP with illuminated TMR https://alnk.to/ge5GrY6 Primary Arms PLxC 1-8x24 SFP with Nova reticle. This scope is not up for sale yet, but soon. It is essentially a SFP version of this one: https://alnk.to/a43a7qG For the time being, if I were to pick a simple robust one piece mount in the $200 and under range, it would still be Badger Unimount. Allegedly, it has been discontinued, but there is still some stock https://alnk.to/dAmjJLY

Since yesterday Rumble Studio crapped out on me yesterday, I ended up doing a livestream on Middle East strictly on my Locals page. When I checked today, Rumble Studio looks to be working now. I figured I should do a test run and see if everything works. If noone chimes in, I'll just talk to myself for a few minutes and log off.

This is my last evening in Florida before heading home tomorrow. While here, I took a defensive carbine class from Gary Juhl on Sunday, so I figured I should do a recap from that and take some questions if there are any. I could use a break from work anyway. Last few days have been hectic and my brain is fried. I could use a diversion. This will go live to Locals, Rumble and X. No Youtube this time since I want to be able to show the setup that I used.

My voice is finally back, so let's do a final wrap-up for what I ran into during SHOT last month. Naturally, I'll address your questions as I go along.

Here is the summary from days 1 and 2.

Here are some impressions from the range day that happens eveyr year the day before SHTO exhibit kicks off.

Some impressions from the Beretta range day: Beretta, Burris, Steiner, Sako, Tikka, Norma

60 is a round number of some sort, so I figured we should do something special. For the first time, I think, I have a live guest, not someone joining be via digital connection from afar. I am in Wyoming at the moment, trying to chase down an elk and visiting with David, the proprietor of Discreet Ballistics. They make what is likely the best subsonic ammunition on the market. Definitely the best I have seen, but there is more to what they do than just accurate subsonics. Tune to learn more about them. https://discreetballistics.com/ Post show notes: -the bulk of the discussion focused on what faster barrel twist does to bullet lethality and accuracy -David went in depth into how different bullets perform in soft tissue and what makes them effective -A lot of the discussion was on different bullet types, construction and manufacturing method and how they do with fast twist barrels

This is going to be a special edition version of DLO Live! Eugene is joining me to talk about the events that transpired in Israel over the last few days. We will do our best to cover what has been happening and why. I will not take any gun or optics questions unless there is time later in the show.

Element's 5x30 prismatics are finally here and I have two scopes from the first production lot. I have spent enough time with these to offer some first impressions. These are some of most full featured prismatics on the market today with excellent image quality and side focus. Also, since I designed the reticles, I will go over the reasoning behind various reticle features. https://shrsl.com/4954k

The topic of scope mounts comes up again and again. I have talked about in the past, so if you have been following my channel, a lot of this might not be new. However, I do not think I have ever tried to focus the discussion on the mounts to this degree. The purpose here is to not necessarily discuss any specific mounts (although I'll be happy to do that if I am familiar with whatever brand you are inquiring about). The purpose is to introduce a somewhat different way of thinking about scope mounts than is common. In principle, there isn't that much there and 15 minutes should be more than enough. In practice, I am allocating an hour and a half and I am afraid we will use up all of it.

It has been a month since I have done one of these, so there is a lot to cover. -S&B's new 6-36x56 is here, so I am kicking off the next High End Tactical Comparison -I am considering a wholesale boycott of Swarovski/Kahles. I'll explain why -Apex 12x50 binocular with a reticle is here -Gunwerk Elevate Bipod is in the house and I am really liking it so far -I am, again, jumping into the rabbit hole of the best way to set up auxiliary red dot sight on your AR. And, of course, there is more along with the customary Q&A

Join me at www.darklordofoptics.com for further discussion. These two scopes are both 5x prismatic designs, but they could not be more different form each other. The video explains why. SwampFox Saber: https://alnk.to/1XUCNyb Vortex Spitfire Gen2: https://alnk.to/58ogsf6

There is no prepared monologue for this one. There is all sorts of interesting stuff happening in Russia, so I'll go over that a little and then do the customary Q&A.

An old tradition I used to have was an occasional re-visit of how different optics companies have been growing and evolving. It has been a little while, but I think it is worth resurrecting. This time, I am going to spend a little time talking about Tract Optics and I hope one of the founders of Tract, Jon LaCorte, will join me for this. Aside from the general company and product line overview, Tract has just announced a new interesting 4-25x50 design that is worth discussing. I have briefly seen the prototype several months ago and I plan to test in the future. Post show notes: There was a brief aside on the critic I wrote down of a video by Brassfacts. The write-up is here: https://darklordofoptics.locals.com/p... A couple of time tags. 0:00 we kick off with a general introduction 10:45 I go over which Tract products I ahve personal experience with 16:55 Jon goes over different product lines Tract offers 38:48 We talk about the new 4-25x50 Toric scopes that has just been introduced 48:00 We kick of the Q&A part of the show.

This livestream is going to piss off a bunch of people. I am going to get a little nerdy and give a bunch (not all, I am sure) of my fellow gun writers a hard time. They are often good shots and excellent writers. However, when they try to get numerical, all too often, they draw on technically accurate things and come up with completely asinine conclusions. I am going to address one of those and that is the relationship between objective lens diameter, resolution and magnification of a riflescope. Naturally, I'll take questions as I go along and switch over to the customary Q&A toward the end.

It has been a little while since I did a livestream. We all make plans and life happens, I suppose. This is going to be a general update and Q&A livestream. I do not have a specific topic in mind, but I am kicking off several riflescope reviews, among other things, that are worth updating you on.

It is that time of the year when Will and I try to squeeze a week's worth of new stuff from SHOT Show into a two hour livestream. Last year, it took a few attempts to go through everything, but we'll see what 2023 brings to the table.

Befitting the end of the year, I have a year worth of impression of the Razor Gen3 6-36x56. Will is gong to join me again to offer his perspective on the Gen3 Razor. He has had a chance to compare it side by side with many other high end precision scopes out there. The specific scope I have is the mrad model: https://bit.ly/3VcAXJD I have had a chance to compare it to the more expensive March 5-42x56 https://bit.ly/3wNfknM and Tangent Theta TT525P https://bit.ly/3HOj5BU quite extensively. Will also looked at it next to ZCO, Kahles, Nightforce, etc.

After some consideration, I decided to expand this "if I could have only one" thought exercise to knives. I was deliberating about it when a very well known knifemaker Shawn Houston agreed to join me for this discussion. Shawn forgot more about knives and knife steels than I will ever know, so view this as an opportunity to pick his brain on everything knife related. I like his take on how blades are supposed to work and I fully expect the discussion to dig pretty deep into how an edge works and how to sharped a knife properly. Shawn and his work can be found on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/triplebhandmade/ and on his website https://www.triplebhandmade.com/

Welcome to the yearly edition of the unthinkable scenario where I can only have one gun. We'll discuss what gun and cartridge would be an ideal option in such a nightmarish scenario intermingled with the usual Q&A.

This edition of DLO Live! is really going to be centered around a general Q&A, but there are several specific topics I would like to cover as well, as time allows. -It turns out that one of the companies very well known in the photography world, SunwayFoto, decided to jump into the shooting support market. I have a tripod and a few other products from them that I just started looking at. I'll offer some initial impressions. -Why do some scopes weigh a lot and others do not? There is no single simple answer to that, but there are quite a few design aspects that matter. This one might get nerdy. If you want a case study on how to make a high quality light weight FFP scope, Vortex Razor HD-LHT 4.5-22x50 is a good example: https://bit.ly/3KEbZyA -Picatinny 1913 vs STANAG rail clamps. They look the same, but they are not. STANAG is a better standard and here is the "why" of it. Mounts I comfortably recommend: Badger rings and mounts, for example https://bit.ly/3EX6L0F https://bit.ly/3ShDHny Seekins Precision rings https://bit.ly/3CQki7r and mount https://bit.ly/3MNVnGb Element Optics Accu-lite https://bit.ly/3EYhU1s Vortex Pro rings https://bit.ly/3gp5Ag6 This is by no means exhaustive, just a couple of examples.

This time, scheduled for the correct time... We will revisit the origin of the conflict and cover recent events and future possibilities. Eugene and I will offer our take, but more importantly we have a guest with us, Paul, who spent time in Ukraine during the conflict.

Strasser RS14 EVO has been in my hands for a little while, but our time together is coming to the end. If you see me shed a tear during the livestream, do not think badly of me. Sending it back will be hard. If I could afford it, it would be staying here. It is a classically beautiful design on the outside and technically brilliant and innovative solution on the inside. Since most of the time the RS14 was here it had Trijicon's Tenmile 3-18x44 on it, I figured it fitting to review them together.

Join me at www.darklordofoptics.com for further discussion. This is sort of a continuation on the whole theme of getting ready for hunting season. Last year, I did not quite think through my shooting support solutions well enough. This time around, I decided to take a slightly less conventional approach. The basic problem is that I need the means to quickly change between low to the ground (say prone) and higher off the ground (say sitting) solutions. On top of that, I want to be able to use the same hardware, when possible, to support a binocular and/or spotter. The bipod I use is here: https://sovrn.co/13d8c0z The various adapters and other bipods are here: https://sovrn.co/zciiss2 I'll update my impressions after the hunting season is over.