I've dabbled a bit in handgun silhouette for the NRA smallbore and hunter's pistol matches, but I haven't seemed to get anything that felt right for sights or scopes for the 1/2 scale targets. I haven't tried any sights other than factory T/C sights and they weren't all that useful. Since I can't hold all that steady, a high power scope that lets me pick a paint chip on the target doesn't work very well and it mostly just convinces me to go back to shooting a rifle. Even a variable doesn't feel right either, but I can't put my finger on why. The dots in the scopes I have tried don't seem to work well, except for a Circle-X reticle in a Bushnell Trophy scope that I have. It's got a fine crosshair reticle inside a circle and the circle frames up the pistol targets well. The one I have is only 1.75-4x, though, and even on 4x seems to need more. They also make a 3-9X that I'm considering buying for an hold Mauser hunting rifle that I might also try on a Contender pistol barrel, but neither model has an adjustable objective. Maybe I just need to try an adjustable objective variable with a bigger dot or something. Anyone been down this path before me and have experience to share?

Using a Leupy 12X fixed with crosshairs on contender 22LR...shoot it about three ofur times a year..whenI get up early enough to get to the range for pistol.
M

Are they standard or fine crosshairs? Does anyone make a decent variable-power target scope with a big fat dot (1 minute or larger) or am I going to be buying and then sending a scope to someone to change the reticle if I want to try that?

they are standard cross hairs. Good luck on the 1 minute dot, when you find a source let me know.

Innocent

You might try a 4x or 6x hunting scope with conventional crosshairs. I made AAA and my brother made Master class shooting such scopes. Too much magnification can be a distraction. Trigger control is far more important.

Thanks.. will try that. I'm doing well with the trigger. My Contender is a pre-G2 with the spring replaced. It's excellent.

24X Leupold scope on TC Contender for .22, .22 Hornet or 7TCU. The .22s don't kick, but the 7TCU does and you better be careful. Hang on.

i shoot a weaver v-16 with a tk lee dot, i would be using a kt-15 but Jud would not part with it. i shoot a 30 for rifle and the 16 being half the power make up for my twice the wiggle. i find a fixed 15x to be perfect, i have a g2 with a nice trigger job. using the taco grip. consistance of grip pressure and making sure you have the scope the same spot in relation to your eye(paralax) seems to be the most impactive thing to me.

i like the dot but for pistol i do think heavy cross hairs ate the bees knees

by ate the bees knees i mean are the bees knees.... something wrong with my keyboard...

Jason wrote:Are they standard or fine crosshairs? Does anyone make a decent variable-power target scope with a big fat dot (1 minute or larger) or am I going to be buying and then sending a scope to someone to change the reticle if I want to try that?

Jason -

I found a Nikon Buckmaster 6-18x side focus scope with a fine crosshair and a dot (not sure of it's size) to work very well on taco hold Hunter Pistol setups AS LONG AS I'm shooting on white targets (this sound familiar?... re: our Lever Action post vs fiber optic discussion). They also make it with a Mil-Dot and BDC reticle as well (MIdway has the Mil-dot version on sell right now for $309).

For Black targets I tend to lose the fine crosshair/dot on the animal and find a thicker duplex reticle to work much better. I cannot explain why, the duplex just seems to work better for me on black targets. The scope I use with the duplex reticle is an old $50 Simmons AO 4-16x they don't make or sell anymore.

One piece of advice I will give anyone, regardless of which scope is used; Don't assume that just because you can hold a scope steady at a higher power that you should use it.... I find that with anything above about 10-12X, I will start crossfiring on the wrong animal or even a wrong bank if the target banks are set very close. I found that by keeping the power cranked down to less than 10x (usually about 8-9x) I "nearly never" fire on the wrong animal or bank, and my scores are just as good (if not better) than when I crank the magnification any higher.

just my .02,

-Tim

I have found that I do best with my Leupold 6.5 -20X cranked up to the max...20 power. I shoot both smallbore and regular Hunter Pistol scoped classes set up that way using a TACO hold. Never had a problem with shooting the wrong targets, but you DO have to pay attention. A lot of people wiggle too much to use that much magnification, but for me, I find that I can see pretty much exactly where the trigger breaks and then look at the spotter's board to see where she sticks the pin. If I see much variation between those two, I know I am not treating the trigger right or am doing something else goofy. Practice is what it takes! During the shooting season I try to dry fire about 2 or 3 40 shot practice matches a week at home to stay in practice and work on the timing, muscle memory and general technique. If I am fortunate enough to be able to shoot in 2 or 3 matches a weekend (and that hasn't been possible for a long time!), I don't need so much practice.

I will say that I prefer white targets...the little target dot on the Leupold fine target crosshairs can get lost on a black target, but it isn't too bad if you are really focussed and concentrating on what you are doing.

I've had to shoot scoped classes for a long time now because my eyes are just not good enough to see everything I need to see in the open sight classes and be competitive.

Shooting the wrong target? I was fortunate that my ex was my spotter and coach. When I missed, for example the second turkey on the left bank, she would say, turkey no 3 on left bank is next. By all means try to have a spotter/coach. That one thing will be a tremendous help in your scores. We also used a spotter board to mark the hits so that we could see where we "thought" the shot broke as opposed to where it really hit. Your spotter can also keep tabs on the wind flags for you while you are aiming and alert you to sudden gusts down range and keep tabs on the timer. Hope this helps..Dave Deo Vindice