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Lets talk rangefinders. I'm it the market for one. Thinking about a Leupold. I want to spend $400 or less and I want it to work. If my target is 450+ yards I don't shoot. I'm not sure if max. range distance specified on products is the truth or
not. What says you?
Usually rangefinders list the maximum distance on a "reflective" target (think highway sign). In my experience ranging distance on game runs 1/2 to 3/4 of the "reflective" rating.
In your shoes one of the 1000 yard rangefinders from Bushnell or Nikon should do the trick. My buddy has a Scout 1000 ARC, and it would hit 450 easy.
I will always swear by Leica. My 1200 will read to 1000 everytime and I got it to read at 1321 once even! I had a bushnell and leupold (both 800s i think?) and neither was reliable over 250. The Leica's are also small light and simple and easy to use.
Does the Leica though give you angle distances for archery?
I have a Leupold RXII I can usually range an elk sized animal out to about 350 with it, but you have to stay steady. I am a bowhunter and it works great for the closer range that I need. It has angle compensation in it that seems to work. It also has a ballistic mode to set your caliber up to, then when you range something it will tell your how many inches to hold over. The only problem is in low light the black led inside is hard to see, if you can get one with a red readout I would definitely think about it.
No the Leica is just point and shoot. It does not give TBR. The leupold I tried did but it was very complicated to say the least.
I have also only seen terrible performance out of the Leupold RX series, but reports on the new ones are pretty good. Bushnell has brought some not-so-good rangefinders to the market, but the Scout 1000 is pretty good. The Elite 1500/1600 has excellent ranging capabilities, and pretty good optics, but it is over the OP's budget.
Leicas are great rangefinders, but even used they are usually over the OP's budget, and the OP can easily stay on budget for the performance he is looking for, IMO.
If you want angle compensation, I would look no further than the Leupold TBR-1000 DNA... Used it in the high country last year and it is bad A$$! I was a huge advocate of my old Leica 700 because of the optics and red LED... The Leupold is great, it also has good optics and a red easy to read LED display....
definitely agree with graylight on this one me and my dad both own one and especially with the red LED read out it is easy to read in low light conditions
Has anybody used the Vortex rangefinder? If it is out yet.