#supersniper

Every year new optical companies pop up and guys buy from them. Nobody would ever grow to be a great company without support from shooters but a lot of companies make really mediocre stuff. Just because a company is little known does not mean that they do not, or cannot, make good scopes though. Compared to large companies like Leupold, Nikon, Nightforce, etc SWFA is what I would call a little guy. SWFA has been around for a number of years but I would guess most shooters and hunters have not heard of them. They are primarily a a distributor of other companies’ wares but they also have their own line of optics that are called the Super Sniper (affectionately know by their fans as Super Chicken due to the logo) that will hang with any scope out there.

Every year on Black Friday SWFA runs a sale where at a minimum they mark down their optics. Their fixed power scopes are always the best deal and can be bundled with rings, sunshade, and a bubble level at no cost. The variables and HD variables don’t have the option to bundle but you do save some money on them. This past fall I came into possession of one of each of the following through purchase or loan from someone else who took advantage of the Black Friday sale: 6x42mm with Mil-Quad reticle, 3-15x42mm FFP with Mil-Quad, and 5-20x50mm HD FFP with Mil-Quad. Admittedly, all three are very different but all are good to very good buys. After having several months of these scopes sitting around because my life is super busy, I got out and tested all three.

Top to bottom: SS 6x42mm MQ, SS 3-15x42mm FFP MQ, SS 5-20x50mm HD FFP MQ

Test Platform:

All of the optics were tested using one of my match rifles because nothing replaces a live fire: bullets don’t lie! This rifle is a Remington 700 action with Benchmark HV barrel that is chambered in .308 Win Palma 95 with a 1-10″ twist. The stock is a Manners Composite Stocks T6A with the Mini-Chassis System which is remarkably stable and repeatable. This rifle is extremely accurate and precise so is a great platform for testing rifle sights. All shooting was done an Atlas bipod and Red Tac 1/2-Pint rear bag. All ammunition was loaded with 175gn Sierra Match King bullets. 

What really matters:

My opinion of the purpose of and requirements for a rifle sight differ from some folks. A rifle scope is a rifle sight first and foremost and an optical instrument second. I care far more about mechanical soundness than I do brilliant optics. If I need to look at something with optics that allow me to discern fine detail I will use an binocular or spotting scope; both are exactly the right place to spend your money on a great glass. Rifle scopes are not for viewing things, they are for shooting things and it is entirely possible to shoot with 1MoA precision using iron sights at 1000yds so I don’t buy that I need super high definition glass in my rifle sight. I just need to be able to resolve enough detail to shoot well and where that usually requires a better set of lenses and engineering is with high magnification. That does not particularly concern me because I rarely shoot with anything over 12x even at  1000yds. I am not saying you do not want or need good glass in a rifle scope but it is not the most important thing by a long shot. On to what counts.

As stated, I am a mechanical reliability, precision, and accuracy type guy. The first thing I will do after zeroing a new rifle sight is shoot a “Tall Target Test” to calibrate the accuracy of my adjustments and to test the ability of the system to return to zero. If a sight cannot return to zero I will not use it. I prefer to use rifle sights that have adjustments that are within 2% of perfect but any decent ballistic calculator will allow for a correction factor.

I shoot these tests a few ways: a group at every 1MRAD, a group at every 5MRAD, or a single group at 15MRAD. If in MoA I would do every 5MoA, every 10MoA, or a single group at 30MoA. I start at my zero shoot two, dial up and shoot, then dial back to zero and shoot again. I had three scopes to test so I elected to shoot every 5MRAD.

The rifle range at my gun club is spot on at every distance beyond 100yds but when they rebuilt the berms a couple of years ago the dropped the berm at 100yds on center and the target boards at 93yds. All of these scopes that I have on hand are MRAD so each milliradian is equal to 3.348″ instead of the 3.600″ it would be equal to at 100yds.

In all three scopes the most error showed up in the first 5MRAD and decreased as I dialed out which I guess is what you want if you have to deal with error. The error is easily corrected for with your ballistic app and equally important is that all three scopes returned to zero although with the two standard scopes each had a round out of group when shooting return to zero. It always possible it was my fault but it looks like the same precision all the way up the tall target with those two scopes. I used a military surplus M118LR for the first two scopes and when I got the HD in my hands a couple of weeks later I was using my handloads for an upcoming match. In sum, I have no reservations about using any of these scopes based on this test.

Features common to all:

The tube length on all three scopes is between 5.75 and 6 inches so you can set up your rings to span nearly the entire tube for support but will have enough rail that you can move the scope fore or aft by .5 to 75 inches to get eye-relief properly positioned. Each has a minimum of 3.5″ of eye-relief (6x42mm) to a maximum of 4.2″ (3-15x42mm) which is an important consideration if using them on a heavily recoiling rifle.  Eye relief is decent but is fairly critical; that is to say the “eyebox” is a little tight if you like the modern lingo that dumbs it down. The scope tube diameter for all is 30mm and each scope has between 30 and 40MRAD of adjustment (about 104 to 140MoA) which is a lot.

SWFA SS 6x42mm with Mil-Quad:

Overall, this is a very decent optic that sells for around $300 dollars. Mine was bundled with rings, a bubble level, and a sunshade. The rings are a 6-screw ring made from aluminum and appear to be very nearly identical to the Burris MTAC rings. They are light and they are functional but I do not expect them to be as rugged as a steel ring or a Nightforce aluminum ring with titanium crossbolt (SWFA recommends 40 in-lbs compared to 65 in-lbs with NF if that is any indication). They are a bulky too but  pretty is as pretty does unless it is a really svelte rifle and then looks count too. This scope is dedicated to a .22LR training rifle so I am positive the rings will be just fine. I probably would not use these rings on a big gun.

The scope itself his a little on the heavy side. It weighs in at 20oz or so: about a quarter pound more than a similar sized Leupold but about a quarter pound less than a Bushnell LRHS. For a hunting rig it is a pretty good weight. I would say it is Goldie Locks and the 3 Bears all around: not too heavy, not too light, just right.

The elevation and windage knobs are cheap looking but give your 5MRAD per revolution, are easy to read, and are positive. I would prefer a little lower profile turret for elevation and a capped windage knob as I always hold windage with my reticle. Those are just preferences though and I think that they are quite good for a $300 scope.

The glass is good but not exceptional and I noticed some distortion at the edges. I would say it has a “sweet spot” that is 2/3 or 3/4 of the entire field of view and just suffers distortion at the edges. Again, I am not using a rifle scope for viewing and the distortion would never affect my shooting since the entire usable portion of the reticle is in the clear portion of the field of view. The ocular is a fast focus style and the parallax adjustment is on the ocular housing as well instead of on the side or objective lens. It is not as easy to use as a side focus but is easier to use than an adjustable objective. The parallax adjustment is a little tight and it does not take much movement at all to make a large change.

The Mil-Quad reticle is different from scope to scope model from SWFA. The MQ reticle in the 6x is a little heavier than the reticle in other models but is still very usable. I actually prefer the solid diamonds of the 6x to the hollow diamonds of the two variables in this test. It has plenty of hold-over if you need it, small enough wind holds to be precise, and the heavy inverted plex works well for closer shooting.

As a whole this is a very nearly ideal hunting scope. The glass is good, the adjustments are good, the reticle is good, and it is not too heavy. It offers enough magnification to shoot to at least 600yds which covers 99.9% of deer hunting. Considering the cost and the bundle available I can’t imagine needing anything else.

SWFA SS 3-15x42mm FFP with Mil-Quad:

Compared to the fixed power scopes I am not sure this one is worth $300 dollars more but is still a good scope. The fact that this scope is not offered with any bundles on sale fortifies my opinion; that is, if you need rings and a level, or a sunshade. That said, compare features and cost to just about any other optic like a Leupold VX-6 and I think you get a lot.

It is on the heavy side: 24oz just like the Bushnell LRHS but nowhere near the quality of glass or adjustments. The knobs are the same cheap looking knobs that are on the fixed power Super Sniper but they are positive and repeatable. It shares the fast-focus eye-piece of the fixed power but it has a side-focus parallax adjustment. The glass has almost no distortion at the edge of the field of view but you can see in the picture there is a tiny bit of chromatic aberration (that little “halo” you see at the top of the white target board). I have heard some guys cry about CA in an optic but I have never found it to be a distraction when shooting.

The reticle is a little thinner than on the 6x and the diamonds are hollow with a dot in the center. They don’t have the FFP version depicted on their website but this is a fair representation:

For a $600 dollar rifle scope I think this a pretty good buy.

SWFA SS 5-20x50mm FFP HD with Mil-Quad:

The HD version of the Super Sniper seems to be an altogether different animal than the standard scopes. It just looks different: the elevation and windage knobs are more refined looking and feel more crisp, the diopter adjustment is a locking configuration compared to a fast-focus, and the lenses are all HD as the name implies.

Locking diopter:

Lower profile turrets that are very nearly like a Bushnell DMR/HDMR/ERS/XRS:

I thought the turrets resembled the turrets on a Bushnell DMR except that they do not have a locking feature. They are really quite good. Also, if you dial your elevation the turrets on the HD offer 10MRAD per revolution compared to the 5MRAD you get from the standard line. That makes it harder to get lost in your knob which is the most common error I see with guys who dial elevation.

The parallax knob is stiff but pretty accurate for the yardages listed (compared to the 6x or 3-15x42mm) out to 600m and from there out the infinity setting works. I thought the glass was good throughout the power range with no discernible degradation in image quality. There is still a little CA in this scope but again it is not a big deal to me.

The reticle is the third variant of the Mil-Quad in as many scopes:

Conclusion: