Riflescope sunshades

[zahc]

I was flipping through the shooter's guide catalog and noticed a lot of riflescopes wearing a sunshade. Is this the new 'in' thing or something? I thought the purpose of a sunshade was to prevent glare off the objective lens. Do they actually help?

I think rifles look really ugly with them.

 

[cdbeaver]

They may look ugly, but it you're shooting off a bench or from a rest into a southerly or southeasternly or eastern direction in the morning, that sunshade does wonders in helping you to see the target.

My Leupold target scope came with one in the box. I didn't like the looks of it on the scope, so didn't use it until I found I had difficulty seeing the target at times. Installation of the sunshade made a great difference.

 

[zahc]

I get it now. It's for when the sun is quartering toward you.


Do they take away any FOV?

 

[cdbeaver]

I haven't noticed any field of view loss; however, when shooting at paper, anything more than your target area isn't really noticeable.

 

[Cortland]

Benchrest shooters will sometimes use sunshades that go the entire length of the barrel (looks really silly) in order to block "mirage" from heat coming off the barrel.

 

[AZRickD]

A sunshade is also to keep the target from seeing the shooter. If the sun is in front of the shooter, the sun can reflect off of an unprotected lens.

For that purpose, the shade must be as long as the lens is wide (or something like that).

Rick

 

[4v50 Gary]

Sunlight reflecting off of one's lens is supposedly how Hathcock bagged his legendary NVA sniper. For want of a piece of plastic or cardboard the guy gave himself away. Too bad for him, good for us.

 

[cheygriz]

They work for me!

 

[zeke]

There is another company that makes plastic inserts thet slip into end of flip up covers? They are very effective at blocking reflection from scope lense. Got tired of spooking deer in the morning facing the sun rise.

 

[Gewehr98]

Yup. Called ARD's...

Or Anti-Reflection Devices. Sold by an Tenebraex, here's what they look like from the objective lens end:

 

[Fatelvis]

Gewehr, does that ARD effect how bright the scope appears, or is it unnoticable?

 

[Gewehr98]

On an overcast gray afternoon, it does dim things a little bit.

But if there's direct sunlight out, it does a good job as a sunshade replacement, and the objective lens glint absolutely disappears from the front end.

 

[Fatelvis]

Thanks, I always wondered......I guess if it was overcast, it wouldnt be needed anyhow!

 

[Sharpshooter223]

I love my sunshades on my bausch and lomb scopes that I use on my target rifles. I'm spoiled of having them now and want them for my other scopes!!!

 

[Black Snowman]

At low magnifications there is FOV loss on my BSA Contender 3-12x40 with it's 6" sunshade installed but at about 8x it's narrowed down enough that it doesn't interfere.

 

[sigman4rt]

Sunshades

All my scopes wear a Tenebraex filter, it screws onto the scope underneath the flip-up scope cover. They really work well without adding the extra length of a sunshade. The only thing they don't work well on are zero magnification scopes, you can see the honeycomb a little when you sight through it. That said, it's a truly functional piece of hardare.

 

[WhiteKnight]

How much does it distort the image quality?