At the 5.11 booth a came across their BRAVO travel jacket. This blazer sports coat has internal secure pockets and retaining straps. This covert jacket allows you to carry various EDC gear in a secure and ergonomic manner for rapid access and deployment. It isn’t quite John Wick’s bullet proof Italian suit but I imagine it’s a suit he’d wear while on vacation from a “job”.
All posts by moondog
Discovery ED-LHT Gen2 3-15×50
Discovery Optics sent me their ED-LHT precision hunting scope. The new Gen2 features Japanese ED glass, reducing chromatic aberrations and improving overall sharpness. Or at least that’s what ED glass is supposed to do, but given the LHT’s budget price, one can get a little suspicious.
My dubiousness wasn’t helped by the fact that Discovery Optics scopes come with an outrageous amount of stuff. Not just a set of scope rings, but a scope level tool, flip up lens caps, a sun shade, a cleaning cloth, and a cleaning tool. Many budget scopes include mounts or other accessories with the scope to try and attract novice gun buyers by given them trinkets while offering mediocre optics.
But in my testing the ED-LHT out-performed some better known scopes brands I’ve reviewed. The image was clean and bright and impressivlely sharp. I was able to see detail in the USAF Optical Resolution chart at 15x that I’m used to seeing with 24x scopes.
The LHT does have some drawbacks. Its eyebox is tight and unforgiving. Is a bit heavy at almost 28oz. But it’s performance for a $300 scopes is impressive. And with all of its accessories, its even more of a value.
AFFILIATE RETAIL LINKS
Worldwide shipping direct from Discovery. Use 15% off code: moondogED3-15
https://discoveryopt.com/products/discoveryopt-ed-lht-gen%E2%85%B1-3-15x50sfir-ffp-mrad-moa-diameter-30mm-optics-scopes?srsltid=AfmBOooDsrA0lOpIkkmmOG9L036lvClUAm_6Vo9DRovdmP4UIckRtDda
Amazon 10% discount code: Moondog315
https://amzn.to/4lIOVAM
RESOLUTION
Group -1 / Element 4
SPECS
Magnification 3x-15x
Objective 50mm
Field of View 12.6M-2.5M@100YDS
Eye relief 88mm-83mm
Exit pupil 11.97mm-3.3mm
Tube diameter 30mm
Click Value 0.1MRAD
Elevation Adj ±23.2MRAD
Windage Adj ±17MRAD
Length 333mm
Weight 792g (27.9 oz)
CVLife 360º Swivel Tilt Bipod
CVLife really needs a better name for this bipod. The new CVLife Light Weight 360º Swivel & Tilt Bipod is pretty much a knock-off of the Magpul MOE Bipod save for its name. Like the MOE, the CVLife bipod is with an aluminum alloy frame, covered with blade-like polymer telescoping legs.
The CVLife’s legs give little resistance from it’s stowed position, allowing you to quickly deploy the legs by swinging them downward where they lock into position splayed out below the rifle. Pressing down on the metal button at the top of the hinged leg, unlocks the leg to swing and fold it back for stowage.
The polymer legs have a locking button allowing each leg to extend out along index stops of the the legs metal core. Each leg has a soft rubberized foot pads which are not changeable or adaptable for spikes. Between the legs is a wide knob which loosens the ball joint allowing the bipod to tilt and swivel a full 360º.
The CVLife bipod comes in your choice of black or FDE brown. CVLife sent me a Picatinny 1913 mounting version to test. They also make an MLok and rifle swivel stud attachable version.
In my testing I found the bipod to be stable and quick to deploy with a little practice. It doesn’t have any spring loaded action unlike their knock-off Harris bipod or spring extending legs found in UTG bipods. But the simplicity is often more reliable. That said, I can not as yet report on the durability of the unit but it does appear to be better built than CVLife’s knock-off Harris bipod.
This product is available on Amazon through my affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3IPQviD
Use discount code: 10MOONDOG
Join the CVLife FB group for more discounts and opportunities to test new products. Join CVLIFE Facebook group by mentioning “Moondog Industries”: https://www.facebook.com/groups/565495247379394
Fenix HT32
Fenix updated their HT series of reachable flashlights with a hunting flashlight which offers a very intuitive 2 button selection scheme. Users can quickly switch between green, red, and white light depending on the situation; to preserve night vision or to track prey. It is able output a blinding 2700 lumens at maximum brightness.
BUY
Get 10% off using code AF-MOONDOG
on Fenix LIghting’s website https://www.fenixlighting.com
Amazon https://amzn.to/3UsK8IX
PSA Jakl 308: SHOT Show
Palmetto State Armory is developing the JAKL, a gas/piston action Battle Rifle platform and showing off its versatility and modularity. On the surface it has MAGPUL Masada ACR vibes, which isn’t a bad thing (if you can divorce the ACR design from the mediocre rendition by Bushmaster and Remington before they went out of business). The ACR never reached its full potential. In any case the JAKL is a badass looking rifle.
The concept JAKL rifle they showed me SHOT Show 2024 was chambered in .308, with features found in rifles such as the FN SCAR, FAL, and the AR10. It does them one better by offering a non-reciprocating ambi charging handle and an 8-position gas setting to allow the rifle to cycle with suppressors and subsonic cartridges.
New Athlon Talos 10x
While many optics come to SHOT Show to show off the latest and trendiest, it’s surprising to see a brand bring out a traditional product. Athlon showed me their new fixed power Talos SFP. That’s right, a fixed power scope. This Talos has a fixed 10x magnification.
What is impressive is that this scope has 35mils (120 MOA) of internal adjustment. So this scope is perfect for airgun or competitive bench rest shooters who are shooting at fixed targets at known ranges. Moreover, coming from Athlon’s Talos line, this optic is also one of their most affordable.
Available on Amazon through this Affiliate link https://amzn.to/4bMSfGU
APEXEL 3-Axis Telescope Phone Mount
Phones have changed how we take photos and videos in our personal lives. Phones have also become ubiquitous in the world of telephotography, birding, and astronomy. Many entry level spotting scopes and telescopes come with plastic and metal phone mounts.
As anybody who has used these free or inexpensive mounts has discovered, getting them aligned properly and keeping them in place can be challenging. And if you need to remove the phone momentarily to adjust the eyepiece or make an optical adjustment, you have to re-align the phone from scratch every time you remove the phone.
APEXEL sent me a 3-axis phone mount for telescopes and binoculars. The mount is made of aluminum alloy for rigidity and stability. It has geared controls knobs that slides your phone along 3-axis of motion: vertical, horizontal, and toward and away from the eyepiece. In my testing I was easily able to align my phone.
It does have 2 shortcomings well 3. The third can’t be helped as it’s a rather large device. The other issues are eye relief and the phone clamp. You will not be able to use this mount on most rifle scopes; which have ≥3″ of eye relief. The APEXEL doesn’t have enough range of adjustment; toping out at about 1″. The other disappointment is the phone mount itself, which is a pinch style claw mount. Your phone is simply held in place by spring tension. APEX should have added a ratcheting mechanism instead.
While this mount isn’t perfect, it’s nearly so. At less than $60 currently, it is a good value compared to specialized other telescope mounting systems of the past. I hope APEXEL comes up with a solution for using it with long eye relief optics like rifle scopes.
This is available on Amazon through my affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3Pr3NGi
Maven RS.5 4-24×50 SFP
Maven is a new company in the Premium Optics world, founded in 2013 in Wyoming by three veterans of the outdoor industry. Their goal was create quality sporting optics without the big box store mark-up by selling direct to consumer through their website. This business model is not new (Arken, Tract, and Discover are some examples) but what does make Maven unique is the level of customization they allow on their products. Maven was the first optics company to offer customers a choice of different color accents, camo patterns, and custom engraving on different parts of their optics.
Perhaps more than most, this scope looked “premium priced”. The price of the RS.5 starts at $1400 and depending on level of customization can run up to $1510. They also offer accessory bundles which include scope rings. The base model arrives in a compressed paper clamshell package, that opens like a high end egg crate; but those fancy ‘cruelty free’ eggs they sell at Organic Markets.
Surface appearances aside, my testing their RS.5 precision hunting scope showed excellent optical and tracking performance. This Japanese made scope has ED glass and an well designed SFP reticle that offered useful elevation and wind hold stadia and a super fine .1 MOA floating center dot for precise long range shooting. Despite its svelt 30mm tube and low profile turret, it offered 100 MOA or vertical travel and precise tracking.
I was especially impressed with the scope’s stylish industrial design. The turrets are resettable but instead of visible hex or slot screws, the top of the turret is seamless hidden locking hut which twists off (though mine was really on tight and required some rubber bands and a pliers to loosen). The control surfaces were nicely checkered and had nice pewter grey accent coloring making the whole scope feel more like a fine timepiece than a typical scope.
I’m looking forward to trying out their other scopes and binoculars. The Maven RS.5 may look boojie but it performs like a badass.
AFFILIATE RETAIL LINK
Maven website: https://alnk.to/7qjxEL4
Amazon: https://amzn.to/43epRJH
SPECS
| RS.5 MOA | |||
| Focal plane | Second | ||
| Magnification range | 4x – 24x | ||
| Obj. lens diameter | 50mm | ||
| Tube diameter | 30mm / 1.8in | ||
| Objective outer diameter | 59mm | ||
| Eyepiece outer diameter | 43.6mm | ||
| Overall length | 366mm / 14.41in | ||
| Weight (without battery) | 25.5oz / 723g | ||
| Internal adjustment range (MOA/MIL) | |||
| Travel Elevation | 100 MOA | 29 MIL | |
| Travel Windage | 70 MOA | 20.3 MIL | |
| Click value | 0.250 MOA | 0.1 MIL | |
| Adjustment per turret revolution | 20 MOA | 10 MIL | |
| Parallax adjustment | 10y – Infinity | ||
| Exit pupil diameter | @4x: 8.5mm | @24x: 2.1mm | |
| Eye relief | @4x: 77-98mm | @24x: 86-98mm | |
| Field of view @ 100y | @4x: 27.8ft | @24x: 4.6ft | |
| Front/Rear mounting length | F: 53mm | R: 52mm | |
| Effective objective lens diameter | @4x: 34.5mm | @24x: 50.0mm | |
| Field of view | @4x: 5.31° | @24x: 0.88° | |
| Field of view, apparent | @4x: 21° | @24x: 21° | |
| Diopter correction (dpt) | +/-3 | ||
| Light transmission | 90.10% | ||
| Twilight factor | @4x: 14.1 | @24x: 34.64 | |
| Functional temperature | -4°~158°F | ||
| Submersion tightness / waterproof rating | 3m depth | ||
| Gas purged | Nitrogen | ||
| Reticle construction | Etched Glass | ||
| Reticle options | SHR-W | SHR-MIL | |
| Illuminated reticle Y/N | Yes | Red | |
| Origin | Made in Japan |
UTG ARCA-Swiss rails
UTG makes some of the best made firearms accessories bar none; and more notably at a reasonable price. At SHOT they showed off their new ARCA-Swiss rails. These rails attaches to an M-Lok compatible handguard and provides a secure mounting point to a variety of shooting tripods.
The clever industrial designers to at UTG weren’t satisfied with simply creating light-weight ARCA-Swiss adapter rails. They created rails that were also MRAS and R-Lock compatible to boot. Best of all all UTG Leapers products are made in Taiwan (the good China) and their UTG Pro line is made in the good ol’ USA. So you don’t have to feel un-patriotic when you’re looking for a good value.
This rail will be available in April
April 28 Contest: Discovery ED-PRS Scope
CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNER
Edward M. of Lewisville TX
April 28 Discovery ED-PRS Scope Contest
Win a Discovery Optics ED-PRS Gen2 FFP Scope. The contest Prize will be chosen from all entries submitted. Entries must be received no later than 12pm EST on April 28, 2024
CONTEST INSTRUCTIONS
1. Take a screen shot of my YouTube or Rumble channel showing you have subscribed/followed.
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@moondogo
- Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/Moondog
2. Prove you have the skills to fill out a form and upload those screen shots https://forms.gle/aMtKBGfWTjyseRBK7
https://forms.gle/aMtKBGfWTjyseRBK7
RULES
NO PURCHASE IS NECESSARY TO ENTER. YOUR CHANCES OF WINNING DO NOT INCREASE WITH A PURCHASE. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED.
1. Eligibility
Void where prohibited by law. Must be legal resident within the USA or Canada. Moondog Industries employees, subsidiaries, affiliates, suppliers, advertising and promotion agencies, employees’ immediate family members, are ineligible to participate in the contest/giveaway.
Entrants must be willing and able to appear on YouTube to discuss the contest and post images of the prize on their social feed should they win the contest.
2. Sponsors and Platforms
Moondog Industries (known as the SPONSOR) is a video Edutainment producer and game promotor based in San Francisco, CA. YouTube, TikTok, Rumble, and online video platforms (known as PLATFORMS) are not SPONSORS or in any way affiliated with the contest or content.
3. Agreement to Rules
By entering your contest, participants agree to abide by the SPONSOR’s Official Rules and decisions. The SPONSOR retains the right to refuse, withdraw, or disqualify entries at their sole discretion. By submitting an entry, the participant agrees to accept the decision of the SPONSOR as final and binding.
4. Entry Period
Contest email entries must be received between:
12:00pm EST 16 Mar 2024
and
12:00pm EST 28 Apr 2024
5. How to Enter
This contest requires your skill in navigating your phone or computer controls to screen capture an image of the following YouTube channels/Social Media accounts. Subscribe or Follow and make a screen capture of those pages showing a greyed out Subscribe button or indicator that your account is Following that page. Send a screen capture image file of any of those sites to contest@moondogindustries.com . One entry per person or per Social Media account. Fraudulent methods of entry, photo retouched, or other methods of circumvention of the rules may result in the SPONSOR invalidating a participant’s entries.
6. Prizes
Winner must be able to receive the prize by e-mail or by physical mail. Prize may be substituted at the sole discretion of the SPONSOR. Acceptance of the prize grants SPONSOR permission to use the Winners entry, name, and likeness for advertising, promotion, and trade without further compensation or remuneration unless prohibited by law.
7. Odds
The odds of winning is dependent upon the number of eligible entries received.
8. Selection and Notification of the Winner
The winner will be chosen at random by the SPONSOR from among the entrants that demonstrated the skill to navigate the electronic entry and have met the minimum requirements. Winners will be contacted via the email used to enter the contest no later than December 31, 2024.
SPONSOR is not liable for the winner’s failure to receive notification of winning if he or she provided the wrong email address or if their email security settings caused your prize notification to go into the spam or junk folder. If a winner does not respond within 24hrs of sending a notification, the SPONSOR will select an alternate winner. Receipt of the prize is upon the condition of compliance with federal, state, and local laws.
9. Rights Granted by the Entrant
The SPONSOR, upon submission of an entry into the giveaway or contest, has the right to use the participant’s submission, voice, likeness, image, statements about the contest, etc., for publicity, news, advertising, promotional purposes, trade, and so forth, without any further notice, review, consent, compensation or remuneration.
Participants shall defend or settle against such claims at their sole expense, and shall indemnify, defend and hold harmless the SPONSOR from any suit due to damage of or by the prize.
10. Terms & Conditions
The SPONSOR reserves the right to modify, suspend, cancel or terminate in the event that non-authorized human intervention, a bug or virus, fraud, or other causes beyond your control impact or corrupt the security, fairness, proper conduct, or administration of the contest/giveaway.
11. Limitation of Liability
Entry into this contest constitutes the participant’s agreement to release and hold harmless the SPONSOR and PLATFORMS, subsidiaries, affiliates, employees, etc., against all claims liability, illness, injury, death, loss, etc., that occurs directly or indirectly from participation in the contest or use/misuse of the awarded prize.
12. Disputes
As a condition of participating in the promotion, the participant agrees to resolve all disputes with an arbitrator designated by the SPONSOR in the state of California, without resorting to any form of class action. Entrants waive all rights to punitive, incidental, or consequential damages, and waive all rights to have damages multiplied or increased.
13. Privacy Policy
Participants agree to abide by all privacy and NDA laws in the State of California and any federal laws of the United State of America.
14. Winners List
Participants may request a list of winners by submitting a request in writing to Moondog Industries for up to 30 days after the contest ends.
15. Social Media Platform Rules
Winners will agree to post a photo of the prize on their social media channels in such a way as does not violate any rules of that platform. The winners also agree to appear for an interview where they will discuss the prize and its performance. If there are functional problems with the prize, the winner agrees to make a good-faith effort to resolve all issues with the SPONSOR prior to posting reviews or opinions about the prize.
16. Affirmation of Acceptance of and Agreement to All of the Official Rules
By entering the contest, the entrant has affirmatively reviewed, accepted, and agreed to all of them.