By Jeff Johnston, FE Hunting & Shooting Editor
There’s a place for a huge-ass scope, and one of those is atop of a .50-cal. Barrett. The rifle alone weighs around 30 pounds, so clearly weight isn’t an issue. So this is one case where I personally want an optic with the most magnification possible, a giant 56mm objective, full-fledged target turrets, an illuminated reticle that looks like a Christmas tree, and a fat tube for maximum adjustment range even if it requires scope rings that cost more than some guns I own.
There are only a handful of these gun-mounted Hubble telescopes out there, and one of them is Trijicon’s Tenmile 4.5-30x-56mm. It weighs 36 ounces alone, but has every feature to make long-range shooting as mathematical as it possibly can be.
A giant elevation target turret allows making adjustments without coming off the rifle at all because it is tall enough to be seen when on the stock and tactile enough to cleanly feel each click. Of course it has a zero stop and all the bells and whistles; the windage dial is covered. Custom turret caps can be made for your dope and easily installed. The adjustment range is 100 MOA of elevation, 50 MOA of windage, which isn’t bad, but frankly I’m surprised it’s not even more considering the 34mm tube.
The left side of the scope houses the illuminated reticle’s rheostat that contains both red and green illumination; each color has five intensity settings with off stops between each. All is powered by one 2032 battery. The etched reticle itself is a marvel; multiple versions are available in first or second focal plane, in MRAD and MOA. I like the fact that the subtension values are etched at the very bottom of the reticle for those like me who tend to forget such details.
Here’s the deal with ultra-high-magnification optics, including riflescopes and spotters: While it’s easy to wish you had 60x magnification so targets at 1,000 yards would look huge, the reality is that everything is an engineering equation with optics, and so after about 30x, the optic’s lenses would have to be so big to transmit enough light to be usable that the scope wouldn’t be practical. And besides, scope shake as well as mirage all but make anything over about 30x (depending on the conditions) unusable anyway. So in my experience, this 30x Trijicon with its 56mm objective is about as high powered as I can go with it still being practical to mount on a rifle.
In testing, I found this Tenmile unit supremely bright, clear, incredibly precise in its adjustments, and very tough thanks to its heavy build. It’s obvious to me that Trijicon put everything the company has into this scope line in an attempt to appeal to the professionals who can spare no expense. Its reticle, once learned, is amazing in its speed and precision if the shooter wishes to forgo dialing. The illumination system is tops. Optically it hangs with about anything, at least to my eyes.
Ninety-five percent of the time I feel like shooters buy bigger scopes than they actually need on their rifles. But sometimes a guy truly needs a big-ass scope for the most precise, long-range work possible, and this particular Trijicon is simply one of the best available.
Cost: $2,995
Pros: Bright, tough, and great adjustments; excellent reticle and reticle options.
Cons: Is so big that it looks silly on all but the biggest of target rifles.
