300blk CVA Scout or T/C hand guns with rifle scopes?

[Slow Loris]

Does anyone with one of these break action handguns use a rifle scope with the gun? Wondering if the recoil is tame enough not to be inviting a black eye or if a LER scope or red dot is considered a must by most who own one of these. Anyone with experience?

[golfindia]

My 300blk prohunter has no recoil.

I have a 35 Whelen barrel with a scope on it, never been a problem

[steven11b]

I use a red dot on my CVA scout pistol but I wouldn't be worried about using a scope as the recoil is fairly tame.

[bangbangping]

Is this a scope you already have or are you planning to purchase? Whether or not recoil is an issue, it will be awkward shooting a handgun with a rifle scope. I'd certainly try it before plunking down dollars.

[RKB731]

I have been shooting a T/C Contender chambered in 300 Whisper (Blackout) for over 12 years. It currently wears a BSA 3 x 12 riflescope and I have no issues. I have only shot subsonic in my barrel, can't comment on supers.

[Slow Loris]

Thanks for the comments.

Is this a scope you already have or are you planning to purchase? Whether or not recoil is an issue, it will be awkward shooting a handgun with a rifle scope. I'd certainly try it before plunking down dollars.

Just brainstorming and researching at the moment. Wasn't thinking I'd be shooting such a setup like a regular handgun.

[teegee52]

I shoot an Encore with a 16.5" Bergara barrel as both a pistol and rarely as a rifle. No max barrel length for a pistol here in Illinois. Use a 1-4 Primary Arms Rifle scope. Just have to be careful of eye relief. Off hand I tuck it in tight with my left elbow against my chest. With the rifle scope's improved field of view I not only find it much faster but also a lot more accurate off hand.

[Damocles]

I threw a rifle scope on my CVA Scout pistol in 300 Blackout to test out overall accuracy before moving permanently to a pistol scope. Recoil isn't an issue on the Blackout, even with full house loads, but it is rather awkward.

[Slow Loris]

I threw a rifle scope on my CVA Scout pistol in 300 Blackout to test out overall accuracy before moving permanently to a pistol scope. Recoil isn't an issue on the Blackout, even with full house loads, but it is rather awkward.

I have no personal experience with pistol scopes, but they too look awkward. Plus the long eye relief seems to cost these scopes in other areas. I'm kind of going on the assumption that these sorts of guns are best used with some sort of support (bipod, bench, shooting sticks, etc) rather than used like a conventional handgun regardless of scope used. I was thinking that available rifle scopes would be much better at making long range accurate shots and dealing with bullet drop than any pistol scope I've seen. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I'd be interested to hear more about your set up and what you can do with it.

More generally I think a lot of my interest and I imagine others in these single shot hand guns is as an alternative to a break action or bolt action SBR. They're a lot cheaper and less hassle than getting an SBR, and they're even more compact. But of course at the cost of not having a stock of any sort. So the question really is does not having a stock amount to too much of a compromise or are there ways of compensating for that which make these specialty hand guns a real alternative choice to SBR bolt/break actions to get the most out subsonic 300BLK?

[Damocles]

I can't claim to be an expert on scoped handgun shooting, but I'll pass on what I've picked up. Unless you're out in the brush while hunting, a bipod or bag rest is a must. The weight wasn't bad shooting offhand, but the front-end balance throws things out of whack. I suppose you could get a single-point sling and use it like some people do on MP5 pistol setups.

When it came to scoping up the pistol, it basically came down to what felt the least awkward. With a rifle scope my arms were so bent it became uncomfortable. With the pistol scope my form comes closer to a standard pistol stance, except sitting down. YMMV, but I had no problems keeping groups the same size going from a 12x to 7x scope. Subsonic here, as, outside of experimenting, I don't bother with supersonic. That being said, not everything is peachy with a LER-scoped pistol. The lack of a stock really does spice things up. No cheek weld becomes interesting after I've been out there and my head starts bobbing from a tired neck.

Something that I had never considered, but was throwing me for a while, was proper grip. It wasn't until I practiced dry-firing the pistol that I noticed my crosshairs would sometimes jump an inch to the left of the bullseye after the snap. Working with it, I found that my hand would subtly tighten during the trigger squeeze, and when the trigger would break my hand would shift the pistol. Very subtle, but, when fixed, tightened my groups from ~2" at 100yrds to ~1" at 100yrds.

In my view, these pistols don't do anything the break-action rifles won't do, besides the compact form factor.

That's probably way more than you asked for, but for me shooting a scoped break-action pistol is tons of fun because it's weird, oddball, and everything you do is harder than if you tried it with a rifle. In short, I don't feel the need to be as serious with it.



Excuse the sight and mount. I had just stolen them off a T/C and the rings weren't spaced correctly.