LabRadar Chronograph Review
Whew!! Got it! Now for some shootin'. We set up prone and Rhian got his trusty .308 with some 215 Bergers ready.
The display is easy to see if you set up straight on to the unit.
As you can see, we got the corrected reading for the muzzle, 6 yards out, 20, 40 and 60 yards out, but it didn't get the 80 yard.
We were having some issues with grass and felt it could be blocking some results so we set up on the tripod at its lowest point. Also we switched to my 300 win mag with 215 Bergers and I put my MagnetoSpeed chronograph on for velocity comparisons. The readings of the two units were very close, so close that it would be hard to prove which one is actually just a few fps off.
Next we strapped the MagnetoSpeed to my AR 15 in .223 with 55 gr bullets to see how the LabRadar does on smaller calibers. We pretty much failed here. Even with several adjustments to settings and unit location the LabRadar was not wanting to grab the small bullets. The ones it did grab registered a couple hundred fps different than the MagnetoSpeed. Investigating led us to find out we were using one of the earliest prototype units and a software change had already been put in motion. New units should not have this issue. We also had some issues with wind triggering the unit on the very sensitive settings. This was only an issue while trying to tweak the unit to get readings on the .223.
The display is easy to see if you set up straight on to the unit.
As you can see, we got the corrected reading for the muzzle, 6 yards out, 20, 40 and 60 yards out, but it didn't get the 80 yard.
We were having some issues with grass and felt it could be blocking some results so we set up on the tripod at its lowest point. Also we switched to my 300 win mag with 215 Bergers and I put my MagnetoSpeed chronograph on for velocity comparisons. The readings of the two units were very close, so close that it would be hard to prove which one is actually just a few fps off.
Next we strapped the MagnetoSpeed to my AR 15 in .223 with 55 gr bullets to see how the LabRadar does on smaller calibers. We pretty much failed here. Even with several adjustments to settings and unit location the LabRadar was not wanting to grab the small bullets. The ones it did grab registered a couple hundred fps different than the MagnetoSpeed. Investigating led us to find out we were using one of the earliest prototype units and a software change had already been put in motion. New units should not have this issue. We also had some issues with wind triggering the unit on the very sensitive settings. This was only an issue while trying to tweak the unit to get readings on the .223.
Publisher's Note:
We recently received the software (firmware) update for our unit. We haven't had a chance to install it and re-test, but we will report our findings when we do. We were told the update will solve the issue of missed readings on smaller calibers.
By the way, this thing is really easy to set up and use. I love it. I had tested it briefly before we sent the unit on to Jeff and Rhian for their own independent evaluation.
We'll be using it at the LRH-NTO Shooting Classes next month to help in validating trajectories for each of the shooters' rifles. Imagine this unit's advantages when you have 8 rifles to measure velocities on in a short time frame.
-Len Backus-
By the way, this thing is really easy to set up and use. I love it. I had tested it briefly before we sent the unit on to Jeff and Rhian for their own independent evaluation.
We'll be using it at the LRH-NTO Shooting Classes next month to help in validating trajectories for each of the shooters' rifles. Imagine this unit's advantages when you have 8 rifles to measure velocities on in a short time frame.
-Len Backus-
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