Thread: Pulsar Apex XD Thermal Rifle Scope

Pulsar Apex XD Thermal Rifle Sight

Greetings hunters!

At last, I managed to have use of, though way too briefly, one of our new Pulsar Apex XD Thermal Rifle Sights, thanks to a very accommodating customer. It was SO GOOD, that I whimpered when the courier took it away.

Demand for these sights has exceeded supply, which is hardly surprising considering its price v performance. It is a beast, to say the least, and will be the downfall of many New Zealand woodland furries.

Production
Serial production began in Yukon Optic's Lithuanian factory at the end of November 2014, and due to demand, Yukon have began parallel manufacturing these by their UK subsidiary, Polaris Vision Systems EU Limited. All our Pulsar Apex sights are manufactured by Polaris.

Performance
Firstly, it has an amorphous silicon 384x288 IR UFPA, refreshing at 50 frames per second (50Hz). As anyone knows about thermal imagers, the faster the refresh rate, the more information reaches the user, for a smoother, higher detailed image. We don't sell the low Hz crap, because we know New Zealanders deserve the best. I could neck shoot a deer in the neck at 250m with the XD38, and over 300m with the XD50.

Features
The Pulsar Apex XD has some really cool features, such as Picture-in-Picture mode, three modes of calibration, a choice of 10 reticles, which can be changed on-the-fly whilst maintaining POI, a wireless remote, one-shot and freeze frame zeroing, and a very good resolution enhancement algorithm. It has a wide field-of-view, and a progressive 2x zoom. It also has pre-programmed viewing modes, and fully adjustable brightness and contrast. It is also waterproof to IP67, and is cased in an impact proof, glass filled body (same as all Pulsar products). The f1.2 objective lens delivers great performance, and has a fast-focus lever. I forgot to focus it on some of the videos, which is really annoying.

The first thing that surprised me was the size and weight. It's a lot lighter and smaller than I expected. It uses the same mounting system as the new Pulsar LRF N870 (a review coming up on that as well soon), which is very strong. It was easy to mount, and did not take long to sight-in. I used a ball of BluTac, which I rolled between the palms of my hand, and pressed onto the aiming mark as a means to sight-in. It worked a treat.

I fitted the Pulsar Apex XD38 on to our Baikal MP-161K, before 'evaluating' its performance on my dwindling rabbit population. The second part of my Baikal review will include my experiences with the thermal.

Enjoy this video:

Pulsar Apex Thermal Pulsar Apex XD38 / XD50 Thermal Rifle Sight from Yukon Optics New Zealand on Vimeo


The video is OK, but I wish I had more time to produce videos with it. For instance, I forgot to take any Black Hot videos (sounds a bit dodgy eh?).

Anyway, I got to use one, I got to kill with one, and I can't wait to have a demo that I can use, and pass on to my dealers.

The image is so sharp that the video doesn't do it justice, but its better than nowt!

There's a bloody typo in the vid. Supposed to be 'cattle at 1050m not 1350m'. Will fix this later today. It is after 5.00 am, and I have almost finished a 20 hour shift. Self employment eh?