Rifle scopes with LM rail

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Introduction

Mounting rails on rifle scopes are much more dependable than rings, to be clear. I do not know why, but they gain little to none popularity overseas. Here, in Europe, rail standards are rising and have already been popular for a long period of time.

The oldest mounting rail standard, known as "LM rail", "70°C rail" or "Prism rail", has been in use for decades. Nowadays, it’s slowly dying out (or it is already outdated, to be fair) and being replaced by modern rail standards, such as Swarovski’s SR rail, Zeiss’s ZM/VM rail or similar. However, LM rail standard was used for a long time and it was used only by European manufacturers (and it was widely spread among them). Its lack of popularity today might be a result of needed drilling during installation of this mounts.

There are still a lot of rifle scopes out there with LM rails which are perfectly working, so it is logical that manufacturers still produce mounts for those scopes. In contrast, there is basically no more new rifle scopes in production with such rails.

Properties of LM Rail standard

At first, LM rail had a prismatic shape in its cross section and the angles of the rail were placed at 70° angle. The rail was 15 mm wide at its base. The problem with these rails was that almost all of these rails were individually fitted and custom finished, because this was the only option to join rifle with the rifle scope. Later, LM rails became standardized, which made mounting process easier (because all such rails got same size and dimensions) and it was no longer important which scope manufacturer produced the scope with its rail.

Pros

LM rails are definitely a reliable solution. Therefore, they are durable and robust. Without rings, there is also no pressure or tension on the scope tubes (and no signs on the scope when removing it). A lot of supporting material always result as a good solution with more powerful and hard kicking calibers. Screws that connect the rifle with the attached scope, also work as a recoil stoppers. Last, but not least – achieving the perfect horizontal alignment is simple with the railed scopes (no matter which type of rail is used).

Cons

Huge drawback of LM rails is that they required a gunsmith to first drill 2 holes into the mount from side to side through the rail and tighten the rail through them with screws. Also, gunsmith had to carefully placed these holes with exact locations of the holes on the rifle to make a joint with screw. If this part was not made carefully, screws could not have been inserted correctly. If the scope was later put on a different rifle, there was almost always a need for drilling new holes, because old ones from the previous rifle were useless (distances between slots were not standardized as it is with new rails, Picatinny for example).

From economic aspect, this results in higher costs and non-interchangeable parts. We should not forget to mention that beside the fact that there are less and less mounts and scopes with this rail on the market, there is also too much potential for errors with this type of mounting.

Brands that used to use this rail standard

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VIDEO

Hunting riflescopes are the most common type of riflescopes. For this reason, this is the biggest category on our website. Even though there are many types of hunting-riflescopes, there are some characteristics that many of them share.

A rifle with optics - hunting riflescope

Mounting solutions - Ring and Rail mounts

Both ring and rail mounting options are available. This is the only category where rail mounting is available, but it is only available with some middle-class and premium scopes. There are four rail mounting standards altogether (the rail option offered depends on the manufacturer):

LM rail (optical devices with this rail are no longer manufactured but mounts for it are still produced)
Zeiss ZM/VM rail
Swarovski SR rail
Schmidt & Bender Convex rail

Schmidt & Bender Polar T96 2.5-10x50 with a S & B Convex rail

Tube diameter

Tube diameters of 30 mm and 25.4 mm are the most common.

Scopes with a 34mm tube are rare – Schmidt & Bender Polar T96 series is one of the few that use it.
Zeiss Victory V8 and Blaser Infinity are equipped with a 36mm tube,
whilst Swarovski dS is equipped with a tube that measures 40 mm in diameter.

It is important to note that tube diameter does not affect the light transmission rate.

Turrets

Riflescope for hunters is equipped with low-profile, capped elevation and windage turrets. After a scope is zeroed (at 100 m), most users won't make any further adjustments to the windage and elevation. For this reason, the turrets are capped to prevent unwanted rotation.

As such optics is commonly used in forests where one can quickly bump the riflescope somewhere, capped turrets are the best way to avoid the unintentional shifts of the point of impact.
Furthermore, these are among the most delicate parts and can break if hit too hard.
Caps are used to prevent that.
With some modern, premium optics, there is an option of purchasing an uncapped, BDC elevation turret which allows the user to quickly compensate for the bullet drop at longer distances by setting the turret to the number for the corresponding distance (1 – 100 m, 2 – 200 m, 3 – 300 m, etc.)

The reticle

Most riflescopes are equipped with a hunting-oriented reticle. Usually, the reticle is a crosshair with thicker lines at the sides and narrower lines towards the center.

There are no holdovers or hash marks because it is meant to be simple to use.
The reticle is mainly in the second focal plane, meaning that it appears to be of the same size regardless of the magnification, providing minimal coverage of the target.
Blaser Infinity with first focal plane reticle configuration is an exception to the rule.

FFP-hunting optics were used in the past but are gradually dying out. Commonly, the riflescope is equipped with an illuminated central dot, the intensity of which depends on its purpose.

Magnification

The magnification is either

fixed or
variable.

A few decades ago, fixed magnification optical devices were the prevalent type, now it is the other way around. In England, Scotland, South Africa, and some other countries, many users still prefer the fixed type over the variable type. Entry and middle-class riflescopes have a 4–6x zoom factor, whereas the premium ones boast a 6–8x zoom factor.

Parallax

Parallax is typically fixed at 100 m.
If magnification is above 12x, a riflescope is usually equipped with an adjustable parallax setting (side focus).

Swarovski Z8i 2.3-18x56 has an adjustable parallax turret (on the left)

Subcategories

There are many subcategories:

Best Hunting-riflescopes

Riflescopes of the highest quality are produced by the renowned European sport optics manufacturers such as:

Such devices are equipped with:

an illuminated reticle,
commonly a fine, central illuminated dot.

The zoom factor is 6x or greater. There is an option of purchasing an uncapped BDC turret on most. Reticles are in the second focal plane, except with the Blaser Infinity series which features an FFP-configuration.

Premium optics boast:

an exceptional field of view,
impressive resolution,
a high light transmission rate, and
a high degree of colour fidelity.

They are difficult to compare because there are only small differences among them, but each series has its own strong point (Leica Magnus series, for example, is known for its incredibly wide field of view).

The middle-class devices are not to be overlooked since its popularity has risen considerably in the last few years.
Most of these devices are made in Japan and highly popular because of their excellent price to performance ratio.
Some European-made devices can also be found in this class.

A short presentation is available here.

Short Presentation | HuntingRiflescopes | Optics Trade from Optics-Trade

Rifle scopes with LM rail

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VIDEO

Introduction

Properties of LM Rail standard

Pros

Cons

Brands that used to use this rail standard

Conclusion

Kaps Classic 8x56 mm RC/OC (rail)

Kaps TLB 1-4x24 (rail)

Kaps TLB 3-12x56 (rail)

Kaps Classic 2-8x42 RC (rail)

Kaps Classic 2.5-10x50 mm MRC (rail)

Kaps Classic 2.5-10x56 mm MRC/OC (rail)

Kaps Illuminated 2.5-10x56 mm MRC/OC (rail)

Kaps Illuminated 2.5-10x50 mm MRC/OC (rail)

Kaps Classic 4x36 mm RC (rail)

Kaps Classic 6x42 mm RC/OC (rail)

Kaps Illuminated 8x56 RC (rail)

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Mounting solutions - Ring and Rail mounts

Tube diameter

Turrets

The reticle

Magnification

Parallax

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Best Hunting-riflescopes

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Rifle scopes with LM rail

Sub Categories

VIDEO

Introduction

Properties of LM Rail standard

Pros

Cons

Brands that used to use this rail standard

Conclusion

VIDEO

Mounting solutions - Ring and Rail mounts

Tube diameter

Turrets

The reticle

Magnification

Parallax

Subcategories

Best Hunting-riflescopes

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