Sightmark Pinnacle Scope Review

Sightmark is a lesser known optics company, but it has recently brought a premier scope line to market. The Sightmark Pinnacle is a 1-6x24mm variable that comes with a couple of reticle choices. When I pulled the scope from the box it shipped in, two markings on the packaging gave me a lot of information about the company and the scope on loan to me.

The company is headquartered in Texas, where the design work for the Sightmark Pinnacle likely occured. There in Texas, Sightmark determined that the Pinnacle would be a 1-6X optic and have a 24mm objective lens. It also designed and set the specifications for the entire scope, to include the tenth-mil adjustable capped turrets, internal adjustment mechanisms and 30mm maintube. Last, the company designed the two reticles that would go in the Sightmark Pinnacle, the AAC and the TMD.

The TMD came in the Sightmark Pinnacle I evaluated, and it's one of the more useful reticles available for a 1-6X scope. There is a floating dot where the traditional crosshair would be, and the horizontal and verticle stadia lines are clearly marked in 1-mil increments. There is a large oblong circle that surrounds the stadia intersection that measures 51/2 mils tall and 3.6 mils wide.

The floating dot is small enough to work as well for precision shooting as six power allows it to. The clean 1-mil subtention also makes it possible to use the Sightmark Pinnacle with any catridge/rifle combination and not be tied to a ballistic reticle/cartridge combination. The reticle is also in the first focal plane, so the 1-mil marks will always accurately measure 1 mil regardless of our power setting.

The reticle has five illumination settings, available in either red or green. Reticles that illuminate in more than one color are increasingly frequent and provide us with an option previously unavailable. Traditionalists favor red, while many shooters prefer green because it contrasts more sharply with most backgrounds. Whichever you prefer, the Pinnacle can display both.

The other stamp I found interesting on the box read "Made In Japan." A lot of really good scopes get made there. Some of the most well-recognized optics companies headquartered here in the U.S. (where Sightmark does its design work) actually have their scopes built in Japan. The Sightmark Pinnacle falls into this category.

The scope industry is a little unique in that most companies employ management, engineers and customer service types, but the actual building of the scope gets done by only two or three big optics assembly companies. One of the best in the world is in Japan, and that's where the Sightmark Pinnacle is built. I know some pretty serious optics snobs who insist that the best glass available today comes from that factory in Japan.

Sightmark's scope has performance on par with other similarly priced 1-6X optics on the market. The company did an excellent job designing this scope and spared no expense on its manufacture. The glass offers excellent clarity, the reticle is one of the better ones available, and the 30mm maintube is robust while still offering substantial amounts of internal adjustment.

The 1-6x24mm scope was the first Pinnacle model available, and I'm interested to see how the newer models perform. The optics industry is crowded and very competitive, but there's always room at the table for one more quality manufacturer.

---