So, for those of you that have both or have used both, which of the two would you obtain? What are the drawbacks? I've been tasked with figuring out if the Labradar is worth the additional costs over the V3. The LR coming in at $660 with the unit, case, and base. The V3 coming in at $460 with the rail adapter, phone xfr adapter, tapered spacer kit. It's disappointing that neither have package discounts for these pretty universal combinations. Make the mistake of shooting the V3 bayo - the cost savings is erased.
The LR wins mostly because of versatility and usability beyond rifle, though there may be ways around that.
I'm looking for reasons other than the obvious, that the MS is difficult if not impossible to use with something other than rifle being chief among them.
We are looking to track archery, pistol, and rifle - with and without suppressors. Busy ranges is less of a concern, for now.
Thanks for the info.
We have a ShootingChrony Beta Master optical unit that is suitable - if clumsy - to get the slower/non MS usable shots. It doesn't seem to do well with the rifle speeds when shooting though?
I've read lots of other boards posts, I guess I just trust some of you guys more? Thanks for any input.
Nothing kills the incentive of men faster than a healthy sense of entitlement. Nothing kills entitlement faster than a healthy sense of achievement.
04-19-2018, 10:20 PM (This post was last modified: 04-19-2018, 10:25 PM by mdewitt71.)
I have both... (plus a Caldwell and a ProChrono).
The LabRadar is my favorite now.
No messing with the bayonet or having to take it off from rifle to rifle, no barrel harmonics issues if I try to zero or group either.
LabRadar is easy to setup and I use a 13000mah Anker battery (from Amazon) and it lasts me several weeks.
I have a Dell Laptop case that I had brand new in the plastic and it fits the LabRader perfect, so I didnt buy the expensive "LabRadar" branded battery or case.
I had 6 guys shooting at the range both sides of me and only my rounds were being recorded; if its setup properly it just plain works.
The Caldwell App is my favorite app but, the Chrony is finicky and the tripod is garbage.
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf. ― George Orwell
04-20-2018, 12:13 AM (This post was last modified: 04-25-2018, 06:12 AM by Klem.)
I use the Labradar now and for years used the fold-out Chrony. Never used the Magnetopeed so cannot comment on the comparison. Other than to say the shift in MPI with something hanging off the end of the barrel is well known and undesired. That is unless all you want to do at the time is chronographing. Seems like such a waste of bullets to shoot for velocity only. The same with my Chrony, you set it up and cannot shoot for groups at the same time unless you faff around getting the 'tunnel' through the skyscreens exactly lined up between the target and the shooting position. It's just a drama I don't have time for so mostly I shot for velocity only.
My point is, the biggest benefit of the Labradar for me is its incidental position next to the gun. I turn mine on and shoot groups while it records the velocity at the same time, whether I really want to know or not. It is quick to set up so it's just part of the range routine now. Previously I only set up the Chrony when I wanted to know the velocity. A couple of button presses and it does it's thing next to you. It goes to sleep and wakes up when you fire a shot and at the end of a string you check the velocities out of curiosity.
I don't use the inbuilt AA battery compartment as it drains them too quickly. I use 4*18650 Li-ion rechargeable batteries with a voltage regulator. Lab Radar wouldn't tell me the voltage range of the USB Micro slot so I just use a $2 regulator to keep the voltage at 5V (the universal standard for USB devices). https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/XL4015-Volta...SwKIdaWG7V
I knocked up a stand for bench shooting out of a piece of wood with some rubber non-slip on the bottom. Labradar's stand is $40 so I guess old cheap Uncle Klem couldn't bring himself to paying that after forking out hundreds for the main device.
I have had no issues with the Laradar except for suppressed. The inbuilt microphone does not pick it up so you have to use the 'Doppler' setting. This means the radar starts measuring velocity only when the bullet enters the emitter arc down-range. You don't know exactly when it entered the arc so it's a bit of guesswork extrapolating it back to a muzzle velocity. What you can do to mitigate this is have the device as close to the gun as possible and turn the emitter across the barrel axis (so it's not pointing at the target). This shortens the distance before the bullet enters the arc so there's less difference between muzzle velocity and when it first detects the bullet.
Just a FYI on the lab radar, there is a blue tooth app that’s over due. Emailed them last month and said it should be released soon. Nice to use your cell phone to make changes. Love mine. 1st and only chrono for me. Wouldn’t use anything else. Worth every penny!
I have a Magneto Speed. I use a 13 slot rail mounted on the handguard so the forward 2/3 of the rail are extended enough to use the picatinny mount so now POI shift on my ARs (except my 24" Lilja).
Now the family has 4 Howa's. That is a problem and I too am tired of wasting bullets. I've gone through 100 RDFs and all I have to show for my efforts is velocity - partially my fault.
Looking into Labradar until the next best thing comes out. Buy once, Cry once I guess.
MD, good call on the laptop case! I've still got my backpack I used when taking some college courses to carry my laptop to class - it also just happens to be orange... This could also help with ammo, etc. Very good call. Also, would you mind posting or messaging a close up picture or pictures of how the mount plate is assembled? I've got two pieces of 14x14x3/16" aluminum plate that I think I can make a mount from to simplify my life. As far as I can tell, it's a plate with a tripod ball head adapter attached, this sound about right? The ball heads are 10 bucks from amasson.. Removing both of these accessories would save me $70 bucks!
Klem, good call yourself on the mount for the bench. I am glad to read about your external battery source and the voltage regulator, curious reasoning only, as most every battery I can find out now has a "smart" charge system, which includes what you bought there from ebay. Doubling those in series may cause problems? If one goes out, I guess... one is none... I have four batteries sitting around, two 12k, one 15k, and one 20k. I think one of the 12k's will be my new dedicated radar battery, sorry son.
I think I'm pretty much sold on the Lab Radar. I'm communicating with them now about upgrades planned, I don't want to spend 600 bucks to be slapped with a "well, you could have a really great system with the bugs worked out, but since you bought yours three months before we released the upgraded version.... here, here's $20 off the newest model for the inconvenience" situation. Good thoughts Bearcat, thanks.
Just so happened that LR got back to me. From their email:
"Every unit ever built has had Bluetooth built into it. This is part of the forward thinking that went into this product. We did not want to keep upgrading and selling a model 1, then 2, then 3, etc. This should be a one and done purchase. The unit is upgradeable in the future as well by downloading free firmware updates from our website." They also expect the app to be out within the month. Sounds good to me.
Now, to add Kestrel sensor arrays to it, and be able to Bluetooth to the app in the phone with a ballistic AE library... THAT would be a nice unit.
Nothing kills the incentive of men faster than a healthy sense of entitlement. Nothing kills entitlement faster than a healthy sense of achievement.
04-20-2018, 08:06 PM (This post was last modified: 04-20-2018, 08:12 PM by mdewitt71.)
This is how I roll........
Base mounting plate fits perfect in top pocket.
The faster the SD card the shortest time it takes for the LabRadar to go active again from the last shot readout..... If you have a slow or older card, it will take several seconds for the fire light to come back on.
I run a 16GB "XC I" it is perfect and plenty of room; Choose from the middle column and you will be fine- https://www.sdcard.org/developers/overview/speed_class/
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf. ― George Orwell
04-21-2018, 01:47 AM (This post was last modified: 04-25-2018, 06:09 AM by Klem.)
Kswhitetails Wrote:Klem, good call yourself on the mount for the bench. I am glad to read about your external battery source and the voltage regulator, curious reasoning only, as most every battery I can find out now has a "smart" charge system, which includes what you bought there from ebay. Doubling those in series may cause problems? If one goes out, I guess... one is none... I have four batteries sitting around, two 12k, one 15k, and one 20k. I think one of the 12k's will be my new dedicated radar battery, sorry son.
.
KS,
Don't want to get too far off the spirit of your thread but to clarify. Lab Radar (LR) draws more power than all other chronograph types because it is active, not passive. I use the same 9V battery for the old fold-out Chrony for months but with the LR you cannot take for granted your power supply. It needs to be fresh every time, or at least have a back-up. Arguably rechargeables are the go because they are the cheapest.
With my battery pack in the last post I think the smart charge system you are referring to is the PCB, not the power regulator. It is the Protection Circuit Board (PCB) found in all Li-ion battery packs. The PCB protects and manages what otherwise would be a fragile battery from over-charging, over-discharging, or drawing too much current. Without a PCB the battery will likely be permanently damaged or even catch fire. For example, if you let a Li-ion cell drain below 3V it's difficult to get it to hold a charge again.
The PCB is the bulge in my pack shown in the photo. With the PCB the Li-ion battery still provides 8.1V when fully charged down to 6V when 'empty'. As I said, the sales rep for LR won't tell me the acceptable voltage range of the radar so I have to limit the external power supply to a constant 5V with a voltage regulator (on left). I could do away with the voltage regulator and attach the battery straight to the radar and it will probably be fine. But it's an expensive risk so I'd rather spend $2 and a few minutes of soldering time.
I did initially use a commercial (Chinese) USB power pack but after a while it stopped taking a charge. I threw it away and built my own power pack. Here's the original setup. My fault for choosing the cheapest power pack on Fleabay.
Copy that Klem. I was of the understanding that the PCB actually measures in and out based on need/draw, but how could it know the limitations on the demand? I can’t see your most recent two pics. And don’t worry about taking it off course, I’ll get things back on track. Take this wherever you think it should go, I need to know what to expect.
Nothing kills the incentive of men faster than a healthy sense of entitlement. Nothing kills entitlement faster than a healthy sense of achievement.
04-21-2018, 03:59 AM (This post was last modified: 04-22-2018, 05:11 AM by Klem.)
Ks,
You are correct, a Li-ion PCB measures what is going in and going out but it only steps in to isolate the battery if its factory-programmed limits are exceeded. Other than that it leaves the battery alone.
It will allow up to 5-7A to be drawn from the battery pack before stopping it. LabRadar lists its consumption as 0.8A at 5V, so well within the limits of the PCB. It will also cut off power to the radar when the first cell drops below 2.3V. Any lower and damage to the battery occurs. When I say first cell Li-ion batteries are never exactly the same so some will discharge and age quicker than others. Some have more internal resistance than others. This is why if you have more than one cell after a while the cells will get out of balance. I use a smart charger to balance Li-ion packs every now and then to keep them fresh otherwise they will start to give reduced capacity when there's nothing wrong with them. The charger gives voltage reading for individual cells which I why the white JST plug is on the pack. The red Deans plug is for power in and out and the JST for monitoring the individual cells when charging. If you keep all the cells in your pack balanced you get more life/capacity out of the battery. Commercial USB power packs don't let you do this and this may have been what was wrong with mine. I never pulled it apart so will never know.
Back to Lab Radar. That 2-cell 7.2V Li-ion pack made from 4*18650 laptop batteries is enough power for my 2-hour shooting sessions (total capacity is about 4000mAh). The radar draws more power when it is emitting than when it is on standby and you toggle between the two settings between strings. Like a radio, battery life depends on how much transmitting you do relative to how much it is on but on standby. The radar has two time limits that you can adjust;
'Arming time' (when the radar is emitting, max power draw) = 300 seconds.
'Screenaver' (the LED screen is backlit) = 600 seconds.
I set Arming to the full 300 and Screensaver to 120. If the screen has switched itself off and you fire a shot, as long as it is still Armed then it will wake itself back up again. Once Arming reaches 300secs without a shot being fired it switches itself off. When each shot is fired it re-sets the clock to zero so you can leave it Armed/emitting for longer than 300secs as long as you are still shooting.
I've dealt with them a lot (battery Junction) so their claim of 500 charge cycles would be a good stance if the unit fails early.
.
How much did it cost?...Unsure because I built the pack and regulator some time ago for a portable lighting project. I just soldered up the USB Micro lead to make it compatible with the radar. That said, about $20 for four batteries plus the PCB and regulator $6, plus plugs and heat shrink, leads etc $4, so about $30. About the same as the Battery Junction power pack plus postage link you sent, but with the hassle of putting it together. For me, putting this stuff together is a hobby so I don't put a cost on my time. I did start out by buying a ready-made pack which was nice and clean and neat but that didn't last. I would also be cautious with any claims to capacity. That pack claims to be 12Ahr which is probably exaggerated. Battery Junction sells cheap parts and their international postage is reasonable. They are an Indian company that sells Chinese batteries. Those two countries are not high on the honesty scale when it comes to product claims.
If you don't have all this hobby gear at hand then I'd be the first to recommend sourcing a ready-made USB power pack like the one in your link.
Here you go, 30 bucks. Use the 1.0A output. Limited at 1.0Amp/5v. This means that unless the LR goes defunct, you can't overpower the port. The battery isn't going to "push" 1.0Amp, but it's available only if required by the device. We may be making this overly complicated -which I get - that's part of the fun. Nice pack btw Klem. That yellow thing looks like Iphone and Samsung had a stepchild.
Nothing kills the incentive of men faster than a healthy sense of entitlement. Nothing kills entitlement faster than a healthy sense of achievement.
Here you go, 30 bucks. Use the 1.0A output. Limited at 1.0Amp/5v.
Perfect!
The power pack can't force the radar to accept current, only voltage. Those '1A' and '2.1A' outlets are the max amps available if you need it. Current ratings on power supplies are like a bank account, you draw only what you need and the rest is left unused. The max the radar needs is 0.8A so you can use either port.
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