{"id":3647,"date":"2021-04-13T08:29:02","date_gmt":"2021-04-13T08:29:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ammoman.com\/blog\/?p=3647"},"modified":"2021-03-18T16:23:09","modified_gmt":"2021-03-18T16:23:09","slug":"the-rise-of-the-lpvo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ammoman.com\/blog\/the-rise-of-the-lpvo\/","title":{"rendered":"The Rise Of The LPVO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Taking A Peek At The Modern LPVO<\/span><\/h1>\n

Magnified rifle optics have been around for many decades. The accuracy of rifles started to improve in the first half of the 1800\u2019s. This allowed people to make hits at longer and longer distances. It also increased the need to spot targets at longer ranges. Eventually, a telescope was added to a rifle and the telescopic sight was born. Telescopic sights started out as something for shooting at longer ranges, which limited their utility at closer distances. People soon started realizing the need for something that worked at both close range and long range, and thus the low power variable optic, or LPVO, was born.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Germany has a long history of creating precision optical gear, so it\u2019s no surprise that the first LPVO was made for a German rifle. In 1922, Carl Zeiss rolled out the <\/span>\u201cZielmulti\u201d scope<\/span><\/a>, one of the very first low power variable optics. The scope (and others like it) was used by hunters who needed to quickly transition between targets at different ranges. For most of the 20th century, though, the rifle scope was thought of as something used only at long distances (over 300 yards) and only by people such as snipers or hunters looking for long-range prey.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 1990\u2019s, though, things changed. America\u2019s armed forces were frequently fighting in urban environments where hostiles were intermixed with innocent civilians. It became important to have good target acquisition and verification at ranges past 50 yards. This meant finding an optic that worked while our soldiers went from room to room clearing houses and could also be used to peer down an open street.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Enter The LPVO: Low Power Variable Optic<\/span><\/h2>\n

The answer was the <\/span>Schmidt & Bender \u201cShort Dot\u201d<\/span><\/a> LPVO, which was created in the mid-1990\u2019s as a response to the experience of Special Forces units fighting in the Battle of Mogadishu. The Short Dot codified many of the features found on today\u2019s LPVOs.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n