PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR riflescope review

Professional Airgun Optics (PAO) is a highly respected scope brand that’s enjoyed far beyond its intended shooting genre. The reason why you see so many of them atop the receivers of rimfires and HMRs, besides PCP, springer and CO₂ airguns, is that they deliver the kind of specifications and performance levels that everyday shooters want. And they do so at a price everyone’s very happy with.

The latest addition to PAO’s highly popular catalogue of scopes sets a new standard, though — not least because the F1 5-30×56 PA IR’s asking price immediately elevates it as it’s PAO’s flagship model. However, it’s POA’s priciest scope for a good reason. Well, a lot of good reasons, as a matter of fact, as we will see.

Is the PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR riflescope any good?

Quite simply, this is a scope that’s literally dripping with impressiveness, from ocular to objective. So, where to start? Perhaps with the most obvious break-from-the-norm — its body tube. Sturdily made from aircraft grade aluminium, its 34mm diameter eclipses your common-or-garden 25.4mm (or 1in) scope. Even the 30mm tubes you see on classier tellies look a little underwhelming, side by side. However, it’s fat-bodied for one, very important reason: light transmission.

Because this scope has a magnification capability of a massive 30x power, it needs to allow through plenty of light to present a bright sight picture when fully cranked. A 34mm tube allows that, whereas anything with a thinner body would result in a much darker target image.

What’s more, PAO has coupled its scope’s big tube with an oversized objective lens — 56mm in diameter, no less. Its glass lens has also been multi-layer coated to allow through as much light as possible with minimal loss of luminance value.

In practice, looking through this scope at sub-16x powers is almost like looking at an artificially illuminated target. I found the image quality to be remarkably bright at higher powers, too. When it came to assessing data for the optical quality of this scope under test conditions, the fact it matched or bettered my own expectations was really no surprise (see the Optical Performance panel).

Ordinarily, I wouldn’t consider such a high-magnification scope for shooting in dull lighting conditions but, believe me, I had few issues with the F1 under “real world” conditions. Sometimes, strong overhead light could make the image look a little washed out and less contrasty, but it never affected my ability to aim. In actual fact, I didn’t feel the need to screw on its 75mm sunshade to combat trickily lit targets at any time. It’s really nice that PAO throws this into the package, all the same.

What extras come with the PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR riflescope?

Actually, a lot of extras accompany the F1, including a set of two-piece mounts that have been both well-made and thoughtfully specced out. They’re tall enough to accommodate the scope’s large objective bell, and their rings are 34mm. Additionally, they come with step-down inserts should you want to use them on scopes with 30mm and 25.4mm (1in) tubes. You can also choose them with either Picatinny or 11mm “airgun dovetail” clamps when you first purchase the scope, too.

Another thoughtful extra is the magnification throw lever — a knurled bar that screws into the zoom ring to assist turning. While the ring isn’t stiff enough to rotate by hand, the throw lever’s ergonomic benefits surprised me — and I now think every zoom scope should have one of these.

I swear by flip-up scope covers, so I pushed on the spring-loaded, opaque ones PAO supplies with the F1 from the get-go. It’s worth pointing out that the objective cover fits the sunshade if you use it, and the ocular cover stays in its original orientation even if you change the magnification or eyepiece quick-focus rings. You will need to remove the cover to access the latter, of course, and it offers +/- 2 dioptres of focal adjustment.

The “PA” and “IR” suffixes used in this scope’s nomenclature refer to it being parallax adjustable and having an illuminable reticle. Both features live on the left-hand turret and fall to hand easily.

This turret’s outer knurled ring rotates to select red illumination of the central, hanging crosshair /dot section of the etched reticle. There are six brightness levels, numbered “1” to “6”, with “off” — being black — selected when it’s set between numbers. Battery operated, the turret’s serrated cap unscrews to access the CR2032 button cell.

The inner knurled ring operates the scope’s adjustable parallax system. For airgunners’ benefit, it has yardages marked for “10”, “15”, “25” and “50”. PAO lists this scope’s total parallax adjustment as 10 yards to infinity, but I got the scope’s ring to work as close as eight yards.

While parallax adjustment is useful to remove aiming errors caused by eye-to-scope misalignment, the system also doubles as a rangefinder on higher-magnification scopes. You simply turn the PA ring until the blurriness of the target “snaps” into sharp focus…and then read off the distance shown on the ring’s vernier.

With PAO’s F1 set to 20x power, I could estimate the target distance fairly well. At the 30x setting, I was even more accurate. To really help range-finding accuracy, fit the supplied, 80mm diameter sidewheel, though. Effectively, its greater circumference offers more distance between the yardage markers — and, of course, you can customise it with some self-adhesive labels to suit your preferred shooting distances.

You could use the F1’s unique Multi-Stadia Reticle for rangefinding, too, though it would take a fair bit of preliminary work. It’s probably one of the most comprehensive crosshairs I’ve ever come across, with so many reference points that you could easily get overwhelmed by it. Thankfully, its etched design means it’s not cluttered, nor disruptive to the actual sight picture, though.

However, I suspect that most shooters will end up using only the main elements of its many stadia, rather than the numerous accoutrements that adorn them. At least the PAO’s reticle design is mathematically calculated, featuring lots of practical, MIL-based assets.

What’s more important is that it’s positioned in the scope’s first focal plane (or FFP) – hence PAO’s “F1” prefix for their new scope. FFP scopes are considered the “best” in terms of construction.

For variable magnification models, they have a big practical advantage over their second focal plane (SFP) counterparts: the relationship between the reticle and the target never changes, regardless to what power the scope is set.

This is useful, for example, when you’re allowing holdover. Let’s say you’ve chosen a specific reference point further down the vertical crosswire to allow for pellet drop. Whether you’ve got the magnification on 5x or 30x (or anything in between), that will always be the point you aim with on a FFP scope. By contrast, on a SFP scope, you’d be forced to use completely different reference points according to what magnification setting you’ve turned to.

While vari-magnification FFP scopes are therefore a lot easier to use, you should be aware that the perimeter of the crosshair can disappear as you zoom in. In the case of PAO’s 5-30x scope, it’s quite marked. At 5x, you can see lengthy German-style thick posts at the 3-, 6- and 9-o’clock positions… but by 30x, you don’t see them at all. The field of view is also extremely narrow when it is on full power, too.

The PAO F1 gives you another aiming option when shooting at distances different from your primary zero range: you can adjust its external turrets to “dial-in” an aiming point that’s always dead-centre. Their adjustments are MIL-rated, but each turret also has an extra trick up its sleeve.

The right-hand windage turret incorporates a Zero-Lock feature. To adjust it, it must be unlocked by pulling it out. The new setting is then locked from accidental turns by simply pushing the turret back in. Its vernier can be set to “0” by slackening off the slotted cap with a coin, free-spinning the turret and retightening.

The elevation turret can also be set to “0” in the same way, but it features Zero-Stop. This prevents you from winding the turret more than one rotation, avoiding those embarrassing misses when you’ve returned the dial back from the wrong direction and are, actually, a full-turn out. Yes, we’ve all done it!

What is the Zero-Stop feature like on the PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR riflescope?

The Zero-Stop feature must be set after you’ve zeroed your scope. Once the turret’s been removed to expose the mechanism, you reposition the internal stop-ring as required. It’s locked with a grubscrew and PAO supplies the relevant hex tool. I would recommend that you accommodate some downward adjustment of the elevation turret when setting the stop point. That way you can dial-in some hold-under for targets that are closer than your primary zero range.

The click-stops of both the F1’s elevation and windage turrets offer 0.1Mil point of aim (POI) adjustment, where each click alters the POI by 1cm (10mm) at 100m.

This also equates to 5mm at 50m, 4mm at 40m and so on, making it easy to remember if you prefer to always shoot with the central part of the crosshair, rather than aiming off.

For example, if you needed to compensate for 20mm pellet drop at 40m, you would simply turn the elevation turret “UP” by five clicks (20 divided by 4mm = 5) and then aim dead-centre.

The same would apply for windage. Say you estimated the breeze to blow your pellets off to the left by 10mm at 25m, you would turn the windage turret “Right” by four clicks (10 divided by 2.5mm = 4). You could then still aim dead-centre as the wind drift would be compensated for by the turret adjustment.

With such a long list of features, and its comprehensive reticle design, it would be all too easy to dismiss PAO’s new F1 5-30×56 PA IR as an expensive, perhaps even gimmicky riflescope. But that’s not the case at all. It more than delivers on its price and there’s nothing superfluous as far as airgunners are concerned. It didn’t let me down in any department during my tests oncer and, indeed, I found myself making full use of every feature at some point.

I can’t see that many spring gun shooters would want such a weighty scope on board, though, so the PAO F1 is probably best reserved for a PCP. After all, magnifying targets to the tune of 30x is certainly very conducive to making the most of a recoilless rifle’s accuracy.

PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR riflescope optical performance

Clarity at centre

5x  9/10

10x 9/10

20x 8/10

30x 7/10

Clarity at edge

5x  9/10

10x  8/10

20x  6/10

30x  6/10

Optical performance is carried out at 25m in typical daylight conditions, viewing newspaper print at low, mid and high magnifications

Technical Specifications for the PAO F1 5-30×56 PA IR Riflescope

Magnification: Variable, 5x to 30x (stepless)
Objective: 56mm diameter, fully multi-coated
Tube diameter: 34mm
Mounts supplied: Two-piece (11mm dovetail / Picatinny options)
Reticle: Multi-Stadia, etched – first focal plane
Illumination: Red hanging centre, six brightness settings (+off)
Parallax adjustment: Sidewheel, 10m to infinity
Turret adjustment: MIL (1cm @ 100m)
Elevation: Zero-Stop, 100 click range
Windage: Zero-Lock, +100 clicks R; -100 clicks L
Focus: Quick-focus +/- 2 dioptre
Eye relief: 95mm
Field of view: @100m 7.7m (5x) / 1.17m (30x)
Length: 388mm
Weight: 823g
Nitrogen filled: Yes. Sealed, water-, fog- and shockproof
Extras: Mounts, zoom ring throw lever, flip-up lens covers, 80mm PA sidewheel, 75mm sunshade, CR2032 battery, lens cloth, lifetime warranty
Price: £549
Website: shootingparty.uk