It's the difference of a half pound that makes me curious. The glass lenses are probably the heaviest part of the sub-assemblies in a scope, the tube being the second heaviest. Even doubling the thickness of a scope tube would "only" add a few more ounces. The erector assembly is obviously made of very small parts, changing them from synthetic to metal doesn't seem to account for the significant increase in weight.
Maybe they quadruple the thickness of the tube.
I wonder what a scope would cost if the metal parts were made of titanium......
You certainly have a good point, and I think the obvious answer is that nobody posting here actually knows for sure.
Even if the tube thickness was quadrupled, that'd only mean an ounce or two. Aluminum isn't that heavy; when I'm machining something to remove weight, I have to remove a LOT of aluminum to make much difference.
More/thicker glass maybe? That's got to be the heaviest part of the scope.
Is Mule Deer suggesting lighter scopes have plastic internals?
One comment on SWFA scopes using brass internals - brass is cheap to machine, so parts can be turned out pretty fast and don't have to be sent for anodizing. Downside is that it's heavy. Material choice does make a difference in both performance and cost, and the cost includes machining time as well as basic material cost. The SWFA scopes could definitely be made lighter and just as good or better, but would cost more.
