Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Why so many scopes that suck?

True Beaver10; but, it's a matter of manufacturer's intent as to whether such scope has defective turrets.

Do you genuinely believe the failure rate- that is x amount of failures per 100 scopes- is the same between a Leupold VX3 3.5-10x40mm and a SWFA SS 3-9x42mm?

I believe, leupold works quite handily for me, my pards and hundreds of thousands of other other Americans... I also believe that swfa and nightforce fail, quite frequently it appears. Savvy?

To me, this is where this whole debate gets convoluted.

What is your definition of failure? To me that is not an apples to apples comparison. It seems you are comparing 2 products manufactured towards a totally different market with different expectations of each.

A person buying a VX3 as a “set and forget” scope is probably not going to consider values being incorrect a failure if it holds zero for them.

A person buying the SWFA that does not track accurately will consider it a failure.

Damn....I gotta work on my Clickenese.

Treating you like a brother again. The question was do you believe the failure rate per 100 is the same?

Everything has a failure rate. There’s a huge difference in that failure rate between those scopes.

To you- everyone that sees large numbers of scopes, Leupolds for instance, failing in actual use compared to SWFA and Nightforce is lying? And everyone who can’t even zero their own scope (hundreds of thousands of other Americans) are telling the truth? It doesn’t have flip all to do with killing a deer. It’s a BIG target at most ranges they are shot at, and there are hundreds of thousands of animals missed and wounded each year.

You don’t use Nightforce, you don’t use SWFA, you miss several times at a deer, blame the scope but it wasn’t the scope, claim that joe Bubba is the source of knowledge for optics, and that everyone one here who sees and shoots all of these scopes are lying?


There is almost no way that you are this ignorant or have such a low IQ that you believe what you write. You either have an unbelievabley high emotional attachment to an inanimate object, or you are bored and this is your outlet.

Remember-



As I’ve probably never seen a Leupold, and I probably live in my moms basement.

I try to live in a world of facts. However, just because someone else's personal experience differs from mine, I don't assume them to be a liar or even stupid.

Amen brother, amen.

I think you got it backwards, folks that have success with anything but what YOU claim is the best, are liars.... the simple fact of the matter, is leupold have worked very well for over 100 years, in both the field and shooting sports...I will say it 1 more time for you, run whatcha bring, don't worry about what others are runnin.... I've a safe full of people's that have garnished my walls, with lots of good bone, none of which came from a tree stand or a foodplot.. to me, leupold are not junk, are not failure prone, maintain zero amazingly well and just fuucking every time, weather they go to alberta, BC, Montana, idaho, Washington, Oregon, New Mexico, Hawaii,... is that really that hard to understand?

BTW, I am very very skeptical, this is the www after all. Remember the Blackhawk down story I cited yesterday? Do you wanna know how many "navy seals" I've met? Last one I met ended up being a cebee!!! Laffin

Carry on, I know I will, slumming that little gold ring and doing God's work... Haha

Exactly.... God forbid if something works for someone that you don't like.... I absolutely hate big dumb turrets, objectives over 42 mm, 30 mm tubes, jumbled up crosshairs, scopes that weigh over 16oz... that's my opinion, if you feel the need or like all t hose features, run it!!

My biggest gripe with Leupold has nothing to do with their reliability. The Leupold Campfire Exclusive Webcast was the biggest joke I've ever seen. If I didn't know better I'd have thought it parody.

BTW, me and Jud hunted together for a week and neither one of gave a crap about how the other scoped his rifle.

I see you edited your post formy, now I am ignorant, bored and have a low iq because I've used leupold for 35 years?? Haha I'd knew you'd show your ass eventually..... good talk!!

[quote=ctsmith]BTW, me and Jud hunted together for a week and neither one of gave a crap about how the other scoped his rifle.[/quote

No or what boots we had, what pack we had, how we tied our shoes, how we wiped our ass....

Agreed

...but we did discuss ass wiping this weekend.

There were a few years when I was doing a lot more shooting than now. Mostly 308's and I was buying 8 lb jugs of powder and 1000 count boxes of bullets two at a time. I've had a VX-III 4.5-14x40LR develop a parallax adjustment that wouldn't hold shot to shot, a VX-III 3.5-10x50 get a dead spot in its horizontal adjustment, a VX-II 4-12x40AO get loose inside and need an erector rebuild, a VX-7 2.5-10x45 show considerably more parallax than it should much past 100 yards, an M8 6x42AO Target need a rebuild since I dialed it so much moving it around on a number of rifles, and more recently had an M8 6x42 make me think the barrel on an accurate 243 had crapped out until I noticed the rattle the scope developed. I also have a Swarovski Z5 needing service.

I have a number of other Leupolds that have given excellent service, some over a very long time. One is a Vari-X III 2.5-8x36 I got about 1985. Still works great.

Sure, I hunt from an elevated stand and happily shoot over a food plot. Nevertheless I have popped more than a few caps and have had a few scopes go bad.

I just can't wade through 13 pages, so forgive me if this has been covered.

1.) Consumers by on price.
2.) Consumers prefer variable scopes
3.) Variable power scopes are more sophisticated, have more parts and are more expensive to build than are fixed scopes.
4.) SWFA SS scopes made their reputation on very good reasonably priced fixed power scopes. I have SWFA 6X42 BS 10X42. Clear and rugged.

5.) China can build quality or they will build on the cheap. China builds aircraft carriers, stealth fighters and nuclear bombs. They can reverse engineer anything, and WILL for a PRICE. Just because it is made in China is not automatically make it garbage. The market goes there most to keep costs down. They contract for price and quality is not the driving factor.


About 2 years ago I did a test of three upper end Chinese made scopes. I talked with JB about testing parameters and the ability of the ChiComs to make a quality product. In his words 'they will make whatever you pay them to make."

I took these three scopes, did low light testing, did tracking, did clarity on power adjustment etc on more than one rifle (Mostly 6.5 x 55 and 9.3 x 62). I then wrapped them up and put them in mail to several other members who mounted them on everything from 7 x 57 to .416 and banged away. Not one failed even after being shipped USPS to four different cities and back and being subjected to recoil from various calibers that were all "big enough".

What did I learn? These scopes were heavy. Steel tubes and lead glass. One was a S&B PMii clone that has Schott contract glass. Another wasa a TAC VEctor Paragon with Schott glass. No lead glass manufacturing in Europe so Schott Werks sends it to China. Scope was big and heavy. It worked. I thought it had a parallax issue at higher magnification. I saw that in the others also.

So why do scopes suck?

It's tough to build a high quality variable power scope in the $250-$300 price range. It's nigh impossible for $125. I see that the S&B Chicom clone is now going for $500 on EBAY. Not worth it. Buy a Leupold. Mine now sits on a Ruger 77/22. Another is on a Ruger 7mm Mag. It was a good experiment. For the money I spent on them, the SWFA 10X42 is a better scope.