Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics I’m not Bashing on Leupold,,,,But…

…damn!

I have enough skin in the game with Leupold scopes to form an opinion. Not an opinion based on one or two scopes, more like circling the neighborhood of 25 Leupold scopes at one point.

I’ve used their VX6 line for several rifles, and I actually had good success with them. I sold all except for one. I’ve only owned one VX5, still have it. It’s been a good scope but it’s been relegated to the semi-retirement shelf until something comes up for it to ride.

A few of my Leupold’s are VXII variants. The others are variations of the VX3 models, including the newer VX3 HD line.

Recently, I made a switch on several of my varmint rifles that were sporting 1” tube set and forget Sightron’s. I wanted 30mm scopes with turrets. I decided to make a push for lighter weight scopes, buying up four in Leupold VXIII, VX3i and VX3 HD configurations. All 30mm dialers.

After mounting and sighting in three of the four. I found that all three had a propensity of having a lot of ‘deadness or slop’ when using both elevation and windage to correct for sighting in off a solid bench rest…

What I mean by ‘deadness - slop’ is, with the rifle steady, I’m watching for the reticle to move towards a bullet hole in the target for correction. The Leupold’s would not engage and move the reticle when I started to dial. There was this hesitation, more like a pause, with no reticle movement, until I was fully twisting the turrets way past the point when they should have engaged the internals.

All three scopes eventually moved the reticle. But in no way, was it precise. More like crank, crank a little more, then the reticle moved.

You might imagine the feeling of faith this gave me for dialing elevation while varmint hunting. It’s a good thing these rifles are only pointed at ground squirrels, pdogs, coyotes and such.

IDK, maybe they’ll be fine. Lol.

🦫

I'm rooting for Reupold,but sadly they're not rooting or themselves. A somewhat kinda' sorta' "made" in America scope,is a warm and fuzzy notion. Hint.

As arranging POA/POI goes,they ain't in the cards and done it to themselves. Hint.

Just sayin'...............

There are some guys here that have 100 of them and have never had a failure. I've seen pictures of some of them laid out on blanket covered tables. Beautiful rifles (most times remington 700's). They have never had an issue with that rifle platform either.

It's never been difficult to savvy who actually shoots and who don't,if only to the chagrin of Melting Snowflakes the World over. Hint.

As an aside,how are those 108's and the like doing in your 6x45 Krunchenticker upper? HINT.



You CLUELESS Drooling DUMB Fhuqks are a hoot! Hint.

Fhuqking LAUGHING!..............

The reticle should move on the first click.

We test every scope on the collimator to check for backlash and the optic tracks as it should. Most scopes have about 1/2 a click of backlash.

You should solidly bench mount the optics and check for backlash, move the reticle one direction and then reverse.

I do always make the finish move down on elevation and left on windage but that's from having run mills and lathes for so long.

Remember what leupold said on the podcast? You gotta tap the turrets for them to settle. LOL

This is exactly why I started getting rid of my Leupold scopes several years ago. I got so darned tired of adjusting , tapping the side of the scope to get it to move, shooting, adjusting, tapping etc... on just about every Leupold I owned that I just gave up on them. The glass is wonderful IMO, but the reticle adjustments were awful. A tall target test just made it even worse. I think I only have two or three left at the moment and those have been working fine for the moment so they are somewhat safe until I have a problem with them.

Since I have started looking at other scopes and found the Athlon, Arken, and several other scopes I don't feel the need to go through the Leupold carousel any more- even though I would love to see them fix their problems and become the scope manufacturer they could be...especially since their facility is only about 5 miles from my house. The fact they closed their custom shop doesn't help much either since now you can't get custom reticles or other work done there at all... They seem to have a pretty loyal following for the most part in stores, gun shops, Sportsmans' shows, on line, and on the used market so I doubt our complaining about their problems is going to affect them much.

Way to go Beav.......you've just subjected us to another round of regurgitated, decades old, LardassBurns and HomoCamuglia pics.

Reupold is the Biden of scopes. You get what you get and there is NO predicting it. Hint.



Just sayin'.............

JB, that’s been my experience with the VX6’s and VX5. The rest of my Leupold’s had been set/forget.

There’s something odd with these three VX3’s. I typically turn one click back then twist ahead to my MOA setting or the same but in reverse. These scope’s don’t have a zero stop. It was a Wtf moment X’s three.

These weren’t new scopes. They were sold to me by three different sellers, but all looked almost as new.


🦫

I know, I know, JR. 😬 I don’t smash on Leupold. They help thousands and thousands of hunters kills shît.

I just hadn’t had this happen before. I’ve had some set/forget scopes that took some persuading to get them nuanced into zero. But three out of 4 scopes? I had to say something about that.

🦫

Like a lot of companies, Leupold has discovered that investing in advertising and social media "sponsors" yields higher (short-term) profits than investing in design and manufacturing. I'm sure their management team is being rewarded handsomely for doing so, and will be long-gone before the real cost of that path is realized.

I understand your envious.

Then there are idiots like you that claim to have had every conceivable issue.

I can't be absolutely sure, but it seems the problems seem to have started about the time the original owners of Leupold either passed away or retired and the offspring took over the company. Rumor has it they aren't interested in the day to day operation so have handed it over to a bunch of bean counters to operate the business while they live off the profits, but who knows how true that is or isn't?

I have heard a few times that because of the way they mount their reticle tube adjustment springs and adjustment screws, if the grease on them gets thick and heavy after a few years they don't want to adjust easily until the grease gets thinned somehow or you way over adjust to go past the adjustment point and come back, giving the adjustment mechanism a good work out so the grease gets distributed again. I believe this is the reason most guys (like me) tap their scope with something fairly firmly to get the adjustments to "settle in" but this is an iffy fix at best and doesn't always get the desired results . I've actually had Leupold techs tell me to do this to make adjustments when I'm zeroing a scope. I've tried this and it usually works if you go a couple turns of the dial past your adjustment and come back to it, but who wants to deal with that every time you need to make an adjustment? Especially at the price of ammo and components these days?
The tall target test is even more indicative of a design issue that I'm not sure how to get past except to waste even more ammo trying to figure out where it might be after an adjustment, especially if you are starting from scratch and may have to make a lot of adjustments to get to your POI...

What’s funny is you don’t have to spend more to actually own a scope that adjusts correctly. Fugking Laughing !

When Leupold had their technical experts address the forum, they said that their scopes didn't do that, but when they did, you needed to tap on the turrets to get them to work.

If they had any common sense they’d have redesigned the internals to actually work when they came out with all the 30mm and bigger tubes with bigger mag ranges.

Those guys have a future in politics. Deny then say when it happens, you do this. If it doesn’t happen why peck on the turret to fix what just didn’t happen.

Lie with a straight face, then fall back on plausible deniability.

Brandon could take notes. Those guys were good.

DF

Sightron. They make great scopes

Beav,
Specifically what VXIII, VX3i, and VX3 HD are those with the 30mm tube?

(2) are the VX3i 4.5-14x40 CDS 30mm with side focus.

(1) is a VXIII 4.5-14x40 Long Range 30mm with side focus.

(1) is a VX3HD 4.5-14x40 CDS-ZL 30mm with side focus.

🦫

I’m with Beav and others. I wanna believe and use them but their prices are quite high for optics that don’t work as well as a few lesser priced optics. They are incredibly friendly in pricing to vets and I’d love to utilize their gear but I find them hard to trust.

Got it. Thanks Beav.

When I started using my Bushnell collimator bore sight to check how accurately scopes adjust I found my NXS, FFII, SS scopes--and Leupolds--had the same kind of backlash Burns is referring to. I even called Nightforce to find out what the heck was going on and they said that's not unusual. It's worse when they are cold.

My VariX-II's with friction adjustments don't seem to do that, but it's hard to tell because adjusting them is continuous instead of the clicks.

Casey,

It was pretty cold here for my locale when I was getting a few rifles on target. We were in the low 20’s.

I don’t know if that had anything to do with it.

🦫

A Leupold VX3 looks pretty nice on a Kimber of Oregon custom classic in 223 Rem.

Not certain I’d want to drop a ginormous Arken on it.

Laffin

🦫


PS

Yeah, yeah, I hear you all saying, “But if the Leupold is a ‘pile,’ then all you have, Beav, is a nice looker with no capability to locate the target.

I hear you! I still have a couple, I’m not hatin..

Oh, I know you’re not. We be in the same boat on our desires for Leupold. Lord, knows, I have tried.

It’s like some stupid game of ‘truth or dare’. The truth is, some Leupold’s actually work.

I have two older VX-3 4.5-14x50 CDS LR scopes that Leupold did up for a special run Noveske did with their AR called Varmageddon. Both of those scope have been really great.

The question is do you ‘dare’ to try again?

🦫

I’d kinda like to leave this as ol Bob had it. but man, it tests my patience.

John,

Which models are you testing and what are the pass rates?

All of mine are older ones. All set it and forget it.

Beautiful rifle

No doubt!

🦫

I have many Leupolds, but I’m a set and forget shooter. If I did knob turning I’d go with another scope. Longest shot I have is 275 yards. I’ve put my target down there, got hold over figured out. It’s 225 to green feeder.

lol

Nice country there Hanco…..

I laughed as well....."we"

I laughed again on the last sentence

Have tested 100s of VX-3s in 4.5-14 but these were assembled in the custom shop with my 1/3 MOA turrets.

Now days its mostly VX-6s in 3-18.

I never had one fail for backlash or tracking but had issues with a few MK-6s and there is a reason Leupold discontinued that optic.

Had a VX-6 that tracked out (shifted POA) when zoomed.

Had VX-3s that lost the backlash o-ring because of light staking on the retaining ring many years ago.

It's a pretty simple system where the turret pushes the erector and the bias springs pushes it back.

The erector can't just hang out and not move.

A trifecta of dumbfuqks


😂

two peas in a pod

It's ironic that the picture above that statement shows a Vortex scope and merch.

Is this podcast available to view somewhere?

I used Leupold for so long that I'm still a little surprised every time I twist a turret on another brand of scope and the reticle moves exactly what the turret says it should.

Seen it somewhere on you tube????? . That said it is exactly what they suggested again on here when they had the "open Mike" Q&A session with our members.

They should issue “tapping clubs” in their scopes. Just to keep it fair.. wouldn’t want someone using too big/small of a tapping device

Just tap it!

Those older Leupolds with the friction adjustments seem to hold zero pretty well. Of course, they're set and forget.

The glass may not be as good as the newer ones, but those old scopes just keep on keeping on. At least mine do.

DF

DF,

It’s usually not noticeable because it’s so gradual, but the gas in any optical piece seems to degrade over time.

Sending several of my 30-40 year old Vari-X II’s and III’s back to Leupold made a very noticeable difference in brightness. And made the focus appear more sharp. And in turn narrowed the difference in the quality of view when compared to my newer VX II’s, 2’s, III’s, and 3’s.

My most used deer rifle still wears a VariX-IIc that has held zero like a champ.

Damn, Casey! How old are you?

I just turned 57. I figured you and I were close in age, maybe in dog years.

Grins

🦫

So, what I'm hearing is Leupold makes scopes with cds style turrets, regardless of whether you get the custom dial, it's still a turret supposedly made for twisting, but it doesn't move according to the proper increments? A scope made for dialing that doesn't dial. Houston we have a problem.

Leupold - Trust is Earned

As is distrust.

DF

When dialing counter clockwise on windage or elevation you have to dial way past what you need then clockwise to make it correct. Apparently the erector springs are still not up to par.

Personally I’m done. When my Mk 5 5-25 get back from them it’ll be on the market. PR-1 MIL illuminated 10 billion dollar sob. I’ve had much better reliability with SS and Bushnell.

lol......the next decade older.....

Priceless

This is disappointing to hear. I just bought a few VX3 HD CDS scopes. What a bummer.

Well, they don't all go bad.

Use them and see how they work out.

May want to keep their Beaverton number on speed dial.

DF

Leupolds track like Stevie Wonder....

They should include a rubber mallet with every scope to "tap" the turrets after adjusting.

Maybe Burns will start selling a $5k, long range mallet.....

Coffee just came out my nose!

Don’t get too worked up, just yet.

I had and still have a few good Leupold dialers.

Remember, I bought all mine used. There’s a chance I caught scopes that the original owners had an issue with and just sold them without having Leupold look into their problems.

🦫

Had what I thought were good dialing Leupolds till several quit. One during a coues wt hunt! Another a week or so before the another coues wt hunt. Third scope turret movements were sluggish and imprecise. A Leupold tech said to twist the elevation and windage turrets lock to lock several times to distribute the grease. It worked. Who the heck wants to do that every so often to prevent reticles that hang up?

My late friend Don had an expression: "life is too short to hunt with a bad bird dog" That can be modified to: "with a scope that isn't trustworthy". It is getting more difficult to draw a tag. Why risk it?

I like the old Vari-x IIc models. As do a lot of guys. That is apparent on places like ebay, where they have gotten ridiculous in price. I picked up this one a few weeks ago:

Ended up paying $150 for it. I put it on my new to me Remington 788 30-30. Seems to be working just fine on that rifle. It will be a "set and forget" affair as far as I'm concerned. No real reaching out and touching something with that cartridge anyway, so it's a great combination. I'm like beretzs, I always wish like hell that they are going to work, but don't trust them too much until they have proven themselves. I have one Leupold that actually tracks beautifully and it is also a Vari-x IIc Tactical model. I'm going to hang on to that one too:


I've had that one on a 300wby, 2 7mm rem mags and a 30-06. It worked well on all of them. I'm not a basher, just been burned too many times by Leupold to know to be leery of them. I also have a silver Vari-x IIc 3-9X40 that I am going to sell here pretty soon. Haven't even tried that one yet, but I know it will bring some good money.

I can’t argue about your late friends logic.

🦫

Here’s one of the (2) older VX3 in 4.5-14x50 I have that Leupold did for Noveske’s Varmageddon 223 varmint AR.

I bought both new, here, from ElkhuntingGuide several years ago. Both have been great!





🦫

That's just cuz it's on a Model 70.

^^^^^^^^^ LOL ^^^^^^^^

How goddam hard would it be for Leupold to distribute the grease during assembly? It that a technological challenge?

What do you use for your zeroing mallet Beav

POS, one and all, proudly made in the USA

Mine work great, and yes, I dial.

Sorry about your luck.

Small edit of your post.

Glass from where ever....? "Pacific Rim", whatever that means. ?Chicom?

Who knowns, and they not saying.

Parts from other "sources"....??

But, they come out of Beaverton.

What could go wrong....

They evidently kept "improving" the old friction adjusters to what they now have.

I'm hanging onto my old ones. I hope I never have to send one back, because they don't make them any more, can't support them and will send me a "replacement"...

At least their CS is active and well... Probably pretty busy...

Too bad it isn't more like the famous Maytag repairman.

DF

I killed a lot of game with Leupold scopes, but when I switched to better scopes the rifles shot smaller groups.

I could never get my files (sic) to shoot. 🤣

They don't all mess up, many work great. I've had and have both kinds.

And their CS is first class.

The issue I have, do I want to be on an expensive hunt way away from UPS and USPS and one go bonkers?

One solution is to have more than one in QD rings, sighted in and ready to go.

Around the house, not that bad, can always send them to Beaverton, get them fixed or replaced in a few weeks.

DF

My typo is definitely funny 😁

I prefer scopes that work as they should and don't have to be sent in for repairs

I want to see the proof that you killed game with your Leupold scopes. 2 good reasons why you should use QD mounts when you are using a Leupold, I guess..

I personally haven't had a Leupold fail me yet. Off the top of my head, I have had scopes from Bushnell, Sightron {only scope I ever had fog internally}, Simmons, Redfield {Denver} and Tasco fail on me. on the flip side, I've had scopes from all those brands, including Tasco, give me good service for decades. Some of you act like Leupold stands alone for failures. They certainly do not.

I too have had good luck with Leupolds, but all mine were bought in the 90's or earlier.

However, this thing about Leupold saying that you have to "tap the scope", well that just ain't right.

I also have had good luck with Leupolds. Some models can be quite tough. I have an older FXIII 6x42 scope that was on a rifle that fell out if my stand when I was getting setup in the dark (no, the rifle was not yet loaded). It must have hit one of the many cypress knees on the ground because it had a dent in the tube. I re-zeroed it and continued to use this scope for a few years, until it began to fog up. Leupold repaired it for free (even though it had clearly been damaged) and I still have this scope. I must have about 15 scopes with 4 being Leupolds. Because I used Leupolds almost exclusively when I first started hunting, I thought a wandering zero was normal. I usually only checked the zero once/year just before hunting season and Leupold scopes always had to be adjusted some from the previous year ( and, no, I was not in the habit of dropping them from my stands). However, when I bought a used S&B 8x56, I realized that not all scopes are like this. For me Leupold makes decent scopes for what I use them for (ie, set & forget).

No tapping was required….


870 yards

NO QD MOUNTS REQUIRED

Do you really think no one has ever killed game with a Leupold scope?

Do you even hunt?

You killed it with your Leupold, didn't you? You fn retard.

The group of obsessed alpha hunters on this forum over 40 likely started without any idea of dialing to hunt. The under 40 & extreme long range crowd can’t imagine hunting without a 30mm tube & dialed yardages. Leupold doesn’t seem to have adjusted to their new market well.

Starting pre-rangefinder I bought a flat shooting 7mm & sighted in at 200 - practice let me know inside 500 what I needed to kill stuff. The cheap Bushnell & Swift scopes I used taught me [bleep] optics are bad for hunting.

I’ve never dialed to shoot an animal & have killed a couple past 500 yards & many over 300, I’m a Zeiss conquest guy but have a few v3 series Leupold & would hunt with any of them. Looking forward to shooting an antelope with my inconsistent 25-06 that putting a 4.5-14x50 duplex VX3 on it suddenly made consistent.

I’m curious about how many guys really dial their scopes regularly hunting-I can’t imagine it’s 10% of hunters.

So you are actually implying killing game with a Leupold scope by bludgeoning them with it?

And I'm the retard?

Seek help for your hate issues. Must be a tough thing to deal with.