Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Why so many Zeiss

Wondering why the sudden influx of Zeiss Conquest scopes appearing in classifieds around the internet. Just curious really.

Economy

they seem to be bringing a premium in my opinion

Because they are selling for more than they were new. I don’t understand it with the quality of scopes on the market today. To each their own though.

Yup, this.

Yep, a lot of guys like/love them. Especially the 3-9x40. Great scopes in my opinion. I sold a like new one about a month ago.

Good glass (imo) but I hate the look- they look clunky to me.

Are those the ones Whittakers was selling for $300 some years back?

What brand/scopes do you put on par or above the conquest, for the price point, that are not made in China? Just curious.

I'm curious about this as well...

Most of them appear to be take offs. The one I had for an example was a take off that was on a rifle I bought. The 3-9x40 Conquest's bring an easy $400.00 these days. Even the Terra's are selling for more than I've seen in the past. I recently pulled a 3-9x42 Terra RZ6 off a rifle and also a 3.5-10x44 Conquest MC that are going on the chopping block soon. I expect quick sales with both of those scopes.

When I had my shop I remember buying them from $269 each. At the time I had all the various brands and models available to me so I wasn’t in the mode of buying a bunch of stuff for future use. I did find the Zeiss Conquest 3-9x40 was, at least to my eyes and those of the customers, a brighter image with better clarity as compared to the 3-9x50 and iirc 4.5-14. I was really amazed at the quality of the image the first time I looked through the Conquest and I’ve been using it for 13 or 14 years. I bought 1 and I bought 1 for my brother in law but looking back I wish I’d have bought a few dozen for $269. The reality is that there are a lot more options today than there was 15 years ago and the quality and durability have only gotten better. The features and durability of the scopes today are head and shoulders above where they were 15 years ago and the prices for good quality have gone “down”.

No one is able to look through everything. That 3-9 Conquest was widely available to the point where many were able to look through it, and a fair few found it to be the best bang for the [.22 cents these days...].

We alll find a place where we're willing to lay our cash down, & that was it for a lotta people, and for a goodly amount of years.

I'm one of the silly ones who married-up to the Conquest 4x32, but my eyes have begun to move on from that platform. My stash will likely start moving down the road.

FC

The 3-9x40 Conquest has a really great “suite” of optical properties for a rifle scope. Great eye relief, easy to get behind, bright as heck, and a nice dark reticle that stays visible. The mechanicals are a tangible step above, well, Leupold which really sold me on them at the time. I wish I’d bought another one or two (I have two of them) when they were $300 brand new.

Zeiss are to me far and beyond better than a lot of big name scopes in optical clarity. The same can be said for Meopta. I have a couple Nightforce scopes and am simply not impressed with optical clarity. The NF SHV 4-14x50 F1 has to be the biggest POS for the money. Eye relief is critical and short.

Have you tried the newer Conquest V4’s? I really like them. The 4-16 x44 and x50 are both very nice, nod to the 50mm if you can run a scope that big.

They also made a 1-4x V4 for AR’s, that they chickened out on and didn’t market as such so it flopped and the they discontinued it. I picked up a couple on closeout. Made in Japan just like the other V4’s, really nice AR scope. I bought two, shoulda coulda woulda bought another. Keep your eyes open…

I have a few of the Zeiss Conquest 3-9x40’s. I haven’t specifically looked recently to notice them coming up for sale more but I’ll scoop one up whenever I see one for a good price. They’re still my favorite reasonably priced general use hunting rifle scopes for all of the reasons already mentioned.

Something that some guys may have caught on to is when your old Conquest needs repair (if ever), you send it in and Zeiss will just replace it with the newer V4 model. That happened to me. Sent in a very nice older Conquest 4.5-14x44 and they eventually (6 months later) sent me a V4 4-16x44. Like I've said before, I'm not entirely happy with the glass, or the janky zero stop plastic mechanism or the plastic turret cap. Some things seem cheap on the scope. The glass is not the greatest, but they do track very well. I'm not complaining much because I sent in a $500 scope and got a $1,000.00 scope in return.

That is why they sell for $400 all day long every day. Guys like them for what they are. I am happy with the service I get from my Burris FFII 3-9x40 rifle scopes and they are much less expensive. There are some oddities with the Zeiss, that I don't like, like the bass ackwards turrets. The turrets are also not marked, so there is no reference as to how much you just turned them. No zero set feature either. Also you are very limited in reticle selection. For the guys that don't shoot far, or just need a good durable scope with good glass, the Conquest works fine. Where as the ballistic plex reticle offers more than the Zeiss does at a lesser price point. One of the reasons I stripped a few Zeiss rifle scopes off of my rifles and intend to sell them in the near future.

Janky plastic zero stop? Huh. That’s not how I remember it. I remember brass…I like the zero stop mechanism… once I figured it out.

Clearly (no pun) I need to put eyeballs on the newer SHV’s. My V4’s murder my early SHV optically.