Modality of failure in scopes?

[SDHNTR]

Weight. Weight = thick tubes and robust components. Unfortunately, lightweight sells, so scope companies build lightweight scopes that suck.

 

[Weldor]

In this day and age, you would think an American company could manufacture a solid scope in the USA. I'm sure we can grind glass, machine tubes and make springs , brass parts etc. ????

 

[4th_point]

Well I have a BS just not exactly in engineering so I am in fact a professional BS lol. Yes to maintenance, also major overhauls to industrial facilities. If it’s got a pipe, tube, motor, gear, or made of metal we can un-f*** it up for you!

Yep, tell you what's wrong and get the Eff Out The Way! Been there myself, in a former life working on commercial equipment.

Assuming you are monitoring machinery with voodoo/witchcraft (acceleros), you'll see a 1st order vibe from simple imbalance or one bad tooth on a direct drive gear. Vibe with gear boxes is more complicated due to the mesh, but same concept applies just with a different order WRT the primary shaft speed.

With a combustion engine, the vibe will depend on firing frequency which is based on the # of cylinders and RPM.

With those examples you'll often have isolators at the mounting feet, right? But the isolators are "tuned" for a certain freq. A simple example is your car engine - at idle the engine shouldn't have any violent shaking due to firing.

However, what happens when you have someone shutdown the engine, while you watch? It shakes! That's because the vibe freq is sweeping down from idle to zero speed. The isolators were not selected for those RPM and resulting frequencies.

So how does that compare to a rifle scope? On our machine equipment, we try to isolate the vibe source from other systems. We do that with the isolators. We want low transmissibility there, as the vibe can be damaging or cause variability in machining of intricate parts. With a scope, we have high transmissibility due to metal on metal contact. There are exceptions, like plastic inserts, but they are not isolators in the common sense.

Make sense? There's more, but I want make sure there are no questions regarding the above.

 

[Southern Lights]

My hunch with the drop tests is that the scope tubes are probably getting slightly bent on impact. I think NF does well because their scope tubes tend to be thicker than others and are harder to physically damage.

Of scopes I've had fail or seen fail, it has been with stuff like wire reticles falling apart or turrets shifting/failing.

 

[zrodwyo]

I guess we need someone to take apart a NXS next to a MK5 and report back.

 

[AZ_Hunter_2000]

So while the scope is solid, it may be kind of a fluke it passes more because of the shape of the scope and less of the internals? That might get some emotion out of people

Is it?

I just looked at my last Leupold (VX6HD); the elevation turret is higher than the objective and the wind/parallax turrets extend past the sides of the rifle. Using Maven logic, this scope design should be reliable.

So I then took a look at everything else that I have. Every single one of them is similar as the my Leupold. Then there's my Credo 1-8 (on my 375 Ruger) which is a fat pig.

Observations: Dimensions may come into play. If any rifle that I have were to be dropped, rifle inverted, the elevation turret theoretically would take the hit. If any rifle that I have were to be dropped, on either side, it is questionable on what part (ex: rifle stock, bolt handle, windage/parallax turret) would take the hit.

 

[Macintosh]

The crew putting together the unknown munitions scope hinted at the manufacturer knowing exactly what it would take to make the scope reliable. But ZERO word on what that actually is. My guess is if it isnt already common knowledge, it wont be any time soon, as its likely a +\- closely guarded secret. We can speculate, but thats about it.

Also noted that across all the impact testing it seems clear that side impacts to the turrets cause problems in a LOT of scopes. Which really calls into question “hitting the turret first” as a reason a scope holds zero. Certainly thats horse poo as a general rule applied to other scopes, given the # of scopes with large turrets that fail miserably.

 

[Jaegerr]

I guess we need someone to take apart a NXS next to a MK5 and report back.

Break out the band saw and safety squints

 

[Jaegerr]

The crew putting together the unknown munitions scope hinted at the manufacturer knowing exactly what it would take to make the scope reliable. But ZERO word on what that actually is. My guess is if it isnt already common knowledge, it wont be any time soon, as its likely a +\- closely guarded secret. We can speculate, but thats about it.

Also noted that across all the impact testing it seems clear that side impacts to the turrets cause problems in a LOT of scopes. Which really calls into question “hitting the turret first” as a reason a scope holds zero. Certainly thats horse poo as a general rule applied to other scopes, given the # of scopes with large turrets that fail miserably.

Valid points from you and AZ_Hunter_2000 on essentially the same conclusion. Maybe I should just pose as a new company and send an email to LOW and find out for myself. Hell, maybe have them make me the clearest, toughest scope I can get my hands on and just start ANOTHER new scope company... If only people know rifles scopes have a 50-100% mark up between dealers and consumers. At least what I've been shown on FFL dealer websites. IF the big brands didn't have MAP, scopes would be a LOT less expensive.

Call it Lenta Scopes (tough in latin), FFP 3-15x44 with a big ol' duplex reticle and in MIL/MiL. Oh and make it FDE