Q&A for Leupold Mark 5 Field Evals

[intunegp]

I guess I’m in the bucket of people who assumed that scopes could generally hold zero and now grappling with the implications of that not being the case

Generally holding zero is a tricky mindset.

Do scopes generally maintain minute-of-deer accuracy when shot a handful of times a year at short distances? Yes. Is the general hunter a good enough/consistent enough shooter both in frequency of practice and performance to notice a rifle shifting .25 MOA from time to time? Debatable.

The type of zero loss or shifting that is discussed here is often the type of thing that's easily written off as a poor shot. If you shoot a three shot group at the beginning of the season there's a good chance that your "good enough" and Rokslide's "scope moved" are one and the same.

 

[mickythekid]

I would suggest stop believing everything you read about anything military and snipers.

Care to elaborate?

 

[Ryan Avery]

Care to elaborate?

It's covered in the first part of this podcast.

67. Why the Shoot2Hunt University Doesn't Suck - Shoot2Hunt

Chris Cornelius, a student of Shoot2Hunt U, shares his experience from last year's class!

shoot2hunt.com

 

[wind gypsy]

I suppose that assumption was baked into my previous statement.

Think about the alternative though. Snipers constantly missing targets because the scope can’t hold zero. Was that happening? Then they are rezeroing on what would have to be a daily basis in a FOB. Was that happening? And somehow through that, someone like Kyle nails a target at 2100 yards.

Are PRS guys who shoot thousands of rounds per month constantly losing zero too?

I guess I’m in the bucket of people who assumed that scopes could generally hold zero and now grappling with the implications of that not being the case

Of course military rifles have lost zero and PRS shooters have lost zero. In varying rates from all scopes i'm sure. More prone to failure doesn't mean they never work though.

When i was getting into this stuff the mk6 3-18 was very appealing on the spec sheet. So i called a friend who was running one of the special forces group's sniper school at the time for input and was advised that there were frequent issues with that scope on their "work guns". Tracking, zero loss, etc and i should consider other options.. For recreational hunting..

 

[yeti12]

The fact that people get so caught up in what the military uses but then they turn around and say the government can't make good decisions/they don't trust them is wild to me.

If everyone had to work with or near the government for a few weeks or years you wouldn't be putting faith in their decision making processes.

 

[rbutcher1234]

So did that guy ever drop his own mk5 and report back?

 

[Formidilosus]

So did that guy ever drop his own mk5 and report back?

Of course not.

 

[Shortschaf]

Im going to go out and drop my mk5 here this weekend and if it fails, I’ll come back here and post about it.

Any update @Bwhntr

 

[rbutcher1234]

Of course not.

I’ll review the testing procedure and drop mine then. If (when) it fails, I can swap a spare scope on while the first is getting fixed.

 

[yycyak]

Just be careful. The last guy who tried this died. Or something. (I'm still quite worried for the dude... Not sure what happened.)

I’ll review the testing procedure and drop mine then. If (when) it fails, I can swap a spare scope on while the first is getting fixed.

 

[JPW13]

In the drop tests I noticed both of the scopes were non-illuminated. Speaking to Leupold they advised that the steep additional cost for the illumination was in part because it had to meet a much higher standard of testing. Not really sure what that means, but has anyone else heard that?

 

[hereinaz]

Of course military rifles have lost zero and PRS shooters have lost zero. In varying rates from all scopes i'm sure. More prone to failure doesn't mean they never work though.

When i was getting into this stuff the mk6 3-18 was very appealing on the spec sheet. So i called a friend who was running one of the special forces group's sniper school at the time for input and was advised that there were frequent issues with that scope on their "work guns". Tracking, zero loss, etc and i should consider other options.. For recreational hunting..

Interesting, I heard the same thing from a similar source about the MK 6 on rifles and at the school.

Ironically for this thread, his hunting rifle had a MK 5 because it had not failed for him. Of course the ATACR they used never failed either but were heavier.

My MK 5 has not failed and it has not been babied. It has seen flights, regular range use, matches, truck rides, small falls, and hunting. Been swapped around rifles and rings.

It’s not like every scope in a particular model fails, we are talking rates of failure.

It’s the internet, so don’t believe me and I won’t believe you, lol. I won’t be selling my scope. I will let you know if it fails in the future.

 

[Pilsner]

The general public I referenced might be a bit misleading. I was referring to the general high $ shooter that frequent this type of forum, shoot frequently and spend large amounts on shooting equipment - i.e the average shooter that spends Mark5 money . It's obviously not your average mom and pop 10 rounds a year VX-1 general public, but your average mom and pop isn't spending +$1000 on multiple scopes so that's not the target market anyway.

This forum has international reach (Im South African) and these tests are becoming very well known by schooters world wide. That's not an insignificant international market.

I dont know what sales Maven is getting on their new scope but the interest on the forum is clearly high enough for them to change their scope design from not very reliable to reliable. I imagine Trijicon interest has started to pick up since they changed their design and were shown to now be reliable.

That's 2 examples of companies changing their scopes to become more reliable just within the pages of this forum so the demand is clearly developing.

Now if we could just get SWFA to 2x or 4x production to meet "rokslide demand".
lol.
If only adding manufacturing capability was that simple.

 

[Pilsner]

This is reassuring to hear this stuff is making it across the globe to South Africa. I dream of a day where reliability is standard across all companies and each person can pick a scope that suits them! Though I do believe if you can't find a scope that fits the bill between the new maven, NF, SWFA, Trijicon, and a few others, then you must be looking for something very specific.

Or, sometimes, just something that fits the need but is in stock when we need it.

 

[Pilsner]

Of course not.

check your in box. Sent a DM shortly ago.

 

[kupper]

Here to chime in as a mark 5 owner for 3 years.

10 second pause for me to respond without emotion because I wanted my scope to pass.(clearly a step most others have skipped)

Thanks for doing the test, looks thorough and non-biased the same as every other drop test you do for all other scopes. This info lets me know it’s a good practice to continue to check zero frequently and if the gun experiences a drop I’ll stop what I’m doing and check zero and function.

Now for my experience with this particular scope that doesn’t include a drop test. Like I’d stated I’ve had the scope for about 3 years now. I’ve done multiple matches, multiple hunts, and ran the scope on multiple calibers from 22 creed to 30 Sherman mag. I’ve only had one major loss of zero that happened when I tried to punch the butt of my rifle into a snow bank so I could hook a coyote up on my drag and the snow was a little harder than expected. I then missed the next coyote I shot at so I immediately knew zero was off. On paper I’d went from zero’d the day prior to a 3.5” high right shift. I’m sure I’ve also had wondering zero but I’m pretty good about checking my zero nearly every day or hunt or the mornings of each day of match shooting.

I’ll keep this scope and still love it but I don’t have any misconceptions about its lack of durability. Just because a scope fails the drop test does not render it useless. 95% of scopes are going to fail. If your number 1 priority is durability (and this should be pretty high on your list) get one of the scopes that passes forms tests.

 

[Balderdash]

Here to chime in as a mark 5 owner for 3 years.

10 second pause for me to respond without emotion because I wanted my scope to pass.(clearly a step most others have skipped)

Thanks for doing the test, looks thorough and non-biased the same as every other drop test you do for all other scopes. This info lets me know it’s a good practice to continue to check zero frequently and if the gun experiences a drop I’ll stop what I’m doing and check zero and function.

Now for my experience with this particular scope that doesn’t include a drop test. Like I’d stated I’ve had the scope for about 3 years now. I’ve done multiple matches, multiple hunts, and ran the scope on multiple calibers from 22 creed to 30 Sherman mag. I’ve only had one major loss of zero that happened when I tried to punch the butt of my rifle into a snow bank so I could hook a coyote up on my drag and the snow was a little harder than expected. I then missed the next coyote I shot at so I immediately knew zero was off. On paper I’d went from zero’d the day prior to a 3.5” high right shift. I’m sure I’ve also had wondering zero but I’m pretty good about checking my zero nearly every day or hunt or the mornings of each day of match shooting.

I’ll keep this scope and still love it but I don’t have any misconceptions about its lack of durability. Just because a scope fails the drop test does not render it useless. 95% of scopes are going to fail. If your number 1 priority is durability (and this should be pretty high on your list) get one of the scopes that passes forms tests.

That must've been some hard snow?

Quite a few of my buddies still run Leupolds. Some have had issues, others use kid gloves and or dont expect as much from their scopes in terms of precision dialing and longer range shooting and haven't experienced any issues directly.

For my part, I just don't care to abide finicky things if I don't have to. Others have a higher tolerance.