Who produces the best scopes now

[Trumpetier]

Another vote for Vortex

[phil384]

I thought my Leupold was the dogs danglies until I looked through my mate's Swarovski!

The Leupold is still blummin good though

[para]

The German stuff is out of my budget for airgun use, vortek I have looked at through recommendation and their products as per the website are produced in china, Philippines and Japan and are priced accordingly Japanese high end, Philippines middle and China budget scopes.
Bushnell I remember being made in the Philippines I had a Bushnell Banner that was very good optically and seems the Philippines had the best overall quality and cost.
I was quite surprised that the Hawke high end kit was produced in China.
Im suffering scope snobbery.

[Muskett]

In the 80's the Japs build new factories and had new machinery so built scopes. Inexpensive scopes, to compete in the US market.
There was a huge leap in glass technology and laser precision grounding. Came from the spectacle industry. Glass lenses and the improvement in glass clarity had leaped forward and was cheap but very good.
Far East saw others improvements and Japan exported its machinery to Korea for the cheaper labour. Someone else to the Philippines. Well they were the same scopes that used to have Jap made on them.
Jump forward again and with Chinas boom, they built new factories and new machinery with all the new technologies. Cheap labour too. Their designs weren't great nor the execution; read crap. But they gained some experience, given some advice, and design expertise from the established brands, and now they are starting to produce scopes worth having. A lot of investment. Other, US, manufacturers buy in parts from China to their specs. They might add their own coating too, even tubes, as its all about price and China does it for peanuts. The important bit is they select the quality and specs, even do the designs.
China has the least expensive labour and the newest machinery.
But it remains the very best scopes are made at home, not China. Europe, USA, and Japan do make the best but with their labour costs non are cheap. Some will have Chinese parts but not all as Chinas quality control isn't always good enough for the best. Best machines are still in Europe and in truth glass too. Plus the coating technology can be expensive and a trade secret as too much has been invested in them; can;'t give all the advantages away. Swaro, Zeiss, Vortex, and few others still do it all in house for their top of the range, and that the chinese can't do yet. But that doesn't come cheap.

Just be selective in what you really want.

[Craig-P]

Swarovski, Khales and IOR.

[Geezer]

In the 80's the Japs build new factories and had new machinery so built scopes. inexpensive scopes, to compete in the US market.
There was a huge lwap in glass technology and laser precision grounding. Came from the spectacle industry. Glass lenses and the improvement in glass clarity has leaped forward and cheap but good.
Fe East saw others improve and Japan exported its machinery to Korea. Someone else to the Philippines. Well they were the same scopes that used to have Jap made on them.
Jump forward again and with Chinas boom, they built new factories and new machinery with all the new technologies. Their designs wren't great nor execution. But they gained some experience, given some advice, and design expertise they are now starting t produce scopes worth having. A lot of investment. Other manufacturers buy in parts. The important bit is they select the quality and specs.
China has the least expensive labour and the newest machinery.
But it remains the very best scopes are made at home, not China. Europe, USA, and Japan do make the best but with their labour costs non are cheap. Some will have Chinese parts as China has the newest machines and volume for say lenses. However, thy don't have the coatings or the techniques to make what say Swaro or Zeiss can.

Just be selective in what you really want.

Muskett has basically nailed this thread. All or almost all sub-£200 or £300 scopes are made in China. Good ones are good, bad ones are awful. This roughly (though not perfectly) correlates with price.

Swarovski, Khales and IOR.

And March, Schmidt and Bender, and the top end Leupolds and some others. But they all cost, literally, thousands.

Personally, I mostly use old 1980s Japanese gloss glass on my rifles, and older Leupolds in unfashionable specs (eg 4x28). They suit my older guns visually and handling-wise. And I am old fogey who still thinks a fixed 4x or at most a 3-9x40 is all you need on pretty much anything other than a .338 Lapua sniper rifle.

The unfashionable old stuff is good value if you shop around and buy when you see a good deal rather than when you need a scope badly. Not too hard to pick up an older small Leup for £100, when anything equivalent new would be 3-4 times the price. The downside being you can end up with more scopes than guns, if not careful.

[angrybear]

So looking at a lot of the manufacturing of scopes the majority are now seem to made in China, is the general consensus that China are oftern poorer qaulity compared to those made in Japan or Philippines? Following on which companies still have scopes produced elsewhere other than China ?
Im on the lookout for a new scope but im put off by the made in China tag.

Generally speaking you get what you pay for.
There are plenty of scopes made elsewhere, if you're willing to pay for them, so It's just a case of what budget you're willing to throw at it.

OTOH if you go for the better quality Hawke's the glass is superb, Chinese or not.

For an airgun, If you pay £50 it's likely to be pants, but if you pay £250 it's going to be a lot better.

[hareng]

Hensolt probably the best optically.
Theres Delta an upper mid range producer in Europe, HD wipes the floor with Sightron S3 made in Japan build quality not far off March stuff.

Falcon pay extra for better quality then individually checked again upon receipt.

Seen good and bad from all price ranges but most producers dont do certain checks.

[Gary C]

Simple fact

German is best due to raw material availability. After that Chinese quality comes down to the choice of factory.

Once you get outside the known brands you are buying junk, simply because the known brands have all the decent factories sewn up.

[RobF]

Quite a few of the middle (and lower) range scopes you see today are white labeled scopes from China. If you see a scope you like, go onto AliExpress and search for a scope with similar specs. You will find it there, branded somewhat differently (and cheaper). Falcon Optics (British Company) for instance. Made in China.

Bear in mind though these can be the same because they have failed quality control.

[Portzy]

Bear in mind though these can be the same because they have failed quality control.

Interesting that you should say that. Lately I have seen a number of shops selling "Hawke Vantage +" or, "Hawke Vantage Fast Mount" all coming with mounts and for much less than their usual, discounted from RRP, cost.

Would Hawke sully their reputation?

[cooper_dan]

Interesting that you should say that. Lately I have seen a number of shops selling "Hawke Vantage +" or, "Hawke Vantage Fast Mount" all coming with mounts and for much less than their usual, discounted from RRP, cost.

Would Hawke sully their reputation?

I think a lot of the discounts on Hawke scopes recently has been to shift stock ready for their new versions. For example the Sidewinders were heavily discounted a few months before the new Sidewinder FFP was officially announced

[hareng]

German is best due to raw material availability. After that Chinese quality comes down to the choice of factory.

Materials are available any where in the world.
Choice of producer yes and also pay extra for basic self checking quality control.

Those sell offs would still have a massive markup on and all shops selling at a similar price.

[PCPShooter]

For the Money - Nikon


I think in the mid market they've really wackd the competition

The upper end, Leica, Zeiss, all the usual big European names still make top glass, but the prices are higher now than ever before and the difference less between them and the top mid market stuff ......

[Flashash]

Some very interesting points here as I read this thread on my beautiful iPad Pro. Interesting that said iPad, like all Apple products and Vortex, Bushnell, Hawke etc is made in China. Some Zeiss (I think the Terra range) is made in China. Like it or not (Mr Trump) and China is actually the best in the world at making some things.

With scopes specifically, I think the brand is actually a lot more important than the country of origin. If you like the scope and are happy with the service and warranty then I would pay no intention to where it’s made. I certainly didn’t when buying this iPad!