quote:

Leupold is the only scope company that has seemed to master the concept of a generous eye box. You get virtually no black ring while looking through a leupold regardless of head position

If you believe that you obviously have not used a vxiii 6.5x20x40efr.The eye relief changes so much on mine as you change the magnification, that you have to move your head,forward and back to maintain the proper sight picture.Mine is on my 22-250 varmint rifle as I would not put up with this on a big game rifle.

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The original post wanted a side by side comparison of 4.5-14. You are throwing in different scopes to make your point. It is confusing the issue.

You just made my point, the 4.5x14 Zeiss is even worse than the 3x9 in eye relief. The 4.5x14 Zeiss only has 3.5, while the Leupold has 3.7-5". I will take variable eye relief when even at its worse starts at a longer relief than a Zeiss, and finishes an inch an a half better.

I'll muddy the water a bit. I'm sitting here with a Conquest 3-9 and a VX3 3.5-10. Not easy to measure w/o help.

Z at 3x = 3.5-4"
Z at 9x = 3.5-4.5+"

L at 3.5x = 3.5-4.5"
L at 10x = 3.5-4.5"

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Originally posted by dogcatcher223:

quote:

The original post wanted a side by side comparison of 4.5-14. You are throwing in different scopes to make your point. It is confusing the issue.

You just made my point, the 4.5x14 Zeiss is even worse than the 3x9 in eye relief. The 4.5x14 Zeiss only has 3.5, while the Leupold has 3.7-5". I will take variable eye relief when even at its worse starts at a longer relief than a Zeiss, and finishes an inch an a half better.

Constant eye relief is better than variable eye relief in a field setting. It does not require the shooter to take time to acquire a proper sight picture. This is where the Leupold does poorly. The Zeiss is EXTREMELY forgiving in terms of sight picture acquisition.

I spent some time looking through both scopes and cancelled the Leupold 4.5x14 that I had on hold and bought the Zeiss 4.5x14.

I hunt coyotes every weekend and so does the salesman that helped me. He started out trying to sell me the Leupold and had to agree with me the the Zeiss was brighter and had a larger field of view.

I have Leupold's on everything else except one gun and had made up my mind to get the Leupold until looking through the zeiss. The Zeiss 4.5x14 is better than the Leupold for me.

I'm looking forward to using the Zeiss and hope to pick up some more.

I can't believe anyone feels an eye relief range of 3.7 to 5 inches is good. I have a Leupold 8.5x25 that is unuseable at either end because you have to move your head so much to get a full picture in the scope. I now have it on a varmint rifle and leave it at 12 power all the time. You can't give me a Leupold with more than 10 power magnification! I am not a Leupold basher but something is very wrong with their high end variables.

Everything is a compromise. Leupold sacrifices constant eye relief for compactness and good looks. I think Leupolds are the best looking scopes on American firearms. I wish they would adopt the LPS optical formula to the rest of their line.

Well, I just received a Zeiss 4.5-14 x44 AO from Cameraland and I am really pleased with the scope so far. My only complaint is the plastic turret caps that seem a bit hackey. As soon as I get my rifle back from D'Arcy I will mount the scope and see how it holds up. I plan to hunt mule deer in Utah, mule deer, elk and whitetails in Idaho, mule deer in Wyoming and moose and caribou in Alaska this fall with this rifle and scope...so it should get a pretty good workout.

Thanks for all the advice and input.

Chet