Rifle Scopes IOR Recon 4-28x50 problems? Broken? Your experiences needed.

[jaysoncraig]

I am looking to get one of these but am hearing people having issues with them. And are having further issues getting warranty work done. I can't seem to find any information on what these issues people are having actually are. So I am unsure if I'm being persuaded into a different purchase for legitimate reasons or not.

I don't need to hear how good they are. I have spent countless hours reading reviews and watching you tube. I need to hear the dirt on them. Whats shitty? What breaks? What manufacture defects are coming to light?
Thank you guys!

 

[Livetoohunt]

Not going to be a good response with these guys!!!!! Most here don’t like them do to warranty issues

 

[jaysoncraig]

Thats exactly what I need to hear

 

[Threadcutter308]

I have no personal experience with any IOR product, so I won't even attempt to speculate about how great or how bad they are. It would be unfair to try and do so.

My question to you is; with all of the other offerings from other manufacturers out there, why do you want to potentially risk your hard earned money, time and frustration on a manufacturer's product that has tin cans tied to it's tail ?

"I don't need to hear how good they are. I have spent countless hours reading reviews and watching you tube. I need to hear the dirt on them. Whats shitty? What breaks? What manufacture defects are coming to light?"
Good questions, good points. But, let me ask you a question in return. Let's say you do find the answers to all those questions. If you purchase an IOR and one (or more) of those problems occurs, will that information help you "self repair" the problem ? I think the answer is it is pretty unlikely you will be able to repair anything and it will still have to go back to the factory (Romania (?)). Speaking only for myself, if it were my scope I wouldn't be real interested in that happening.

I don't know if you have a budget, or what it is, but look at Vortex, Kahles, Minox, SuB, Nightforce, etc. For close to, or for similar amounts of money to the IOR, you can buy a scope from one of them that you won't have to always be wondering/worrying about. I was taught by my Dad to never go the "cheap route", it will cost you more money in the long run. He was absolutely right, time and time again. Plus, you buy a good product with a good reputation that the manufacturer stands behind and you never have to worry about whether or not you bought the right product. I have Minox ZP5's and I am sticking with them. There are many, many good scopes out there, but the price/performance ratio of the ZP5's is perfect for my needs. I'd like to have a TT someday, but......I just can't pull the trigger for that much dough.

Oh, and if you are looking for recommendations for mounts (?).......Spuhr One Piece ISMS. Brick shithouses, no gimmicks, run over 'em with a truck rugged. Contact some of the Hide vendors, they can help you out, same with the scopes

 

[jaysoncraig]

I have no personal experience with any IOR product, so I won't even attempt to speculate about how great or how bad they are. It would be unfair to try and do so.

My question to you is; with all of the other offerings from other manufacturers out there, why do you want to potentially risk your hard earned money, time and frustration on a manufacturers product that has tin cans tied to it's tail ?

"I don't need to hear how good they are. I have spent countless hours reading reviews and watching you tube. I need to hear the dirt on them. Whats shitty? What breaks? What manufacture defects are coming to light?"
Good questions, good points. But, let me ask you a question in return. Let's say you do find the answers to all those questions. If you purchase an IOR and one (or more) of those problems occurs, will that information help you "self repair" the problem ? I think the answer is it is pretty unlikely you will be able to repair anything and it will still have to go back to the factory (Romania (?)). Speaking only for myself, if it were my scope I wouldn't be real interested in that happening.

I don't know if you have a budget, or what it is, but look at Vortex, Kahles, Minox, SuB, Nightforce, etc. For close to, or for similar amounts of money to the IOR, you can buy a scope from one of them that you won't have to always be wondering/worrying about. I was taught by my Dad to never go the "cheap route", it will cost you more money in the long term. He was absolutely right, time and time again. Plus, you buy a good product with a good reputation that the manufacturer stands behind and you never have to worry about whether or not you bought the right product. I have Minox ZP5's and I am sticking with them. There are many, many good scopes out there, but the price/performance ratio of the ZP5's is perfect for my needs. I'd like to have a TT someday, but......I just can't pull the trigger for that much dough.

Oh, and if you are looking for recommendations for mounts (?).......Spuhr One Piece ISMS. Brick shithouses, no gimmicks, run over 'em with a truck rugged. Contact some of the Hide vendors, they can help you out, same with the scopes

I have both the Nightforce NXS 5.5-22 and Nightforce ATACR 5-25. They are great, but I want to try a different brand.And I want more bang for the same buck. The Vortex is a great optic but for the $ I think theres a lot of better options out there. Delta, Athalon, Minox etc I just had decided after all my research on the IOR, and I'm here to have my mind changed on it, basicly. The thing is I have yet to talk to anyone who personally has had bad experiences with IOR ... yet. I can't even seem to google bad info. Just hearsay. My alternates are the Minox that you have, in 5-25, the Stryker hd 4.5-30, and athalon Cronus 4.5-29. It just seems there is the most quality(or not!!?) in the IOR and features for the $. I actually started my hunt with a pardon for the Vortex razor hd II, but it doesn't stack up for the money. IMO. I am certainly arm chair generating it here. Ive briefly used other quality optics if someone I meet at a range has one. But most of my trigger time is on nightforce.

I appreciate your response. May you could sell me further on the ZP5?

 

[Threadcutter308]

I have both the Nightforce NXS 5.5-22 and Nightforce ATACR 5-25. They are great, but I want to try a different brand.And I want more bang for the same buck. The Vortex is a great optic but for the $ I think theres a lot of better options out there. Delta, Athalon, Minox etc I just had decided after all my research on the IOR, and I'm here to have my mind changed on it, basicly. The thing is I have yet to talk to anyone who personally has had bad experiences with IOR ... yet. I can't even seem to google bad info. Just hearsay. My alternates are the Minox that you have, in 5-25, the Stryker hd 4.5-30, and athalon Cronus 4.5-29. It just seems there is the most quality(or not!!?) in the IOR and features for the $. I actually started my hunt with a pardon for the Vortex razor hd II, but it doesn't stack up for the money. IMO. I am certainly arm chair generating it here. Ive briefly used other quality optics if someone I meet at a range has one. But most of my trigger time is on nightforce.

I appreciate your response. May you could sell me further on the ZP5?

To me, it's all about the glass. The image quality and very, very low level of chromatic aberration is spectacular. Here is an example of a picture where a camera lens suffers from CA. (copied from Google search) The blue/purple "fringing" is obvious;

Here is a link to Wikipedia that explains what CA is and methods of correction;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromatic_aberration

I am colorblind, but I've compensated for it as best I can as I've had it all my life. For some reason CA just drives me nuts. I think that it comes from the belief that the more CA a given optic has, the lower quality it must be (which I think is generally true). My belief is that when you are talking in the realm of $3,000.00 (and up) optics, each and every one of them should exhibit very little CA. It can be corrected, but that costs money. I think that Minox have done a superb job of correcting it, yet maintaining a "reasonable" cost of their product to the consumer. I have never owned a Schmidt & Bender, but my understanding from reading many posts here is that their image quality is very, very close to Minox. I further understand that the image quality of Tangent Theta surpasses Minox, but not by a whole bunch. I'm intrigued with Hensoldt, but they are even more expensive than Tangent Theta. I also have to consider that my eyesight is not what it used to be and how much, "better" image quality is going to cost me. Going from a ZP5 to a Tangent Theta would have been an additional (roughly) $1,500.00. My eyes aren't that good to make that much cost difference worth it to me. Don't get me wrong, Tangent Theta appears to be a spectacular product. And, I do agree that overall, it may just be a "better" product. But.....the extra money vs extra performance thing.....

I would suggest calling some of the Hide vendors and discussing your options. I know that Minox ZP5 MR4's have been in tight supply and you will probably have to get on a waiting list. I have multiple MR4's and each of them was bought by me going on a waiting list. They are worth the wait.

 

[jaysoncraig]

I come from a photographic background, and such have a good understanding of optics, CA, fringe, etc. It comes from a misalignment of the light transmission when recombining the separated light inside the lens system. The more I read and hear from people like you, the more I'm leaning on Minox. Why did you go MR4 over MR5? I don't like the Christmas tree type reticles. But the function in the 5 might be useful. Im really more of a crosshair/hash mark kinda guy.
Thanks

 

[Ornery]

The Minox scopes have several different usable reticles. From what I have read, they are the optically equal to the TT scopes, but TT scopes have a little nicer turrets.

 

[Ravenyzf-r6]

@BroncoMustang you’ll probably wanna chime in here.....

 

[redneckbmxer24]

I got burned with the 3-18 deals years ago and know enough to know that they still aren't reliable optics.

You could give me an IOR for free and I wouldn't even waste my time mounting it knowing that sooner than later it's going to go tits up and dealing with warranty is going to be a long headache.

 

[Lowlight]

Optics only get you so far, even the cheapest scope today are going to be a huge improvement over we they were selling 20 years ago. The fact we are shooting farther and at smaller targets requiring a more precise measurement or in our case, adjustment means, the tracking on the scope is EVERYTHING.

Glass is Glass, it's held to certain standards. The variation comes from the coatings and those coatings out of the box are normally very good. Where the deviation comes in is over time. Sunlight, even water can break down coatings on our scopes. Because of this lower cost brands may experience a fading or clouded look over time as the coatings degrade.

Where IOR scopes fail is internally, nobody is sending a scope back to warranty Glass, they send them because they don't track, or adjust correctly. Glass does not break, the internals do.

Even in some of the worst conditions I have never not been able to hit a target because the glass let me down. Sure you can press the condition, like Low Light, twilight, etc, and create a situation where the scope can no longer resolve a target. It can rain, fog, etc, where it blocks the sight picture, but those situations are usually universal and not isolated to a specific brand. In other word, nobody says, "Avoid that scope because it cannot resolve targets under X Conditions".

They will say, avoid that scope because it is prone to internal failure, that has plaqued IOR and we have demonstrated this on numerous occasions. Do certain models hold up better than others, sure, but generally speaking you have to get a $3000 IOR in order to hear this vs the cheaper models. When you look at history, and really that is what we all use, is historical statistics, they fair rather poorly. Enough so that most people are smart enough to avoid the brand nowadays and you have to go pretty far down the food chain to find someone promoting them. Some call that a clue.

The deciding factor(s) for a scope purchase should be:

Budget
Use
Reticle
Magnification
Brand
Historical Stats for the Brand

You can fold glass under "Use" if your stated purpose is something like Lowlight Hunting, there we know we need a certain amount of light transference. However for 90% of us on here, this is not the case. It's competition, steel, training, or personal plinking. None of these activities are affected by glass in our modern optics.

Back in the day a high end scope was Leupold Mk4 at $1200, today that same scope is considered budget minded. Anything $1200 or less is considered low budget by today's standards. In fact I have a $300 ACME Brand scope here that is made in the same place as the Althon and does a very good job when you consider the price tag. I have it and used it on my 556 RPR with very good success.

Once you cross over into the $2000 and above category, you have to start looking at how many are out there. Vortex and NF have a giant following. So you might find more complaints because more people use them, but again, look at the model being discussed, guys will bitch about Vortex then digging deeper you find they are all talking about the Viper or PST, not the more expensive models. Nightforce people used to complain about the glass being flat looking. They resolve great which is the point, but they did not have a color pop, until the ATACR Series where NF clearly changed direction by adjusting the coatings to give it more pop. Same glass, just different coatings on a bulletproof design. Next thing you the NF Brand takes a huge leap forward.

Glass is just complicated sand, its the same all around the world, German Glass is not better than Japanese Glass, its the same spec. if you want a serious glass education read Telescope boards. They understand and hyper analyze every element in their scopes. They know the curves, the design, the brands. They will even go so far to explain to you who makes what and why and which brands have a certain lenses and which brands don't. So a guy come in to a Telescope conversation claiming his scope had HD Glass of X Quality, next 10 posts broke down the exact origin of ever lens including the fact that company did not make an HD variant, that lens was X brand, not Y.

We are not spotting stars 10 Million Miles from Earth, we are shooting targets in mostly clear conditions with some intermittent weather. Our eyes can only see so much and scopes are designed around their use. Choose accordingly,

As tactical shooters the reticle is a bigger consideration than glass, the reticle is our point of interaction with the target. Pick the scope with the right reticle and the glass will follow.

 

[Tomokochan]

If you are considering the Minox ZP5 I can add that it is an excellent scope. I’ve just finished reviewing one that I bought ( 5-26*56 with MR5 ret ) against my Razor 2 NF ATACR 5-25 and 7-35 and SB PMii 5-25. Amazing glass, modern turrets and a very useable ret - though PRS people will likely prefer the MR4 )

 

[jaysoncraig]

Wow excellent response @Lowlight . Thanks for taking the time.

@Tomokochan , I will too be putting this next optic on a PRS/PR rifle. Why do you feel they would prefer the MR4? Ive been shooting for a decent amount of time. And competed on more of a tactical side. This is my first jump into LR comp shooting. Is the review you did online?

 

[phillip61]

Truth is you won't find anything negative about the Recon. Probably the best scope on the market right now,

 

[Vargmat]

Here is a short story from the experience of my friend who I traveled around the country with and shot competitons with for two years time.
Since it has been a few years, the exact number of months is a bit hazy but the point of the story is the same.

At the time he had a IOR tac 3.5-18x50 scope mounted to his Tikka T3 Varmint resting in a XLR Carbon chassis. After about 3 months the reticle illumination stopped working, he figured that he could do without and keept going for the rest of the season. But in various competitions and in training he had odd things happening, sometimes he was of target even when he should have been hitting, and we found out at times that the scope would not always return to zero. So by now we are at the end of the season and he arranges to send it in to service.
A month goes by, three months passes, another 6 weeks and then a scope showes up. I write a scope, because it turnes out, it was not his scope. When the service guys at IOR is contacted, they have no idea whos scope he has gotten, nor where his acctual scope are. All this takes another few weeks to figure out. After that, the distributer here in Sweden steps in, and refunds the money for the scope to my friend. He then decided to use the money on what at the time was a new scope on the market, the Minox ZP5 Tac and has been a very happy shooter since. The Minox has performed 100% since and is a superior scope in every way.

During the same time, I went from a Hensoldt 4-16x56 to a Vortex Razor G2 and now a Schmidt & Bender PM2. So we have had a few scopes between us to compare, and I can tell you with confidence that the IOR is at the bottom of the barrel compared to those previously mentioned. And with the given service level, I cant recommend anyone to buy the crap that comes out of the IOR factory.

 

[jaysoncraig]

Wow stories like this kinda blow my mind. I read one review on Amazon even where a person bought a seemingly new scope. And they (the vendor not IOR) sent him a completely different brand and everything, but in the proper IOR box. Scam. What does it take for a company to have such bad service that you experience though? Are they tied up in Military contracts? Or they just don't care? Either way. Im sure glad I started asking around on forums before pulling the trigger. I have no problem spending good money, but on good product.

 

[Tomokochan]

Wow excellent response @Lowlight . Thanks for taking the time.

@Tomokochan , I will too be putting this next optic on a PRS/PR rifle. Why do you feel they would prefer the MR4? Ive been shooting for a decent amount of time. And competed on more of a tactical side. This is my first jump into LR comp shooting. Is the review you did online?

The MR4 being more “Xmas tree” like will work better for holds which I think PRS folks will prefer. I do t shoot PRS so can only speak second-hand on this. My review will be up on Rifletalk.org next week.

 

[CSTactical]

The MR4 is one of the best tree reticle available next to the SKMR3 and one of the most under looked features is the fact it's very useful but not busy or adding a "screen door" look to it. The Minox ZP5 line has been a huge hit and many hide members have been extremely pleased with them. @jaysoncraig if you'd like our assistance to guide you to what would fit you best than please call us at 916-670-1103.

 

[fdkay]

I have one IOR scope and I really like it. It took them till Gen 4 to get the mechanicals figured out and they seem quite popular with the European crowd.
I have not seen any bad reviews in regards to the Recon, and I believe Paul McCoy of Pmac Precision has been shooting one in PRS for several seasons.
That being said, I have been exploring other options and I agree, with the price the IOR's command now, and the expansion of the tactical scope market, they really don't make a lot of sense anymore.
I am on the waiting list for the new sightron 4.5-24, as the price is right for me, though I do wish it would have a zero stop.