Rifle Scopes Minox ZP5 5-25x Parallax Issue

[BytorJr]

So, I had a range partner shoot my rifle today because something just isn't right. Haven't been able to determine scope or barrel. Anyway he noticed something I had not, the parallax goes out of adjustment almost every shot!! Not quite every one, but enough to where it's going back to factory after I find all my paperwork.

Has anybody else had a parallax that moves under recoil? I'm wonder if indeed my scope is moving around ever so slightly to cause my strange patterns on my gun. This was mentioned earlier on my 6.5mm issues and I thought I'd proven this theory wrong; but today, the parallax was indeed all over the place. Same gun, same load as in past.

Thanks.

 

[stello1001]

I had a ZP5 3-15 with parallax or clarity issues. I could fiddle around with it back and forth, I never got a 100% clear sight picture. I always seemed to have one half or two quadrants very crisp and the rest very blurry. Playing with the diopter never helped either. Mine went back to Germany and I got a new eye box or a new scope altogether. I have not be able to give my new one enough use to determine how much better it is. With the very minimal use I've given it though, it seems to be good. I'll have to do some more testing though to give it a better evaluation.

 

[whatsupdoc]

Is the adjustment knob moving? Is it going out of focus? Are you checking the parallax and its good fire a round and it is no longer parallax free.
Dont understand what you mean by or the barrel.

 

[BytorJr]

Is the adjustment knob moving? Is it going out of focus? Are you checking the parallax and its good fire a round and it is no longer parallax free.
Dont understand what you mean by or the barrel.

Sorry, this is on my 6.5mm that seems to shoot all over the place. Time before last I mounted a 1-6x LPVO on it just to see if it was the scope or the barrel. At that time I thought I'd narrowed it down to the barrel (and it still could be the barrel is part of this equation) and not the scope. SO I remounted the ZP5. Now, the the parallax is changing - be it internal or the knob moving. ERA-TAC mount, torqued to rail at 10NM per instructions, 18 in-lbs on rings. Now, with the parallax dancing around, I am wondering if something inside the scope is the real issue and not my barrel. SO I'm fighting 2 "apparent" issues. So I'm taking a known scope (Bushnell 3-12) and mounting it on instead of the Minox to at least determine if the barrel is good or bad ( < 100 rounds, manufacturer told me because it was a Bartlein it may have a carbon ring in it ...I call BS on that, but I did a very good job of cleaning per barrel maker/assembler) and still seem to have issues.

Regardless of potential barrel issue, there is zero doubt the parallax is changing every shot and one has to redial it to bring it back into focus. So either the knob is moving (and it's fairly stiff) or something internal is wrong.

 

[hk dave]

That sounds sucky. For what it’s worth I’ve had more difficulty getting parallax and diopters setup on this optical design than others. That means Minox, Premier, TT. But when it’s all setup right... wow.

 

[BytorJr]

That sounds sucky. For what it’s worth I’ve had more difficulty getting parallax and diopters setup on this optical design than others. That means Minox, Premier, TT. But when it’s all setup right... wow.

No doubt when it's right and the diopter too (that got me for a while due to my eyes continually going south of the border) it's like I could almost read a book at 100 yards!!! Pretty sure today I could read Birchwood Casey on the guy who assisted me today's target!!! He commented the reticle was awesome and not too cluttered and glass was very nice (granted, it was 3PM, so low light and sunshine were not a player (cloudy)).

Just not sure it should be changing with every shot...seems a bit "not right." Will call in next day or 2.

 

[Glassaholic]

Let me ask this, is the parallax/side focus wheel actually moving after each shot, or does the side focus stay fixed and has to be re-adjusted to get back into focus? If the latter it sounds like you may have a loose field lens that will need to be fixed by warranty. I had a Schmidt & Bender that has issues with parallax and it was the field lens that had to get new o ring or something like that. If you do send your scope back in to Minox, ask them to "fix" the turrets, as their latest turret iteration is a significant improvement over older designs (say before 2019).

 

[BytorJr]

Let me ask this, is the parallax/side focus wheel actually moving after each shot, or does the side focus stay fixed and has to be re-adjusted to get back into focus? If the latter it sounds like you may have a loose field lens that will need to be fixed by warranty. I had a Schmidt & Bender that has issues with parallax and it was the field lens that had to get new o ring or something like that. If you do send your scope back in to Minox, ask them to "fix" the turrets, as their latest turret iteration is a significant improvement over older designs (say before 2019).

This scope was received early in January 2020 so it's got the nice turrets. I didn't really note if the knob was changing. It's out of focus, but only what I'd think is maybe 2-3 degrees of knob turn, certainly under 5 degrees and the knob isn't loose feeling. I'll have to take a #2 pencil, grease pen, or something and mark it to see if the knob moves. I'm also not sure I want to burn more ammo finding out. But, if it's something internal, it could explain why things are inconsistent on my gun.

I've got 100 rounds of 6.5mm CM trying to figure this crap out. Granted, many people told me early on it was a scope issue. So, this week, I'm putting my LRTS on the CM and seeing if I have one or two problems. Not going to bother doing much more than verifying where LRTS is zerod, just so I can hit a point on paper @100 and know it's not the rifle. If magically my 6.5 starts grouping like a 1500 dollar AR-10 22" Bartlein-barrelled upper should, then it really points to the scope - especially since Parallax changes.

Something tells me I'm actually chasing 2 things at once and I need to narrow that down - quickly. Inexperience admittedly showing here; hence why I found somebody I trusted at the range (so far, one person only would I trust). So, as suggested by a few, I'll change the scope out again. The LVPO just didn't cut it apparently to tell me if I also have issues with gun itself.

 

[BytorJr]

I would try Badger steel rings; also try mounting the rings in the middle portion of the tube

people don’t like to talk about it on here but if you compare a Premier 5-25, a Minox 5-25, and a Tangent Theta 5-25 all side by side, they have almost exactly the same form factor

I remember when I was first getting started in precision rifle, one of my first scope purchases was a premier and people said to use badger steel rings to avoid parallax issues if people mounted the rings really close to the erector housing area I think is what was happening but still a little fuzzy because I’m far from an engineer haha

That's a very valid point. It's an ERA-TAC mount, should be good to go. In theory anyway. I also made sure the rings were evenly spaced from the erector, unlike my bolt action rifles which tend be be quite biased to get eye relief correct.

 

[lte82]

I had a very similar thing happen on a brand new ZP5. Sent it back to Germany, 3 months later it came back and is perfect. Not sure why these seem to have qc issues going out the door the first time, but they do seem to get it right after they go back in for service.

 

[Pav67]

I have a similar problem on a 5x25.It’s on a vudoo and anything 150 yards and closer parallax will lose focus on reticle.If I take a shot reticle will come back into focus.Need to box it and ship it in.I bought the scope used any advise on warranty claims?

 

[lte82]

I have a similar problem on a 5x25.It’s on a vudoo and anything 150 yards and closer parallax will lose focus on reticle.If I take a shot reticle will come back into focus.Need to box it and ship it in.I bought the scope used any advise on warranty claims?

Just send it in, I'm sure they will honor the warranty.

 

[Guns&WhiteWater]

I had a very similar thing happen on a brand new ZP5. Sent it back to Germany, 3 months later it came back and is perfect. Not sure why these seem to have qc issues going out the door the first time, but they do seem to get it right after they go back in for service.

Good to hear. Mine went back to Germany four weeks ago. They quoted three months.

 

[BytorJr]

I shot yesterday and it was really cold (for 'Bama) and didn't notice any movement. I marked with a 0.5mm pencil and no movement. I suspect it's the actual knob that's moving. Will call and see what I need to do to get it in. Fortunately, I bought two of them. So, we'll see.

 

[Stoweit]

Hopefully it won’take 3-4 months, seems like a great scope, but turnaround time is lengthy. Surprised they can’t work on them in US. You think that better QC would save them some money.

 

[J.J]

Old topic but I'm wondering If my Minox 5-25x56 LR has a parallax issue.

Main reason for doubt is that the parallax "maxes out" at half way setting from parallax wheel. When dialled anything after half way into infinity the image gets blurry no matter how long the distance. All of my other scopes when set to infinity are sharp looking at objects past 300yd.

There is not parallax error since I've been able to shoot accurately from 100 to 1500yd, but adjusting the parallax is pretty finicky since it only uses half of the total parallax wheel range.

Other thing that got me doubting if everything is fine with my scope is that I'm not satisfied with the image quality. And If I'm moving my head away from the totally centered eyebox, first thing that happens is a grayish milky image starting from edges before the image goes away. All of my other scopes shows clear image until the image disappears after moving out of eye-box.

I know how to correctly set up diopter and this problem isn't related to that, and I've also tested that no matter what the diopter setting is, you can not get sharp image after half way of the parallax knob.

 

[kskevin]

@BytorJr … curious how did things turn out with ur parallax issue as I think I may have the same thing. Thought maybe it was my eyes as I get older but image gets blurry and I have to readjust ever so slightly. This isn’t happening when I’m behind my other scopes so don’t think it is me. I also notice it when shooting at 100yds & 300yds but seemed to stay in focus when at 600yds.

 

[J.J]

Old topic but I'm wondering If my Minox 5-25x56 LR has a parallax issue.

Main reason for doubt is that the parallax "maxes out" at half way setting from parallax wheel. When dialled anything after half way into infinity the image gets blurry no matter how long the distance. All of my other scopes when set to infinity are sharp looking at objects past 300yd.

There is not parallax error since I've been able to shoot accurately from 100 to 1500yd, but adjusting the parallax is pretty finicky since it only uses half of the total parallax wheel range.

Other thing that got me doubting if everything is fine with my scope is that I'm not satisfied with the image quality. And If I'm moving my head away from the totally centered eyebox, first thing that happens is a grayish milky image starting from edges before the image goes away. All of my other scopes shows clear image until the image disappears after moving out of eye-box.

I know how to correctly set up diopter and this problem isn't related to that, and I've also tested that no matter what the diopter setting is, you can not get sharp image after half way of the parallax knob.

I read a ton of posts here on hide and came to a conclusion this issue could be caused because of loose field lens (affects both parallax and Image sharpness on the edges and when viewing from outside dead-center eye box).

Any insight on this from hide's optical professionals?

 

[Glassaholic]

I read a ton of posts here on hide and came to a conclusion this issue could be caused because of loose field lens (affects both parallax and Image sharpness on the edges and when viewing from outside dead-center eye box).

Any insight on this from hide's optical professionals?

Yes, that could cause the issue for sure. If the field lens somehow came loose it will cause all kinds of havoc on the IQ and you end up getting very strange results from side focus.