Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/554642
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 5 3 that was one of your top-end scopes? Is it true that lower priced scopes, say under $250, sacrifice durability? Mount it on a .223 or .243, maybe a .270 Winchester or .30-06, but stay away from the magnums, right?" "Well, maybe with some brands, but not Leupold. You can mount any model of our scopes to any rifle out there and it will be just fine. Our Gold Ring Lifetime Guarantee assures shooters of this." "Really? Your VX-1 and Rifleman scopes are as durable as your VX-3s and 6s?" "Guaranteed. Listen, it sometimes takes our engineers a couple years to get just the right . . . the perfect marriage of materials and design to handle recoil energy until there's almost no threat to any of the scope's components. Our erector springs won't break even if completely compressed. And as for weakening, they are made from a material that has one of the very best known return memories of any spring material in the world. That's why we can offer our lifetime guarantee." H earing that Leupold's starter scopes are as rugged as their top-line scopes really surprised me, so while I had Archerd cornered, I asked him to confirm or deny another pearl of conventional scope wisdom: Bigger scopes are more prone to breakage than lighter ones because of inertia. Jolt a big slab of glass and it's going to put increased stresses on mounting hardware, springs, whatever. Basic physics. "Yeah, that's basic physics." "So is there a rule of thumb for properly matching scope size to rifle and cartridge or recoil size?" I asked. "I can only speak for Leupold scopes. You will not see a lens from any of our scopes break from recoil. Our scopes are engineered to dissipate destructive energy before it gets to the lenses or other sensitive components. Again, lifetime warranty." Well, yes, a lifetime warranty is great, but rather useless when you're five days into a Yukon sheep hunt and the scope goes sproing. How does one