Well it happens a fair bit these days, several brands coming out of the same factory, Browning and Miroku, Weatherby Vanguard, Howa 1500 etc, Fabarm and Rotweil, VW Seat and Ford..
The nightforce scopes are made in the same bambu shed as the hakko's... heha.. lets stay light hearted on this one guys, we all know hakko's are crap (once bitten twice shy i am).
anyways, yes i'mand S&B man and have been for 10 years, doesn't mean i won't use anything else if S&B don't have the product i want, i just know that i can't 100% trust any thing else, i used an aimpoint 7000 for my driven boar rifle for a while, replaced it with a doctor optic scope. and now i've treid the S&B zenith, thats whats going on that rifle from now on. my un dying loyalty to S&B products comes from the last 15 years of experience with optics from every know maker, time and time again S&B have proven to be the most user friendly reliable, clear and dependable and tomy taste any way ergonomic scope there is. I've mounted, zeroed, and used enough scopes to fill several 40ft articulated trucks over the last years, and always without exeption S&B have proven to be the utmost reliable, reasonably priced and best scope. I've seen 1 and only one S&B with a problem, the grease on the adjustment internals needed replacing, it got stiffin cold weather. of every other scope brand, be it swarovski, zeiss-hensold, leupold, hakko, springfield, pecar, leisenfeld,zeiss ost, bushnell, nikkon, doctor, kahles, RWS, churchill, nikko sterling,gerhard, tasco, US optics(not seen many of them, but of the 5 or so i have seen 2 din't work right) frankonia, kettner,meopta, IOR,waldlaufer, norconia and a shed load of others, ive seen breakages, quality control problems, tracking and zero wandering problems in them all.
Whats the price of a good hunt these days, ? deer. a weeks roe buck stalking.. ? 600 to 800 pounds, an Elk hunt, $ ? 4000.. i dunno..
but for the sake of $400 to $1000 more spent on a S&B scope when compared to some of the others ( and even $ 100 -$250) less when compared to zeiss and swarovski, is is realy worth it to skimp on the scope.
guys, i've learned the hard way, ive gon to Scotland for a weeks stalking and had the blood leupold fail on me on the 2nd day (luckily i had an RWS 3-9 scope on the 22lr i had along for rabbiting and i swapped it onto my 30-06).
anyways, i remember the feeling of not bieng able to trust my scope. its like when the oil light comes on in the car,or there is a funny smell after 200 miles of a 1000 mile journey, its a bloody awfull feeling. and i don't want that everagain.
I'd trust my life to an S&B scope, i wouldn't to any other.
other manufacturers may have good customer service(so has S&B) they may have more options on reticles (I'm working on that and it will change soon) they may be cheaper( you generaly get what you pay for in the optics market, with the exeption of S&B compared to zeiss and swarovski) some may be made in the USA ( well S&B area German firm, i and no one at S&B can do anything about the lilly livered politics of Gerhard Schroeder or the left wing mentality of the majority of the german nation, but S&B are refreshingly conservative and to the right side of the middle of the road) what more can i say,
you guys will continue to buy what you can afford and like, i'll contine to get on my soap boxes about S&B scopes and slag all others off,, i just hope all is taken with a pinch of salt and in good humour. I'm just glad the US military wanted the best scope bar none and to hell with the cost and chose the S&B. me and a whole Marine Corps can't be wrong eh?
i'd love to discuss these topics around a hunting camp fire over some grilled meat and a few beers with you guys, cheers fellers
Pete,