Author: RifleDude
Subject: zeiss conquest vs minox ZA5?
Posted: July/25/2013 at 10:15
I have several Conquest scopes and 2 ZA5 1.5-8X32s. As with so many things, there are advantages and disadvantages to both.
ZA5 has the obvious zoom advantage, and they are shorter and lighter than Conquests of equivalent top end power. They are also less expensive. If you're mounting a scope on a super light mountain rifle or a trim little rimfire, I think the ZA5 1.5-8 is a very nice complement size- and weight-wise.
Conquest is backed by a company with a long history of building some of the best rifle scopes money can buy. The jury is still out on ZA5 durability, and mine are both mounted on rimfires, so they don't get any recoil punishment. I can say my ZA5s track just as perfectly as my Conquests.
I like the Conquest reticle selection better.
I think the ZA5's turrets & turret caps are too tall and obtrusive proportional to the size of the scope, but that's a minor, personal gripe.
Optically, the center field performance is pretty much equal to my eye in terms of resolution.
The ZA5 (or at least the 1.5-8X32 version) has noticeable barrel distortion (a slight "fisheye lens" look) at the low end of the power range (up to about 4X), transitioning toward a relatively flat field beyond 5X. This is the tradeoff to combining a broad zoom range in a compact size / short focal length. This isn't such a big deal and isn't too noticeable until you look through the scope while panning. Conquest doesn't have as much distortion, and what distortion it has is pincushion.
Subject: zeiss conquest vs minox ZA5?
Posted: July/25/2013 at 10:15
I have several Conquest scopes and 2 ZA5 1.5-8X32s. As with so many things, there are advantages and disadvantages to both.
ZA5 has the obvious zoom advantage, and they are shorter and lighter than Conquests of equivalent top end power. They are also less expensive. If you're mounting a scope on a super light mountain rifle or a trim little rimfire, I think the ZA5 1.5-8 is a very nice complement size- and weight-wise.
Conquest is backed by a company with a long history of building some of the best rifle scopes money can buy. The jury is still out on ZA5 durability, and mine are both mounted on rimfires, so they don't get any recoil punishment. I can say my ZA5s track just as perfectly as my Conquests.
I like the Conquest reticle selection better.
I think the ZA5's turrets & turret caps are too tall and obtrusive proportional to the size of the scope, but that's a minor, personal gripe.
Optically, the center field performance is pretty much equal to my eye in terms of resolution.
The ZA5 (or at least the 1.5-8X32 version) has noticeable barrel distortion (a slight "fisheye lens" look) at the low end of the power range (up to about 4X), transitioning toward a relatively flat field beyond 5X. This is the tradeoff to combining a broad zoom range in a compact size / short focal length. This isn't such a big deal and isn't too noticeable until you look through the scope while panning. Conquest doesn't have as much distortion, and what distortion it has is pincushion.