Fake Leupold scopes

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CAR-AR-M16

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Keep an eye out for fake Leupold scopes being sold: http://www.leupold.com/corporate/resources/counterfeit-warning/

Counterfeit Leupold Riflescope Warning
Leupold® is issuing a customer alert to purchasers of products, particularly via Internet sales, in regards to bogus Leupold products that are apparently being illegally imported from the People’s Republic of China. These products bear many of the marks and trade dress of current Leupold & Stevens riflescopes making them very hard to distinguish externally from authentic Leupold products.

In recent months, counterfeited Leupold Mark 4® riflescopes have begun to arrive with increasing regularity at the firm’s Beaverton, Oregon, headquarters for service. These products are not manufactured by Leupold and are not covered by the Leupold Full Lifetime Guarantee.

Leupold employs serial number tracking for all its riflescopes, so if a customer finds a scope that is suspect, he or she can simply write down the serial number and call 1-800-LEUPOLD to confirm if it is indeed authentic.

In general, most of the scopes appear to originate from Hong Kong (People’s Republic of China), and have “Leupold Mark 4” laser engraved on the bottom of the turret in a silver etch, while the black ring on the objective is etched in white and does not include the name “Leupold.” The scopes also do not bear the Leupold medallion, a mark all Leupold scopes will always possess. An authentic Mark 4 riflescope will always be engraved black on black and have the name “Leupold” engraved on the black ring.
 

ez bake

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Keep an eye out for fake Leupold scopes being sold: http://www.leupold.com/corporate/resources/counterfeit-warning/

Counterfeit Leupold Riflescope Warning
Leupold® is issuing a customer alert to purchasers of products, particularly via Internet sales, in regards to bogus Leupold products that are apparently being illegally imported from the People’s Republic of China. These products bear many of the marks and trade dress of current Leupold & Stevens riflescopes making them very hard to distinguish externally from authentic Leupold products.

In recent months, counterfeited Leupold Mark 4® riflescopes have begun to arrive with increasing regularity at the firm’s Beaverton, Oregon, headquarters for service. These products are not manufactured by Leupold and are not covered by the Leupold Full Lifetime Guarantee.

Leupold employs serial number tracking for all its riflescopes, so if a customer finds a scope that is suspect, he or she can simply write down the serial number and call 1-800-LEUPOLD to confirm if it is indeed authentic.

In general, most of the scopes appear to originate from Hong Kong (People’s Republic of China), and have “Leupold Mark 4” laser engraved on the bottom of the turret in a silver etch, while the black ring on the objective is etched in white and does not include the name “Leupold.” The scopes also do not bear the Leupold medallion, a mark all Leupold scopes will always possess. An authentic Mark 4 riflescope will always be engraved black on black and have the name “Leupold” engraved on the black ring.

That's actually an older warning - I remember reading about that a while back - I think those have actually slowed down in production since looking through one is pretty obviously a fake (I think all those Chinese Airsoft makers started focusing on Aimpoint and EOTech clones since they don't have any magnification to them).

I've actually seen a fake MK IV Tactical that I was seriously considering buying (thinking it was real). It was one of those - friend of a friend's acquaintance. I just couldn't figure out why the price was a little "too good". It had a box and paperwork that looked real as well, but the box wasn't quite right and the paperwork looked "copied" or printed by a bad printer.

I finally asked if we could take the scope outside to look through it and the guy said "sure, its good and clear glass". Once I looked through it, I could easily tell that it wasn't any sort of quality-built scope.

I didn't even know to look for the gold ring around the Objective housing with the Leupold name on it - the fakes have no gold ring, but the Leupold name and font was pretty close to the same.

I remember looking at the turrets and thinking that it looked funny from other Leupolds I've seen, but I hadn't gotten to spend a lot of time with a MK IV Tactical before, so I didn't know if that was normal for that particular line.

The major indicator to me was this:

[Broken External Image]

I almost spent $500 on that scope (thought I was getting a hell of a deal on a MK IV from someone who didn't know better - turns out that this guy didn't know better because he had just paid like $400 for it and was trying to make a profit off of it).

I told him that I thought it was a fake and he got mad but about two days later I guess he tried to take it into a pawn shop and sell it to them and they shut him down - that would make me sick if I had just spent $400 on junk and thought I was getting super-deal.
 

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