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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jeff Bouton" data-source="post: 1214478" data-attributes="member: 14925">John and all,I'm no physicist mind you, however as I understand it, how any individual item survives a fall is not necessarily limited to the distance fallen, or even the perceived amount of force alone (be it a mild knock or hard), but more over how/where the item is impacted. For example, let's say a scope is locked hard on a tripod and it gets blown over by the wind landing on pavement. If the scope lands flat on its side the energy exerted at impact is absorbed across the entire length of the scope body effectively softening the blow and likely the subsequent damage. Take the same scenario and turn the scope 90 degrees so it "tomahawks" squarely into the pavement, then all of the energy enters at one small point and the subsequent shock felt will be much greater and likely something will have to give! The moral of the story, nothing is indestructible, however as a proud Leica employee (and someone accused of being admittedly rough on equipment as a user) I happily stand behind the product and am happy to say that Leica still maintains some of the highest build tolerence in the industry today. Of course, obviously I'm jaded but look around for yourself and see whose products have weathered the effects of time the most. I typically see at least one person still using old Leitz Trinovid binoculars at every show I attend and these things are usually close to 30 years old!At any rate, back to the initial question. With full candor I will admit to seeing this type of break exactly one time in my 5 years with Leica which brings the grand total up to 4 known  occurrences of this type of break. Given that there are some 1500 views on this thread that puts our sample at 0.2%. I'd bet if I posted a query about who knows someone struck by lightning we'd get a higher percentage, yet I still wouldn't be afraid to go outside! ;pGood birding,Jeff BoutonProduct Specialist - Birder/Naturalist MarketsLeica Sport Optics, USA</blockquote>

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