As the saying goes: "Even a blind hog finds an acorn every once in awhile" For the foreseeable future, the Ultra M3A will be considered my acorn (white oak variety, that is). It was blind luck that I came into this optic and truly, I didn't fully understand what I was buying. Heck, even the internet in all it's infinite knowledge doesn't fully understand what the L&S M3A is as it pertains to optics. You can find a lot of speculation and made up nonsense scattered throughout the ether of outdated forums. part speculation, part knowledge, so I will try my best to reproduce and consolidate what I believe is true after many hours of research on this piece of glass.
The L&S Ultra, short for Leupold and Stevens, was a contract scope for the U.S. Military that was developed in the early-to-mid 1980's when Uncle Sam approached Leupold looking for something more durable and capable than the hunting scopes they shoehorned into military service. Prior to the Ultra, military snipers were often using modified commercial hunting optics. The Ultra was how Leupold responded. The result was a simple fixed-power optic, most commonly the 10x and 16x Ultra—that featured:
- M1/M3 style target turrets
- Side focus/parallax adjustment
- Etched reticles
- Heavy-duty construction
- Repeatable tracking
These features seem trivial today, but in the early 1980's were fairly revolutionary for a combat optic. The Ultra was essentially the stepping stone between the hunting-oriented M8/Vari-X era and the Mark IV series. Leupold itself even states that the Ultra program laid the groundwork for the Mark IV series of tactical riflescopes that followed.
Where things get interesting, per the internet, many Ultra 10X scopes (like the example pictured in this article) became associated with the early M24 sniper rifle program. Forum users and former Remington personnel consistently reference Ultra 10X-M3A being used on M24 systems before later upgrades replaced them with variable-power optics. This as you can imagine, means for clone builders of the M24, this is THE scope to have, and collectors have caused these optics to trade a quite a premium relative to what is available nowadays (not saying it isn't a wonderful optic, we'll discuss this later).
This is a really incredible optic from all angles. It's heavy, it's overbuilt, the glass is excellent. No doubt about it, but the scarcity of it really drives it home. This was exclusively a trial scope. It was never sold via contract to the military, and was never produced or sold commercially. Production of the Ultras ran from roughly 1987 until the early 1990's before it was replaced by the Mark 4 series of Leupolds. Now let's take a closer look:
A pretty simple design at first glance.
Objective Lens side
Ocular lens side
A very nice Mil-Dot reticle.
Focusing on my backyard fence roughly 20 yards away. Crisp glass with very fine coatings. Colors remain vivid and bright. Details are sharp. Pretty amazing considering this scope is 40 years old!
A closer look at the turrets. Marked "7.62 MM Nato M118"
A better look at the reticle. Some small artifacts in the upper right hand corner from years of hard use.
The makers marks. 87 at the beginning of the the serial number notates the year made. Forums will tell you that a counterfeit can be told apart from a real Ultra if there are any letters included in the serial number.
Thank y'all for taking the time to read this article. Though bittersweet, OZK Provisions has since sold this Ultra and I hope our customer who purchased this is happy with their optic and still running it hard. If you would like to contribute to this article, please write us via the contact page. We would love to add your knowledge/thoughts/opinions/experiences/photos to this article about L&S Ultras. We are working hard to try and build the most comprehensive archive of vintage and obscure outdoor gear. Straight Shooting!
- Hayes