__NOTOC__ Întreprinderea Optică Română ("

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

n Optical Enterprise"), often abbreviated by the acronym IOR, is a major

optics Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultrav ...

company established in 1936 in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north o ...

. IOR produces military and civilian-grade optics and associated equipment for export and domestic production. The company is known in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

particularly for its

riflescope A telescopic sight, commonly called a scope informally, is an optical sighting device based on a refracting telescope. It is equipped with some form of a referencing pattern – known as a ''reticle'' – mounted in a focally appropriate po ...

s (the LPS 4x6° TIP2),

binoculars Binoculars or field glasses are two refracting telescopes mounted side-by-side and aligned to point in the same direction, allowing the viewer to use both eyes (binocular vision) when viewing distant objects. Most binoculars are sized to be held ...

and other sporting optics, which often accompany Romanian military equipment sold on the North American market, such as the

PSL rifle The PSL ( ro, Puşcă Semiautomată 7,62 mm cu Lunetă, model 1974, "scoped semi-automatic rifle") is a Romanian military designated marksman rifle. It is also called PSL-54C, Romak III, FPK and SSG-97 (''Scharfschützengewehr'' 1997). Though sim ...

History

The company was established in 1936 as a joint-venture between the Romanian industrialists

Nicolae Malaxa Nicolae Malaxa ( – 1965) was a Romanian engineer and industrialist. Biography Born in a family of Greek origin in Huşi, Malaxa studied engineering in Iaşi (at the University of Iaşi) and Karlsruhe (at the Polytechnic University). Lat ...

and Max Auschnitt, engineer Petre Carp, with participation from the French companies Optique & Précision de Levallois and Bernard-Turnne. In 1941, when Romania entered the war alongside

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

, IOR was militarised and was tasked to produce mainly for the

Romanian Army The Romanian Land Forces ( ro, Forțele Terestre Române) is the army of Romania, and the main component of the Romanian Armed Forces. In recent years, full professionalisation and a major equipment overhaul have transformed the nature of the Lan ...

. The first military scopes were produced at this moment for what was then the standard Romanian sniper rifle, the

Vz. 24 The vz. 24 rifle is a bolt-action carbine designed and produced in Czechoslovakia from 1924 to 1942. It was developed from the German Mauser Gewehr 98 line, and features a very similar bolt design. The rifle was designed in Czechoslovakia sho ...

. After the war, though the production continued under

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

domination, the company maintained links to famous Western European firms such as

Carl Zeiss AG Carl Zeiss AG (), branded as ZEISS, is a German manufacturer of optical systems and optoelectronics, founded in Jena, Germany in 1846 by optician Carl Zeiss. Together with Ernst Abbe (joined 1866) and Otto Schott (joined 1884) he laid th ...

, Leica,

Pentacon Pentacon is the company name of a camera manufacturer in Dresden, Germany. The name Pentacon is derived from the brand Contax of Zeiss Ikon Kamerawerke in Dresden and Pentagon, as a Pentaprism for Single-Lens Reflex (SLR) cameras was for ...

and

Schneider Kreuznach Schneider Kreuznach () is the abbreviated name of the company Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH, which is sometimes also simply referred to as Schneider. They are a manufacturer of industrial and photographic optics. The company was founded on ...

, which assisted IOR in its modernization and expansion in the 1970s. As a consequence of Romania's refusal to join the invasion of Czechoslovakia, the Soviet Union ceased sharing technical information and exporting military equipment (including the newly designed

SVD Dragunov The SVD (russian: Сна́йперская Винто́вка систе́мы Драгуно́ва образца́ 1963 года, lit=Sniper Rifle, System of Dragunov, Model of the Year 1963, translit=Snáyperskaya Vintóvka sistém'y Dragunóv ...

). Accordingly, Romania designed the

as a substitute for the

, and IOR was tasked with developing a scope for the rifle as a replacement for the Russian

PSO-1 Russian PSO-1M2 current military issue 4×24 telescopic sight View through a PSO-1 telescopic sight mounted on an SVD rifle The PSO-1 (''Прицел Снайперский Оптический, Pritsel Snaipersky Optichesky'', "Optical Sniper ...

. The result was the LPS 4x6° TIP2 telescopic sight, which became the standard Romanian sniper riflescope. The company is traded on the

Bucharest Stock Exchange The Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) ( Romanian: ''Bursa de Valori București'') is the stock exchange of Romania located in Bucharest. In 2019, the capitalization of BVB increased 23.4% compared to the previous year, to the value of EUR 37.8 billio ...

Products

Since its founding, IOR has produced military (including scopes, binoculars, range finders) and civilian grade optics (microscopes, medical lenses, glass lenses) and associated equipment (

still camera A camera is an optical instrument that can capture an image. Most cameras can capture 2D images, with some more advanced models being able to capture 3D images. At a basic level, most cameras consist of sealed boxes (the camera body), with a ...

s and

camera lenses A camera lens (also known as photographic lens or photographic objective) is an optical lens or assembly of lenses used in conjunction with a camera body and mechanism to make images of objects either on photographic film or on other media capa ...

, cinema projectors, dental units). Since the 1980s, the company engaged in optical electronics,

laser A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The ...

metrology Metrology is the scientific study of measurement. It establishes a common understanding of units, crucial in linking human activities. Modern metrology has its roots in the French Revolution's political motivation to standardise units in Fran ...

, and thermal vision. The company is SR EN ISO 9001 certified. IOR optics are currently imported into the US by Valdada Optics and are marketed as "IOR-Valdada". IOR's LPS 4x6° TIP2 scopes are commonly found on Eastern Bloc sniper rifles such as the Puşca Semiautomată cu Lunetă, and SVD Dragunov. It is also a very common optic on the US commercial market on rifles that feature a compatible side rail mount. IOR was one of the Cold War era manufacturers that survived the transition to a non communist era rather well. This was due in no small part to their close associations with Western European manufacturers and their 1970s modernization. Other manufacturers like the Russian Novosibirsk Instrument Making Plant and Belorussian Zenit company have not been as successful in entering the Western market.

Rifle Scopes range

IOR is producing the following models of rifle scopes for the commercial market. The scopes are produced in batches and thus not all of them are always available on the market. Since early 2000s I.O.R. has started to produce very extravagant tactical scopes with technical solutions not often found by other brands. Among such innovations were: 35mm and 40mm main tubes to achieve greater elevation range, 6×, 7×, 8× and 10×

magnification Magnification is the process of enlarging the apparent size, not physical size, of something. This enlargement is quantified by a calculated number also called "magnification". When this number is less than one, it refers to a reduction in si ...

and parallax adjustment in the form of a ring on a central tube. Glass

lens A lens is a transmissive optical device which focuses or disperses a light beam by means of refraction. A simple lens consists of a single piece of transparent material, while a compound lens consists of several simple lenses (''elements ...

es used in their products is usually sourced from

Schott AG Schott AG is a German multinational glass company specializing in the manufacture of glass and glass-ceramics. Headquartered in Mainz, Germany, it is owned by the Carl Zeiss Foundation. The company's founder and namesake, Otto Schott, is cre ...

Hunting rifle scopes

* IOR Hunting 1-4x32 IL * IOR Hunting 10x56 IL * IOR Hunting 4-14x56 IL * IOR Hunting 2.5-10x56 IL

Tactical rifle scopes

Usually all IOR Tactical scopes are in Mil/Mil configuration ( adjustment dials and

reticle A reticle, or reticule also known as a graticule, is a pattern of fine lines or markings built into the eyepiece of an optical device such as a telescopic sight, spotting scope, theodolite, optical microscope or the screen of an oscilloscop ...

subtensions matched in

milliradian A milliradian ( SI-symbol mrad, sometimes also abbreviated mil) is an SI derived unit for angular measurement which is defined as a thousandth of a radian (0.001 radian). Milliradians are used in adjustment of firearm sights by adjusting t ...

s) and with first focal plane (FFP) reticle arrangement. Some of the models are however also available with MOA/MOA configuration or second focal plane (SFP) reticles. * IOR Tactical 4x24 IL * IOR Tactical 1/6x30 PitBull IL * IOR 1.5-8x26 Trident IL * IOR Tactical 1/4x32 PitBull IL IOR 1/4x32 video
/ref> * IOR Tactical 2.5-10x42 IL * IOR Tactical 2-12x36 SF (.308 BDC reticle)IOR 2-12x36 reticle subtensions video
/ref> * IOR Tactical 6-24x56 ILIOR 6-24x56 video review
/ref> * IOR Tactical 6-24X50 IL * IOR Tactical 9-36x44 ILIOR 9-36x44 video review
/ref> * IOR Tactical 4-16x50 FFP * IOR Tactical 9-36x56 IL * IOR Tactical 3.5-18x50 IL * IOR Tactical 1-10x26 Eliminator IL SFPIOR 1-10x26 unboxing video
/ref> * IOR Tactical 1-10x26 Eliminator IL Dual Focal Plane * IOR Tactical 3-18x42 IL * IOR Tactical 4-28x50 ILIOR 4-28x50 video review
/ref> * IOR Tactical 2-16x42 DZD IL * IOR Tactical 12-52x56 Terminator ILIOR 12-52x56 video review
/ref>IOR 12-52x56 vs S&B 12-50x56 Pm II
/ref> * IOR Tactical 5.8-40x56 Crusader IL (Mil/Mil)IOR 5.8-40x56 video review
/ref> * IOR 3-25x50 Lutaz ILIOR 3-25x50 reticle subtensions
/ref>IOR 3-25x50 vs S&B 3-20x50 Pm II
/ref> * IOR Tactical 5-25x56 DZD IL (Mil/Mil)New I.O.R. scopes presentation
/ref>

Sport rifle scopes

* IOR 36x42 Competition * IOR 40x45 Competition

References

* ''

Guns A gun is a ranged weapon designed to use a shooting tube (gun barrel) to launch projectiles. The projectiles are typically solid, but can also be pressurized liquid (e.g. in water guns/cannons, spray guns for painting or pressure washing, ...

'' magazine, Sept, 2003 by David M. Fortier; "SOF Field Tests Tactical Optics From Romania" By David M. Fortier January and February Soldier of Fortune 2003.

External links

IOR company website

Valdada Optics

IOR and Valdada Enterprises
{{DEFAULTSORT:I.O.R. 1936 establishments in Romania Technology companies of Romania Defence companies of Romania Firearm sights Optics manufacturing companies Greater Romania