"Scope bite" ... when was the last time?

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Only once, and it was may own fault-trying to shoot a 7mm Rem. Mag. 700 BDL from the prone. My younger son got one from a .223 Handi-Rifle. He was seven and insisted on putting his eye about 1/4" from the lens....Grandpa, Dad, and big brother all warned him, but no, he knew what he was doing. The next day, we went to Ft. Davis, (Dad lives in Alpine) and the boys got Kepis- The guide 'complimented him' on his "Red Badge of Courage" :p He was beaming all day, thinking it was actually a compliment.
 
At least you filled your elk tag and thumbs up for that. Sometimes under actual hunting conditions your position is a bit different than when sighting in & practicing. But with an elk, a deer, or whatever in your sights; then you're completely focused on making that shot. I can only recall one instance when I got scope bit and it was under actual hunting conditions on a Wyoming antelope. From the prone position with a 300WSM and a short Harris bipod. The one pictured in my avatar. The 'lope was running left to right, my guide & I proceeded to make a lot of noise yelling at it, as that will sometimes bring them to a momentary stop. It stopped, off to the right more and I shifted the gun to the right and got the reticle on it while my body was on an almost 45 degree angle to the gun versus normal prone position of body & rifle both pointed in the same direction. Got the lope and a very tiny cut which wasn't much of anything but it sure surprised me. From normal shooting positions I never had a problem but you can't always depend on everything being normal.
 
MCMXI said:
I can't remember ever getting scope bite and I've been shooting rifles with scopes for at least 30 years. I shot an elk yesterday morning (shooting suppressed) and have a nice cut on the bridge of my nose and between my eye brows. I got caught by a Nightforce F1 on a Tikka (.300 Win Mag). Not sure if there's something different about the Tikka stock and how it recoils for me but I'm sure this is the first time I've ever experienced this. Clearly the scope needs to move forward a bit.
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It smarts a little bit doesn't it? My last was back in the seventies and was partly my fault for wearing a slick nylon insulated jacket and shooting a rifle that had considerable recoil and a slick recoil pad. I never wore that jacket when shooting that gun anymore plus I changed out the recoil pad for one that had some grip to it.

Congratulations on the elk even if it did draw some blood in return.
 
I've been touched/tapped a few times, but the knockout blow came in the summer of 2019 while preparing for the vintage sniper match at Camp Perry with my 1903A4. The sand bags that the CMP supplied for the 2018 match were total crap, filled with some sort of styrofoam, and had to be repositioned after each shot. I decided that I could avoid that aggravation, and just go prone with a sling. I went to the range to practice.

At that time, I had a Weaver K2.5 mounted with some vintage Redfield rings that necessitated the scope be mounted a little far back. I'm a stock crawler when I shoot prone, and the first shot smacked me right between my eyes, broke my shooting glass frames, and literally almost knocked me out!

I replaced the Weaver with a 2.5 Hi-Lux that was originally on the rifle. And thanks for the fine folks at Decot for replacing my frames free of charge.

Wouldn't you know it, the CMP changed the bags for the 2019 match, and I ended up using them after all at the urging of my partner. Shot my best score ever that year!
 
It has been about 55 years ago. I sighted-in a friends little 308 model 88 winchester. He was short, stocky and had no neck. I, on the other hand, was 6' 1", lanky and all neck. Laid prone using a log for a rest and got a nice half moon on my brow. I've hated 308's ever since. Now I have shot 300 RUM and 338 WM off of bags and am not really crazy about it but they didn't bite me.
 
I have had it happen 3 times. Two were just taps to remind me, and one was quite the hit. First was my very first 30-06, an old sporterized mauser with a 20" tube and a short eye relief scope. Light rifle that kicked pretty good, but one day shooting reactive targets it tapped me on the nose just enough to make me think about where my head was.

The last one was trying out some heavy bullet loads in my tikka 30-06 t3lite. Just a tap to remind me it does move under recoil, no blood or marks, just a little more respect. Both of those were due to the shooting situation and not holding on quite tight enough.

The second situation was the big event though, and brought on by pure hubris. I was at a gravel pit for the second day of bachelor party events (up drinking the night before) shooting all the big boomers. Doing a mag dump at bowling pins with my 338wm with a relatively short eye relief scope. 35 rounds in (of 41 I shot through it that day) I made the mistake of not planting the rifle tight to my shoulder, and BAM! Right in the eyebrow! And my first thought was "I'm getting married in a few days and this isn't gonna be healed up by then!" Luckily the cut was minor and the slight black eye was gone by picture time. But from then on out I hold on tight with a hard kicking rifle...
 
Twice.
First with a .338RUM in a 700 in a kinda sporter barrel. Was shooting a 22 just before and didn't get her tight on my shoulder. BOOM then pain followed by lots of profanity. Kinda proud of my ability to create new profane words that day.

Second was somewhat recently.
A barrett m99. Had an oopsie and a nice bleeding cut on my eyebrow and a bloodied millet scope. And more swearing and laughing since I joked about it happening with a different rifle earlier that day.
 
Never on my own guns, once while doing some load for a friends .264 Win Mag. he was rather short 5' 7-8" and I am 6'9". It just got me a little.
Two other times someone else was involved. The first a U.S. Marshal was at friend of mine's yearly get together, he had never shot a rifle!
Well the first shot was a nice ring over his eye. The second was my nephew (also who never shot a rifle) the first shot out of my bench gun (Heavy varmit 13lb 6ppc) got him good.
 
Thanks for the kind words re the elk and for so many good responses with some great stories. I think I might have identified the issue with that rifle/scope combination, or at least a contributing factor. I have "tactical" Tenebraex flip up scope caps on both ends of the scope, and the cap on the ocular end adds more than 3/4" to the rear of the scope. So with the scope in a good position for me I'm losing more than 3/4" of clearance which is significant. Add in some awkward shooting positions as many have mentioned and it's Whac-A-Mole time! :p

Scope bite is potentially a very serious issue and I've heard of (read about) instances where someone has fractured their orbital socket as a result of being hit by a scope. When I first started working for Remington I asked the lead ammunition technician how he got that really mean scar between his eyebrows but he wouldn't tell me. Naturally I asked someone else and they told me that he was rushed to hospital one day because he was hit by the scope on a muzzleloader that he was testing. It turns out that he left the ramrod in the barrel after pushing the bullet down the barrel ... seriously!!! He was lucky in that he didn't fracture his skull ... or at least I don't think he did.

I played a lot of Rugby in England and Australia many years ago, broke my nose four times, my collar bone and some fingers during those 10 years, but I didn't feel much of anything the other morning. It wasn't until later that evening that the bridge of my nose felt swollen and bruised. The nose is still a bit tender this morning i.e. 48 hours later. Here's a COVID sensitive picture of the current state of the "ol' boat".

scope_bite_2.jpg
 
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Mk-211 said:
Let me tell you that if you've never been scope eyed by a 35 pound 50 BMG rifle, you don't know what you're missing!:confused:

Saying that it hurts like a sumbiotch is an understatement! But that's what you get for shooting someone else's .50 and taking for granted that what they told you was correct.

If you ever shoot a .50 with a collapsible stock, be sure it's locked in position! Don't take their word on it, check it (I did and it still collapsed) for yourself.
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I know I shouldn't laugh at this but the way you worded this is hilarious!! :) and I thought my lightweight 270Win had a nice solid punch to it. I would describe it as a solid, but quick, jab. I bet that 50cal is a whole different zip code of jab.
 
Nice young lady (country girl :)) with whom I used to work went back to Missouri for a long-weekend family get-together.

She returned with an unmistakable curved wound over her eyebrow.

I immediately said something like, "My guess is Cousin Someone had a brand new scoped, highpower'd rifle and y'all were drinking beer before you decided to try it out."

Nailed it. ;)
 
270Okie
Don't worry about laughing, heck, I still laugh about it myself! I should've known better and I even thought I had a good hold of it. But that recoil impulse from the .50 is a real knock out!;)
 
Happened to me only once years ago. Was deer hunting from a tree stand, twisted around to take a shot at a bobcat that was sneaking up on me. Didn't have the butt pad tight to my shoulder in that position. Bam , got the bobcat and the scope got me. Was shooting a Howa 30-06. Gave that gun to my youngest son. He's 40 now, and it got him once also. I think he bought a new scope for it. LOL
 
Have had quite a few folks offer their rifles to me to shoot.

I check eye relief first and handed some back w a " no thankyou".

Gun fit w proper scope positioning, scope w a decent eye relief....or we dont play.

Wonder what % of bites is from trying somebody elses rig
 
Never had it happen to date. My FIL did. When he shot his biggest whitetail with his 7mm Magnum. Broke his glasses, so he couldn't see if the deer was down. Cut him deep above his right eye, so he was bloodied and blind. He didn't mind once he got up to that beauty of a buck. He died a few years back, and I miss him.
 
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