Mounts and Rings for new bolt rifle, confused

[rogerjames]

Bought my first bolt action from fellow THR member bgold. Great guy and great transaction btw. Savage 111 in .270. Really wanted .308 10fp but his offer was too good to pass up!
Anyway, I am a total noob to rifles. I plan on adding a scope to this rifle ASAP. I really am not looking for advice here on scopes, my research has given me a lot of info and a lot of choices. However, my learning of the mounts and rings have not been as successful.

It seems that ring "height" is primarily determined by the diameter of the scope. Is this correct?

Now, I am really confused in the difference between the mounts. 1 piece vs 2 piece? Weaver vs. non-Weaver? Common sense tells me that 1 piece may provide more stability and 2 piece may provide more flexible adjustment. Is this true? Also, do I really need windage adjustment on the mount if this adjustment is present on the scope? Seems like an added variable for error.
Lastly, any mounts/rings significantly better than others? Thanks.

 

[jmr40]

Pick your scope first, then figure out what type of mounts will work best. Savage long action rifles have a much longer spacing between the front and rear mounting holes so a longer scope will give you more options to mount the scope. Most mounts work well enough so it really is personal preferance for the most part.

The old Weaver mounts are the least expensive, and ugliest, but they work better than most. The Steel Leupold mounts with windage adjustable bases work well enough, but are the most expensive, heaviest, the hardest to get mounted correctly and if not mounted correctly can cause the most problems.

I like either the Deadnutz, or Talley lightweights. They are lightweight, easy to mount correctly and because the bases are part of the lower rings they are stronger than most steel rings.

If your scope is less than 40mm with most rings you can get by with low rings but many prefer to use mediums anyway. Above 40mm and it becomes more difficult. Sometimes a medium will work, soimetimes you must go up to a high ring, especially if you go up to 50mm.

 

[SwampWolf]

It seems that ring "height" is primarily determined by the diameter of the scope. Is this correct?

If you mean the diameter of the objective housing, the answer is yes. The diameter of the tube itself has little to nothing to do with the correct ring/mount height. In the interest of achieving the best stock to cheek "weld" possible, I would advise mounting the scope as low as practical (in terms of scope objective clearance. bolt handle clearance, etc.) using the correct ring/mount set-up.

As jmr40 noted, the choice of which style and type of mount is largely a personal one but sometimes is dictated by the compatibility (or incompatiblity) of a particular rifle action with a particular mount.

 

[dakotasin]

2-piece bases give easier access to loading port. 1-piece offers nothing over 2-piece in sporter configurations. the extra stability you are alluding to might be true if you bed the base to the receiver and use something a little more stout than 6x48 screws to bridge the receiver. in a sporter gun it really is an academic exercise, anyway.

as for brands, most any will work fine - kind of hard to mess 'em up. my favorite is talley, but just about any will work fine.