Range finding reticles practical?

[cdb1]

Hahaha no I understood what you meant. With my current skill and knowledge, a $1000 scope will probably be wasted. With the range I used to go to, and the hilly overgrown nature of my area, it's a struggle to find even a 400 yard shot.. let alone something that would really require real glass and great skill. Most budget-ish scopes can handle that. I'm looking for the $100-200 range to get started for the next couple of years until I hopefully have a more reliable and substantial source of income.

That primary arms scope looks promising!! I'm going to see what I can find for a price on those Bushnells.

I would look a the Minox ZV 3 from Camera Land and the Burris Fullfield II series.

 

[Klint Beastwood]

With the exception of ranging with the reticle or hold-over shooting, this is not accurate. Your implication that custom turrets (your apparent beef with Leupold and their fanboi's) are inferior to adapting to environmental changes is faulty - there's functionally no difference in dialing with a custom turret or a standard turret.

never said there was a functional different, mechanically and even solutionwise. it's very similar. what im saying is its limiting.


Ballistic matched turrets are nothing more than a range card wrapped around your turret -
Thats excatly what im talking about. They are a range card built for one particular density of air. Are you suppose to get a bunch of them for every scenario? Using this method IS DIFFERENTTTTTT. To be honest yes, im personally biased because im stuck in my ways, but still, how many of the best of the best in the world of long range shooters have you heard of use a huskemaw. In the hunting world...maybe a few but im just saying.


ou're dialing for shots, you're dialing for shots, so the appearance of the crosshair is largely irrelevant EXCEPT for ranging with the reticle.
Maybe for you. However using the reticle for field firing correction is a primary function of what I use a mil/moa/tmr/horus whatever for.
For making THE shot, no not relevant. For the hours and days and weeks getting dope on the range. at ranges out past 1760y...yes a reticle is going to help with identifing your correction value for your misses faster while walking yourself on target. Same thing at close range work. rezeroing a rifle, shoot once, use the reticle, traverse what i saw in the reticle, fine tune, verify done. on to calibration. there mover targets too, for that type of holdover...no one dials for that..half the time you dont have the time.


I can understand that many folks don't know how to run their gear, so they'll not realize that the hornady.com trajectory they punched on their phone (used to be the trajectory printed on the box) might not match their actual trajectory in their rifle, let alone their current location trajectory. If a guy doesn't actually know their trajectory, or how to manage it, and is printing/publishing a new range card for every environmental condition they shoot, instead of simply utilizing their base trajectory and making adjustments according to environmental changes, then they might be mentally crippled by having ONLY their base trajectory engraved into their turrets. But inexperienced shooters are inexperienced shooters - what do you expect?
I would expect them to learn, and to come at people properly. Pssh guarantee people, including some of the mods around here wouldnt be such talkers in real life, but hey its the internet. Thats why i put so little effort into my points, and run on sentences and not going back and proofing reading anything. No one on here is my people, i could care less if the OP shoots a barska on a custom rem 700 barlein special blah blah .338 edge. Not my gun not my problem. But in the event they take my point, do a little digging and agree with what im talking about, then id say, glad i could help.

Dropping in a milling reticle won't change the fact a guy doesn't know how to correct their trajectory for environmental conditions.
no but they can correct their fire.


Ballistic turrets are not unique to Leupold, either.
Never said they were. if you want me to say i hate the other scopes with ballistic turrets. i do. the nikons, prostaffs, huskemaws, um leupold scopes in general, certain burris scopes. My opinion aint going to hurt their sales or dissuade people from buying their products.

 

[Klint Beastwood]

\
And of course, 1700yrd cold bore shots only happen on really big targets, with really big cartridges. Since the OP is talking about a $500 rifle in 30-06, going to absurdisms like this just isn't productive.
Sure, maybe YOU need really big targets. Maybe its absurd to people on HERE. Bunch of cranky old men, who if they cant do it no one can, sure.
Apparently you've never been to ko2m. Even if your opinion of me is low, someone, somewhere is doing it. Yes im aware of the gear and equipment that goes with it, and how thats not relevant to this and that, and the OP and im wrong your right, hit probability percentage blah blah blah. Im not asking questions. I AM good to go with what i do.
I was making it a point, not a dick throwing contest. I could load up some videos if i wanted to show off, maybe my book from SOTIC will my scores and stuff, get some "street cred" but as i said before, i dont care enough to even capitalized some of these letters. However the cold barrel conversation had nothing to do with the OP if you go back and read who i was talking with. So either way.

I've seen what @eastbank If a dude knows his gear and how to use it for his application, custom turrets and standard reticles can work - and eastbank qualifies
You can take a 1911 .45 acp and hold it up 43 degrees and hit a target at 1000y away. it works. Doesn't mean its a good idea all the time. i was happy to say before it was in the eyes of the shooters....and like you said, per that users application...you literally just wrote a novel coming back around to a point i had already made.

.

 

[Varminterror]

Do yourself a favor and pass on a Simmons scope.

I do generally agree with this - especially when a guy is talking about Simmons scopes coming in the blister pack at walmart - but some of their stuff is serviceable, at least until the kid gets out of school and gets access to a bit more disposable income.

I've had this one since 2004 or 2005, and between the 44mag SBH pictured and a 454C SRH, this one has ridden over top of thousands of 300grn XTP's. Three years ago it took a 20ft tumble out of my deer stand, hit a steel step about 5ft from the ground, and spun into the dirt. Through all of it, it has held up just fine. It's as clear throughout the magnification range as the Leupold VX-3 2-8x, albeit not as refined, and with old style "coin adjust" dials instead of finger click knobs. It's a $130 scope in a field of $250-600 scopes, but I've been very pleasantly surprised by it.

 

[cdb1]

I do generally agree with this - especially when a guy is talking about Simmons scopes coming in the blister pack at walmart - but some of their stuff is serviceable, at least until the kid gets out of school and gets access to a bit more disposable income.

I've had this one since 2004 or 2005, and between the 44mag SBH pictured and a 454C SRH, this one has ridden over top of thousands of 300grn XTP's. Three years ago it took a 20ft tumble out of my deer stand, hit a steel step about 5ft from the ground, and spun into the dirt. Through all of it, it has held up just fine. It's as clear throughout the magnification range as the Leupold VX-3 2-8x, albeit not as refined, and with old style "coin adjust" dials instead of finger click knobs. It's a $130 scope in a field of $250-600 scopes, but I've been very pleasantly surprised by it.

There are exceptions to every rule.

 

[CapnMac]

Like using a sextant instead of a GPS. It is slower, much less accurate, more expensive, and requires way more work.

harumph.
A sextant--the tool--is far more accurate, especially a good one with a vernier scale that allows fine interpolation.

No math processing between different sets of satellite signals. GPS unit can "see" from 7 to ±28 satellites. To "beat" 10m 'civilian" resolution rules, a position is calculated using signals 1-7, then 2-8, then 3-9, which can be mathematically compared, at mps speed, to render a solution to 1.7 to 5.2m resolution--which is more than enough for finding a 5m-25m roadway.

A sextant, though demands much skill from the operator. Learning "where" the horizon is in a moving vehicle takes skill, and practice. "Where" on the celestial object being observed to render the angular reading is also art, and skill. But, it's not susceptible to CME or similar Solar activity, either.

But, like BDC and mil-dots, you do need Almanacs and a good chronometer to use a sextant.

 

[W.R.Buchanan]

If you use one of the Ballistic Programs out there for free you can suss out elevation offsets for the most common ranges you'd be shooting at. This usually will be for 200-600 yards or maybe 800 if you wanted to go farther.

You didn't say what caliber you are using so lets assume .308 Winchester or 7.62x51.

You must also establish what load you are going to use because the trajectory for every load will be different. This is due to differences in FPS or velocity. If you change loads you get to start over with the sighting process.

I worked out the elevation offsets for my Ruger Scout Rifle using 45 gr of IMR4895 with 147gr M80 Ball pulled bullets at @2600 FPS.

With the gun sighted dead on at 200 yards my offsets were +4MOA for 330 yards, +7.5MOA for 420 yards, +12.75 MOA
for 550 yards. Note these are the normal distances that the High Power Silhouette Game is shot at, IE: 200,300,385, 500 meters

These calculated offsets were then tested at the range and proved to be dead on.

I would also suggest buying a scope that has Tactical Style Turrets that are designed to be adjusted repeatedly as most hunting style scopes are not going to repeat their positions very well. some exceptions are Leupold Scopes, Burris, Bushnell and probably a few others. all of these outfits have some inexpensive models. I just put a 1-4X Leupold VX1 Variable scope on my big Spring powered Air Rifle, and it is excellent, Cost $200.

Another way to go is a scope with a Bullet Drop Compensator Reticle (BDC) which is calibrated for common factory loads for a given cartridge. Obviously the 5.56/.223 cartridge has many like that available.

I just bought a 1-6x Millet scope on sale from Midway for $169.95, a screamin' deal on a $350 scope. It will go onto my long range upper (24" bbl) for my SCR Rifle. It has illuminated dots on the vertical cross hair in 100 yard increments out to 600 yards which is about the limit for a .223.

As far as ranging a target in the field I would suggest that you buy a decent range finder. Then using your range card, that you developed at the range, you can dial in the exact elevation offset quickly and easily without all the monkey motion of trying to calculate a firing solution when you don't have time to do so.

It is actually fun to work all this stuff out and you will be a much better shooter as a result of doing it.

I might add that for those of you that shoot Iron sights that Quality Receiver Sights Lyman, Redfield and others) work exactly the same way as scopes do. Once you know the Elevation Offsets you simple dial the sight up to the appropriate MOA and let fly.

Randy

 

[roscoe]

harumph.
A sextant--the tool--is far more accurate, especially a good one with a vernier scale that allows fine interpolation.

No math processing between different sets of satellite signals. GPS unit can "see" from 7 to ±28 satellites. To "beat" 10m 'civilian" resolution rules, a position is calculated using signals 1-7, then 2-8, then 3-9, which can be mathematically compared, at mps speed, to render a solution to 1.7 to 5.2m resolution--which is more than enough for finding a 5m-25m roadway.

A sextant, though demands much skill from the operator. Learning "where" the horizon is in a moving vehicle takes skill, and practice. "Where" on the celestial object being observed to render the angular reading is also art, and skill. But, it's not susceptible to CME or similar Solar activity, either.

But, like BDC and mil-dots, you do need Almanacs and a good chronometer to use a sextant.

I just saw this reply. I don't think you mean the sextant is more acurate than a GPS in terms of positional accuracy. A modern GPS produces ~4 meter resolution in seconds, whereas a sextant is nowhere near that (in the hundreds of meters at best). I have never seen a modern one without a vernier scale, but even the best won't get you within 100 meters. And a GPS can be used on land whereas the sextant requires an artificial horizon, which can further decrease resolution.

And, yes, skill. I think you have to enjoy the math and analog aspect. I collect slide rules and taught my kids trigonometry on an old theodolite. So don't get me wrong, I love using a sextant, too (not that I am an expert, but my grandfather was a bomber navigator in the Pacific in WWII and got me interested), but it is never the practical solution. Now, when the Russians hack the GPS network, and SUVs and minivans are driving into the fields and off bridges, I will surely break out my sextant and sight reduction tables.

 

[eastbank]

to me you will need a very good range finder, a good reliable scope and rifle that will get you close to MOA with the load you decide will get you out to where you want to shoot. and ton of practice. I use the click system and it is very fast for me out to 600 yards and practice shooting out to 600 yards to know where my bullets at hitting, the two bugaboo,s are wind-steady rest and thoses two can ruin your day pretty quick. the most wind drift I ever had at 1000 yards was 63 inches, shooting a 7mm mag 162gr bullet at 3000 fps. I just packed up and went home that day. eastbank.

 

[Citadel99]

Another thing to bear in mind. I just learned on the Going Ballistic Podcast that on a second focal plane scope your ranging will only be accurate at full power without doing additional steps (math) to compensate for the difference in magnification. A first focal plane scope reticle grows and shrinks with your magnification allowing you to use your scope to range at any magnification.

Mark

 

[Varminterror]

Another thing to bear in mind. I just learned on the Going Ballistic Podcast that on a second focal plane scope your ranging will only be effective at full power. A second focal plane scope reticle grows and shrinks with your magnification allowing you to use your scope to range at any magnification.

Mark

It sounds like you've confused yourself a bit - I've been watching and reading Cleckner's work long enough to know he wouldn't make these mistakes, so you might revisit his podcast.

• A second focal plane reticle does NOT grow or shrink, it remains a constant size, as viewed by the shooter - you have this backwards. A First Focal Reticle "grows and shrinks," so the reticle remains the same scale relative to the target and therefore, the mil reading will be the same regardless of power. In a second focal reticle, the reading changes with magnification, and must be corrected.

• Despite the changing reading, a second focal plane reticle is NOT "only effective at full power." A second focal plane reticle is only scaled properly for ONE power, which often is the highest magnification, but if a person can do the ranging math, the added step to correct for zoom power is no more difficult. It's 5th grade math - multiplying by fractions (ratios) - example: if you have a 12x reference scope, but range the target on 18x and read 1.3mils, divide by 18, multiply by 12x, the actual reading is 0.87mils, then use 0.87 in your ranging formula.

 

[Citadel99]

Varminterror--We are on the same page. Brain fart made me write second instead of first in that last sentence. Edit to fix. I also did an edit on the SFP sentence as well. Definitely didn't drink enough coffee this morning... Thanks for the heads up.

I'm of the mindset that I'd rather be shooting than doing a lot of extra math at the range or out doors. That's why I bought a laser rangefinder. I do, though, think it is good practice to know how to utilize your scope as a tool for finding/estimating range.

Mark

 

[taliv]

Despite the changing reading, a second focal plane reticle is NOT "only effective at full power." A second focal plane reticle is only scaled properly for ONE power, which often is the highest magnification, but if a person can do the ranging math, the added step to correct for zoom power is no more difficult. It's 5th grade math - multiplying by fractions (ratios) - example: if you have a 12x reference scope, but range the target on 18x and read 1.3mils, divide by 18, multiply by 12x, the actual reading is 0.87mils, then use 0.87 in your ranging formula.

while correct, it also critically requires the magnification to be properly marked and marked at a degree of precision that it never is.

as an example, let's say you have a .5 error in magnification (i.e. through lens manufacturing, ring labeling and you dialing the ring where it's not exactly on the 18x mark, you're actually at 18.5x)

your real calculation at 18.5x is .84 mils instead of .87

let's say you know the target is 20" tall. on my cheat sheet,
.80 mils is 695 yards
.85 mils is 654 yards
.90 mils is 617 yards

quick extrapolation shows three hundredths of a mil error could mean the target is 23 yards further away.

now according to JBM the difference in drop for 23 yards on a 175g matchking (mv 2650fps) at that distance is around 11-12"

so if everything else about your shot was perfect, and you aimed dead center in the middle of your 20" target, you'd miss an 1 or so low just because you were half an x off on your magnification.

put another way, that 1/2x magnification error is almost a 2 MOA POI error
of course, that's a good BC match bullet and your hunting bullets are likely to miss by a few more inches

 

[taliv]

btw, just for giggles, set your scope up and look at the image, now adjust your ocular (ignoring the crispness of the reticle) and watch your image shrink and grow. now, go back to the ocular setting that makes your reticle crisp, and wonder what your magnification REALLY is

 

[Varminterror]

And adding the problem @taliv described, it gets a lot worse... To name a few examples:

A guy can't really mil to the nearest hundredth mil. I use that 1.3 and 0.87 mil example because I use it as a word problem with students, and it's committed to memory. Note - I read a 10" target at 1.3mil, then calculated 0.87... But the same day I trued that SFP solution, I was shooting an FFP Sig Tango4, where I can't really read much better than 0.1mil, maybe sticking a 0 or 5 in the hundredths, so I would have read 0.8, 0.85, or 0.9mil, instead of 0.87... On a 10" target, shooting a 22LR, I came up with 1.3mil, which gave me 32oyrds. With my AR with the FFP, I read 0.9mil, which would have put me at 308yrds. Reading 0.8mil would give 347yrds... The LRF reading (intentionally so) was 325yrds. With the 22LR, I'm dropping more than an inch per yard from 300-325yrds, so mis-reading 308, 320, or 347yrds would put me about 17", 5", and 27" off center, so at least a minute and a half off of center at best, or as bad as ~8MOA off center. Even with my 5.56, that ~40yrd span means about 6" in drop, just enough to have put me off of the edge of the 10" plate if I had only used the reticle.

A guy may not be able to perfectly bracket the target, or estimate its true "known target" size. Say the mirage blinded me to the edges of the target plate, so I covered the edge of the plate with the reticle stadia instead of centering on edge, giving me about a half inch of target size error... Putting 9.5" into the milling equation instead of 10", I get 303yrds instead of 320... again, that's putting me about 20" off of target with my 22LR... And of course, a guy can take this away from a known 10" round steel plate and use an approximately 36" tall fence post... If it's 40" instead of 36", can you tell the difference at 400yrds? At 600yrds? Can you find the true bottom of the post if there's prairie grass growing between you and the foot of the post? So finding yourself with a read error is all too easy in the field...

So as I said before - ranging with the reticle just can't be as accurate as an LRF, whether it's magnification correction errors, reading errors, or imprecision in the reading, it all stacks up to limit the utility of ranging with the reticle. It's a valid skill, and I spend a lot of time with new shooters trying to pass on this particular skill, but a guy really can't do anywhere near as well with a reticle as they could with an LRF.

 

[Varminterror]

Deleted - double tap.

 

[Varminterror]

btw, just for giggles, set your scope up and look at the image, now adjust your ocular (ignoring the crispness of the reticle) and watch your image shrink and grow. now, go back to the ocular setting that makes your reticle crisp, and wonder what your magnification REALLY is

I played with this particular issue in the extreme case this weekend, albeit for a different reason - I was setting up another revolver with a Bushnell Trophy handgun scope. As it came from the factory, the eye relief sat at about 14", whereas I need 19" for my particular physique. I started playing with the ocular lens to set up the scope, planning to swallow the eye relief issue in positional adaptation, and I noticed an EXTREME shift in the eye relief as I was bringing the reticle into focus. By the time I found my happy place for reticle focus, I was out at 20" eye relief, as listed on their spec sheet. Obviously, a 6" shift in eye relief means a pretty significant change in scaling for the reticle against a constant target.

But there is SOME good news... methods to determine the scaling of the reticle and actual magnification are all over online, whether using a "tall taget" or a known size target, and given the diligence to do the work, those corrections can be easily incorporated, just the same as adjustment gain/lag in the turrets. Milling precision and size estimation can't be cheated, however.

 

[Citadel99]

By the way, thanks for all the great contributions to this thread. Lots of great info in here.

Mark

 

[Rockrivr1]

The one thing this post has shown me is that I'm in desperate need of a scope class that Varminterror teaches. Though I have to find one in the New England area. I have several scoped rifles with both Leupold or Vortex scopes riding on them and I have known setting for 100, 200 and 300 yards (Longest range in my area). Those have been set by many range trips until I was happy, plus while hunting any shot over 200yrds is very rare due to terrain here.

I'm positive though that if I go hunting out west where variables are more varied I would be at a complete loss in trying to adjust my scope on the fly. By the time I figured it out the animal would be miles away.....

 

[eastbank]

I used a Remington 700 in 7mm08 with 120gr nosler BT,s at 3000 fps with a leupold verx111 2.5x8, sighted in at 200 yards and used clicks(1/4") out to 400 yards. zero-200 yards- 9 clicks-300 yards and at 400 yards 20 clicks. I shot two prongs in Wyoming, one a 280 yards and one at 310 yards ranged with my range finder and dialed 9 clicks and held right on, shooting prone with a harris bipod. both prong horns were killed with complete pass thru,s of the chest with double lung hits and didn,t go any where. from the time the animal was selected to getting prone and ready to shoot took less than two minutes. eastbank.

 

[Doc7]

I don't think all the long range stuff is relevant to your application as you have mentioned hunting two times now. (OP, and "drop big bucks to drop big bucks"). Sight in approx 2" high at 100 yards (get more specific by looking up Mean Point Blank range or MPBR) and you ought to be good to go at almost all of your relevant hunting ranges.

 

[CapnMac]

I have never seen a modern one without a vernier scale, but even the best won't get you within 100 meters. And a GPS can be used on land whereas the sextant requires an artificial horizon, which can further decrease resolution.

Fair points.
Mind, back in the Dark Ages, when I was taught all this stuff, the Lowrance GPS units took about 5 minutes to get a position, and it was only good to 10m and that only if it were properly connected to it's receiving antenna array (we have a dedicated RT rating to mind just that one unit). The Loran sets were significantly faster, if requiring interpolation on charts.
Aviation sextant use tended to only be to the minute or so, as 1000 yards was sufficient for aviation purposes. We were taught, for surface navigation, we were taught to measure to the second, as 33 yards was typically half a ship length. Which was generally good enough at 12 knots to allow multiple sightings to keep narrowing the location triangle.

There is a very present problem with the displayed accuracy of GPS being confused with actuall accuracy. Which goes back to a need for situational awareness. 12 knots is right at 6 yards a second, which is more than fast enough to stand into danger.

And it matters if you are trying to aim a 5" naval rifle, too.