| Scope Mounting and Boresighting Cont'd |
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| Now that you've got the proper boresight sight picture through your bore, it's time to look through your scope. All you want to do here is simply get the cross-hairs on the target without moving the firearm. In other words the bullseye is centered in the bore as well as the crosshairs at the same time. This is accomplished by two ways: making large adjustments through the scope's elevation and windage knobs or by adjusting the mounts. Though you can often adjust the scope "into" the bullseye through the use of the turrets, by turning the targets in the opposite direction labeled on the turret that the crosshairs need to go to be on target, you are using a lot of the scope's range of adjustment at close range. At longer ranges, your rifle may be less accurate and off-target. For long range shooters who dial their scopes in to the target, every click they can save at close range adds up when it's time to shoot long range. For this reason, the best way to adjust your scope's crosshairs onto the bullseye is to adjust the base(s) so that the center range of adjustment is on target when you're boresighting. Here's how you do it. Count the total number of clicks that your scope can turn with both the elevation and windage knob. Then, simply set the number of clicks to the center and you're ready to adjust the scope bases. For example, let's say you start with the windage knob. You simply turn the windage knob in one direction till you run out of adjustment. Then you simply start counting as you click in the opposite direction till you run out of adjustment. Let's say that you kept turning and turning your scope's windage knob in the left "L" direction till you couldn't turn it anymore. Then you started turning your scope's windage knob in the right "R" direction till you couldn't turn it anymore and you counted 98 clicks. All you simply need to do is turn your windage knob half the distance back towards the left "L". In this example, you'd turn the windage knobs 49 clicks left "L" to be center. Elevation is a little more tricky. The process is the same to center the range of clicks, however you can't adjust the scope base for elevation at this point! You can add metal shims between your objective (front) scope base and the receiver but most scopes have plenty range of adjustment for most firearms at most distances - long range shooters being exempt. So most hunters will only need to center their windage adjustment and they'll do great. Another supposed way to "center" your scope's range of adjustment is to place a mirror in front of the objective lens and move your crosshairs till both the crosshairs in your scope and the crosshairs in the mirror are the same. I haven't tried this method but I know of others who have and testify that it does work. Either way, ensure that the scope's range of adjustment is centered for windage, before moving the windage screws of the base. Let's say that you managed to get a good boresight picture by looking down the bore of your firearm which, again should look something like this: Good boresight sight picture However, when you look through your scope without moving the fiirearm, you get a sight picture like this: Poor scope boresight picture You'll need to adjust the scope base. To do this, simply loose the scope base windage that corresponds to the opposite direction you need your crosshairs to go. In this above example the crosshairs need to go left to be on target. So you'd loosen the right side windage screw of the scope base and tighten the scope down using the left scope base windage screw. Once you're sight pictures correspond - target centered in bore and in scope, then fire a few rounds. If adjustments need to be made with windage adjust the scope bases a little at a time by adjusting the base to preserve your windage full range of adjustment. Once you get "close" (a couple inches) then go ahead and sight in like you normally would at the range you desire (100 yard, 200 yards, etc.) You now have a properly set up scope on your firearm! |
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