DM,

I want the Leopold scope that costs $700 because it can be mounted on my rifle using the lowest mounting rings. I want to put my cheek on the stock and see through the scope. That is worth alot of money to me. If I am going to have the scope for the rest of my life I might as well have the one I want. I want the best quality and I am willing to pay a little extra for it. I've had crappy quality (on my model 94) and it was not worth the cheap price. I got a crappy scope and a great price. I paid for it in the long run with a reduced quality of experience inthe field.

The scope has been purchased and mounted. The mounting fee was $65 and that included high quality Leupold parts. There currently is no lens cover that will work with the scope because of its concave design. I will have to purchase that later (I'm guessing $35).

I am not a do-it-yourselfer by any means. When I removed the scope on my model 94 and put in new butt screws, I somehow managed to scratch the barrel and messed up the installation to boot. Now cloth snags on the butt screws when it is run across the barrel. Because I wanted to save a few bucks by doing it myself, I now have to take the gun into the gun smith and have them do it over with new screws (and hopefully fix the scratch I made). What would have cost me $20 to have professionally done in the first place may cost me over $100 to fix. I wouldn't recommend people fiddling with their guns unless they know what the heck they are doing or they don't care what their gun looks like. Messing up a gun can be very distressing to people who care tremendously about the condition of the weapon.

The real reason I am here is that I am perplexed about what kind of ammo to buy. I want 130 grain bullets. I am not interested in paying more for more knockdown power. This gun will have no problem whatsoever taking down a whitetail deer. I am willing to pay more for bullets that have a flatter trajectory and are repeatable. I see that the cost per bullet ranges from a steep$1/bullet to a staggering $2/bullet for the 270WSM. Why is there such a wide discrepancy in prices? Are the more expensive bullets more accurate? If the only difference is in knockdown power, I will take the cheap bullets and be happy. If the difference is in accuracy and distance, I will take the expensive bullets and be less happy. Can anybody help me with some pertinent advice?

Thanks.