Nomercy448

I also like a diamond shaped target, I'm too lazy to go find diamond targets so I just turn square 5 spot targets 45degrees (looking like a diamond with 5 square bulls, rather than a square with 5 diamonds). That problem is exactly what I'm talking about. Frankly, it's just hard to hold the same on every shot, so the more you improve your odds to ensure you're holding, the better off you'll be.

The problem then becomes that deer don't have squares, circles, or diamonds printed on them, haha. Not much on a deer to use as reference.

By the OP's original desciption, it didn't sound like anything useful. The guy didn't give any real indication of how he was shooting. The rest of the posters had aptly covered the rings and bases, scope, rest, etc, so I referenced it, and moved onto another glaring issue. And if you'll follow some of his other comments, he's shot other rifles with better results. Obviously there was a reason he thought he wasn't shooting well with THIS rig.

I have taken 3 scopes from my brother-in-law over the last 5yrs that he has said "won't hold zero", including 2 Leup VX-2's. We've taken the time to go through all of the "usual suspects" like you mentioned, added real rings and bases, properly installed, and he still wasn't getting good groups, so he was sure the scopes were "bad". So I mounted the scopes on my .30-06 and did some shooting, did box tests with them, banged them around a bit... They all 3 held fine, and grouped as well as anything I've ever had on that rifle (even with the janky Ruger factory rings on that rifle). So what was wrong with the scopes? Nothing, the kid can't shoot for $hit. Same reason he sold his heavy AR-15, and I'm sure he'll sell the new Sendero he just bought. Moral of the story, is that guys go through the process that you suggested, and then for a lack of other options simply decide "it's just a bad scope", when it often isn't.

Again, you obviously are NOT understanding my point. There are TWO components to every shot we make. Yes, under 100yrds, we can basically neglect most environmentals and shoot without significant adjustment, so it's pretty easy to make our POI meet our POA, but getting our estimations within the same margin for error at 1,000yrds to again make our POI meet POA is much more difficult. But again, the ability to place the POA on target is the same, regardless of range. No matter how well you can hold steady, if you can't tell the rifle is on target, you can't hit the target. Moral of the story, even if a shooter that IS capable of doping well enough to shoot 1" at 1,000yrds is holding a rifle that IS capable of shooting 1" at 1,000yrds, if his magnification isn't high enough and his crosshairs completely cover the target, he can't deliver a 10" group at 1,000yrds, let alone 1". We have to meet TWO criteria, Aim at the target, and make the bullet hit what we're aiming at. No matter how well we can make the bullet hit what we're aiming it, it doesn't mean anything if we can't aim at what we want to hit. Again, if you can't make your rifle hit what you're aiming at (shooting technique and dope estimation), no, a 40x scope won't help you. But equally, it won't matter if you're shooting from a rail chassis bolted to a concrete slab, if you can't tell whether you're aimed at the x or 2" to the left of the x, the shooting technique won't matter either.

Just think of how well you could have shot if you had a real scope. You saw Ridge's groups above at 700+ (a deer will only cover 3% of the FOV at that range on a 3-9x, with the vital zone (6") covering 1/2%... Hope you can hold steady, Ridge can...). There's no arguing that you can shoot better groups with the scopes on 9x than you can at 3x, so why is it so hard for guys to admit they'd shoot better at 12x or 16x than they would at 9x?