Not to hijack the thread but a similar? If the scope 5-25 x 56 is dialed in with 20 MOA and the rail is 20 MOA the total would be 40 MOA?
In order it to get it back to 20 MOA would the reticle be better to be ajdusted or a 0 rail?
1K yard max shooter
In theory yes. But you are overthinking things. The point is 40MOA with reference to WHAT.
When you zero, that's your reference point. The scope + rail "MOA" is 99% irrelevant because the whole point of zeroing is to line up the scope with the line of fire. There is no "absolute" reference frame. The only reference we care about is the zero. At 100 yards the scope and rifle intersect paths. and we call that "0". Everything is referenced from there. SO if you dial 20 MOA up, its not 20MOA scope + 20MOA rail, its 20MOA from your zero. (Becuase what scope actually zeros at the zero markings).
The 1 % is becuase you seem to be assuming the initial measurements/dials on the scope mean something. They mean NOTHING. They are not aligned to anything. THe point of the zero is to match the scope markings with impacts at a fixed distance (and good scope allow you to change the numbers to that they read 0!). However, scopes have a fixed amount they can move. lets say a scope can move 25MOA up and down, for 50 MOA travel. But 100% of the time (after a zero) we need UP (impact) adjustment. They only time you dial DOWN (impact) is on the zero. Once you have that, you essentially never dial down again because the bullet ALWAYS drops.
Now think about if your scope zero's perfect at the "Scope" up/down marking of 0. that means you can go 25 up and 25 down. But that 25 down is wasted (remember we just zero'd). Thus the 20MOA rail forces a 0 at the scope setting of -20 (and remember, its just a number on a dial--you are aligning the dial to your impact at 100 yards). Now instead of 25 up and down, you have 45 up and 5 down. In other words, you get 20 EXTRA moa of elevation.
But because we baught a good quality scope, we just move the nobs so that are zero, instead of -20 reads 0. But internally, the springs in the scope can go 5 MOA down or 45 MOA up (cause our rail just forced us to dial 20 MOA down).
TLDR: What matters is your zero. TO get the maximum elevation out of our scope, we zero towards one end of the range of travel. Mark our zero as zero (MARK IT ZERO!) and measure from there. I can hand my rifle to anyone who knows ZIP about my setup--tell them "rifle is zero'd at 100 yards" and they dial their dope from their--they don't even have to know the 20MOA rail is there. Its immaterial. all that matters is measuring from the zero. What the rail does is move the zero to a more favorable zone of travel in our scopes.
bonus points for understanding--whats my setting for 4.6 mils UP on a rifle zero'd with a 20MOA rail:
Answer 4.6 mils up. Zero is zero.
