20 MOA Pic rail on Savage B22 with Diamondback Tact?

[DIYguy]

Put together a Savage B22 with a Diamondback Tactical 4-16 optic in MOA to shoot NRL22 Base Class. Shot my first NRL22 match a couple weeks ago and made a discovery about my optic and my pic rail. Optic is zeroed at 50 yards and hard stop down is 4-1/2 full revolutions. One of the stages was out to 224 yards. Kestral gave me an elevation of 31.3 MOA. One full revolution is 15 MOA so two full revolutions plus 1.3. That's when I discovered the Diamondback hits a hard stop at just over two full revolutions up. Shot the stage and DOPE was good, had to hold a bit for the last little bit to make distance.
Now for the question. Looking at the pic rail on the rifle I can't find any marking to show elevations and considering normal usage for this rifle I'm sure the rail is 0 MOA. Zeroed at 50 yards scope range is 4-1/2 revolutions down and 2 revolutions up. Rather than hurt the brain trying to do the math, would a 20 MOA Pic rail reduce the down travel and give me more revolutions up for longer distance. Want my zero and most of the shooting distances to be close to the mid point in the scope travel so 4-1/2 down and 2 up gives me a total of 6-1/2 revolutions total.
So.... would a 20 MOA give me close to 3-1/4 down and 3-1/4 up. 3-1/4 revs up would give me about 48 MOA elevation for a max of about 300 yards

 

[davidsaidwhat]

I'm not doing the math either, but the local expert at our match, when advising me on what to buy to get started a couple months ago, said to get at least a 30 MOA, or better 40 MOA, mount. His advice was that either one would allow a 50 yard zero, but if I could get the 40, it would allow more vertical range. This was for a Vortex scope with 34mm tube, so that plays into the situation.

I ended up getting the L3I mount that runs about 34.4 MOA. Mine zero'd at 50 with room to spare. Not sure if they make something for Savage, but giving you an idea of what worked for me.

 

[MarkCZ]

Put together a Savage B22 with a Diamondback Tactical 4-16 optic in MOA to shoot NRL22 Base Class. Shot my first NRL22 match a couple weeks ago and made a discovery about my optic and my pic rail. Optic is zeroed at 50 yards and hard stop down is 4-1/2 full revolutions. One of the stages was out to 224 yards. Kestral gave me an elevation of 31.3 MOA. One full revolution is 15 MOA so two full revolutions plus 1.3. That's when I discovered the Diamondback hits a hard stop at just over two full revolutions up. Shot the stage and DOPE was good, had to hold a bit for the last little bit to make distance.
Now for the question. Looking at the pic rail on the rifle I can't find any marking to show elevations and considering normal usage for this rifle I'm sure the rail is 0 MOA. Zeroed at 50 yards scope range is 4-1/2 revolutions down and 2 revolutions up. Rather than hurt the brain trying to do the math, would a 20 MOA Pic rail reduce the down travel and give me more revolutions up for longer distance. Want my zero and most of the shooting distances to be close to the mid point in the scope travel so 4-1/2 down and 2 up gives me a total of 6-1/2 revolutions total.
So.... would a 20 MOA give me close to 3-1/4 down and 3-1/4 up. 3-1/4 revs up would give me about 48 MOA elevation for a max of about 300 yards

Get a set of Burris XTR rings. They will give you 40 moa of adjustment.

 

[Longshot231]

Get a set of Burris XTR rings. They will give you 40 moa of adjustment.

I'm big fan of the Burris Signature rings. However, they didn't work out on my B22. I configured the rings to give me 40 MOA but that caused the POI to be off to the left way too much. I could not correct for windage enough with the scope's turret.

So I got a 40 MOA picatinny base from EGW. You have to select the custom MOA from the drop down menu. I could not be more pleased.

https://www.egwguns.com/savage-b17-b22-b22lr-picatinny-rail-20-moa

I went back to regular rings and got the rifle zeroed in without any problems. I shoot the CCI 45 grain suppressor round which isn't going to give the extra range that a faster bullet will. However, I can dial up to 17 MILs (58 MOA) and get out to 300 yards. If I dial up to the 17 MIL limit then use the reticle for an additional 10 MILs I can get out to 440 yards

 

[DIYguy]

I went ahead and ordered the 20MOA pic for my Savage B22 from EGW. Still waiting to receive the rail and test it. Now that I'm waiting on the rail probably a moot point as I shot another match with the Diamondback Tact and don't like the optic. Decided to give up on Base Class and just go Old Gun so I can shoot a better optic. Ordered the Vortex Strike Eagle 5-25x56 with the 34mm tube. Has 47 Mil of elevation with zero stop installed. Want to get the rail and optic in hand so I can measure to determine how high or rings I need to stay as low as possible and still clear. From 44mm to 56 objective is a jump so can't rely on same math as previous.
Longshot: Which optic? looks like could be Diamndback but hard to tell. Nice setup.

 

[Longshot231]

I went ahead and ordered the 20MOA pic for my Savage B22 from EGW. Still waiting to receive the rail and test it. Now that I'm waiting on the rail probably a moot point as I shot another match with the Diamondback Tact and don't like the optic. Decided to give up on Base Class and just go Old Gun so I can shoot a better optic. Ordered the Vortex Strike Eagle 5-25x56 with the 34mm tube. Has 47 Mil of elevation with zero stop installed. Want to get the rail and optic in hand so I can measure to determine how high or rings I need to stay as low as possible and still clear. From 44mm to 56 objective is a jump so can't rely on same math as previous.
Longshot: Which optic? looks like could be Diamndback but hard to tell. Nice setup.

It’s a Vortex Viper PST 3-15X. Thanks for the compliment.

 

[DIYguy]

Finally just now received the 20MOA pic rail from EGW. Before swapping the rails with existing compared the two. I can NOT see any difference between the stock rail and the new 20MOA. The OEM does not have a single mark to indicate what MOA and given a stock 22LR rifle I assumed it was a zero rail. Spec sheet for the Savage B22 Precision just says one piece picatinny rail which is another reason I assumed zero. If it was a 20 MOA I would assume it would say so somewhere. Either the new rail is actually a zero or the stock rail is a 20 as they are identical.
Can anyone confirm.

 

[davidsaidwhat]

Finally just now received the 20MOA pic rail from EGW. Before swapping the rails with existing compared the two. I can NOT see any difference between the stock rail and the new 20MOA. The OEM does not have a single mark to indicate what MOA and given a stock 22LR rifle I assumed it was a zero rail. Spec sheet for the Savage B22 Precision just says one piece picatinny rail which is another reason I assumed zero. If it was a 20 MOA I would assume it would say so somewhere. Either the new rail is actually a zero or the stock rail is a 20 as they are identical.
Can anyone confirm.

That is a really interesting question. I have a MkII FVSR with probably that same rail. I just looked at the Savage website, and even the B22 Precision specs do not say if the rail is 0 MOA. Can't help but think they use the same rail on everything.

 

[Longshot231]

Finally just now received the 20MOA pic rail from EGW. Before swapping the rails with existing compared the two. I can NOT see any difference between the stock rail and the new 20MOA. The OEM does not have a single mark to indicate what MOA and given a stock 22LR rifle I assumed it was a zero rail. Spec sheet for the Savage B22 Precision just says one piece picatinny rail which is another reason I assumed zero. If it was a 20 MOA I would assume it would say so somewhere. Either the new rail is actually a zero or the stock rail is a 20 as they are identical.
Can anyone confirm.

That is a really interesting question. I have a MkII FVSR with probably that same rail. I just looked at the Savage website, and even the B22 Precision specs do not say if the rail is 0 MOA. Can't help but think they use the same rail on everything.

IIRC my 40 MOA rail from EGW was etched with 40 MOA. Since it was a custom rail, they would etch it with 40 MOA.

 

[DFOOSKING]

Rails do not give scopes more travel. They give you access to unused travel below your zero.

Analogy time....think of your scope's travel as a 5 story building. You are currently on the 3rd floor. That's your start point or zero. You can move or dial up to the 5th floor. The rail just makes it so you start on 1st or 2nd floor instead of the 3rd and you can still take the elevator all the way to the top.

It will not make the building taller. And too much bias can have you starting below the basement (not good). You would need to zero further out to get yourself out of the basement which is not what we want to do day to day.

If you know your total travel number....

And you know how much "up" travel you have....

You should be able to subtract the two numbers and have how much "down" travel you have on your original rail....

So say you have 30 up and 45 down on your flat rail....

A 20 MOA rail would make it (roughly) 50 up and 25 down....

A 30 MOA rail would make it (roughly) 60 up and 15 down....

A 40 MOA rail would make it 70 up and 5 down...

A 50 MOA rail would make for a shit situation because we don't enough travel....

We have things like tolerance stacking of parts that may add or subtract some from those numbers....we can't forsee that effect and just have to take it with stride.

This shit really isn't that hard to understand.

Go grab ruler or micrometer and measure your rails. The new rail by eye should have a slope you can somewhat see from the side. If you can't....measure it in front and in back. They should be different numbers.

Do the same for the original rail.

 

[DIYguy]

Now for the question. Looking at the pic rail on the rifle I can't find any marking to show elevations and considering normal usage for this rifle I'm sure the rail is 0 MOA. Zeroed at 50 yards scope range is 4-1/2 revolutions down and 2 revolutions up. Rather than hurt the brain trying to do the math, would a 20 MOA Pic rail reduce the down travel and give me more revolutions up for longer distance. Want my zero and most of the shooting distances to be close to the mid point in the scope travel so 4-1/2 down and 2 up gives me a total of 6-1/2 revolutions total.
So.... would a 20 MOA give me close to 3-1/4 down and 3-1/4 up. 3-1/4 revs up would give me about 48 MOA elevation for a max of about 300 yards

This is the question I asked at the very beginning of this journey. My home club has a max range of 227 yards for NRL22 matches and that's how far we shot on one stage for my very first match. My Diamondback Tactical maxed out at that distance, about a yard or two shy. Since about 98% of all shots are between 40y and 100y wanted the sweet spot in the optic to fit in that range. Not that interested in a pic to get me out to 600y if rifle won't do it and matches don't need it.

 

[DIYguy]

Latest info...
Debated on whether or not to open the package for the new rail but then decided wasn't worth the hassle to return. Took the existing rail off to compare the two. Reason I couldn't find any markings on the original rail is they are etched into the underside and not visible unless the rail is removed. In case anyone is wondering, the Savage B22 Precision comes with a 20 MOA pic rail. I now have two. Not sure if the engraving on the original rail means July of 2020 or something 07 and 20 MOA. Attached photo to show comparison of the two rails.