Rifle Scopes How much scope base cant/elevation do you use? 0MOA? 20MOA? 45MOA?

[nuclear_shooter]

Your comment was about weight savings. Which my reply was reducing the overall weight of an object, and each object being reduced by fractions of a pound will add up with each item added. Times that by everything you place on your body and combine that in very steep vertical country at high elevation and you'll be asking yourself what you do and don't need!

The barrel is last place I want to make a compromise in my opinion, that is unless your not concerned about accuracy as the barrel heats up. There are ways to stiffen a stock while reducing the overall weight which is better then taking it out of the barrel, and there is only so many parts to look to reduce the weight while still having durability and constancy.

I don't recall ever saying I could tell 3.2 oz. vs. 5 oz. added to a rifle's weight either, but I couldn't help but notice you don't mention where you live in your profile? Not a lot of flat ground around here, unless you're talking about the road surface.

I live in SWVA somewhere in the Appalachians. We can argue about were to save weight till we're blue in the face, but if you really want a light, good quality rail, why not get the Seekins 20 or 30 moa base? I love mine and the SA ones are 2 oz. They can be had for under $100.

 

[6.5 GUY]

I live in SWVA somewhere in the Appalachians. We can argue about were to save weight till we're blue in the face, but if you really want a light, good quality rail, why not get the Seekins 20 or 30 moa base? I love mine and the SA ones are 2 oz. They can be had for under $100.

You are dead right about arguing over who's opinion carries more (weight) I mean merit! It just gets my goat to hear someone tell me what I need and don't need. I'm fifty, and I've hunted hard since I was old enough to hold a gun in my hand, earned my Marksmen and Pro-Marksmen at age 7, but at this age it's not getting easier to pack unwanted excessive weight around.

Seekins Precision makes great products, and so does Talley. My experience with Talley has been well over a few decades, but last year I ordered a set of tactical rings along with a 20 moa picatinny base that after considerable time trying to figure what was wrong (scope, base, receiver) ended up being that the base was cut wrong! Yes it was cut wrong, it ended up being more like 6.5 moa. So after that experience I started using bases made by Cameron Murphy of Murphy Precision, sharp guy, and he will make them in any moa amount you ask for, and not just in 10 moa increment. He'll do any number, 10-45 or 18, 23, 28 moa or whatever you want. I like working with someone on a first name basis, and helping a small machine shop by doing business with them. I have nothing against using other vendors, but I'll use someone like Cameron that has consistently provided me with a great product and service in the future until it proves otherwise not to.

No hard feelings, it's all good.

 

[6.5 GUY]

Why one needs a robust scope or a solid base for that matter.

High-speed video of scope and the picatinny base flexing on a 50BMG

high-speed video of scope and barrel flexing on a 50BMG - YouTube

 

[CSTactical]

I tend to recommend the 30moa to a 40moa.

Mike @ CSTACTICAL

 

[Irokcrawl]

Okay, run your ballistics calculator for a 208 amax doing 2550 at 6000DA. I openly admit I don't run that load but I did experiment with it in my less experienced days. The point was that just because a round might make a mile doesn't mean its a good idea or anything close to accurate at that distance.

**Edited to add**

Now that I'm home I'll add to this a bit. My point when I made that comment was that just getting the round there doesn't mean much. In my newer days when I tried to come up with a round that would do it all I messed with heavy projectiles, long barrels, and hot rod powders. The 208 will get close to a mile supersonic, but that's irrelevant. There is a point of diminishing return where the cartridge is no longer viable against targets at that range. They had a practice target at 1250 or so at last years Cup, I hit it a half dozen times with as many misses with a 178gr projectile. I'd say that's within the scope of a 308's ability at altitude, though there are better calibers for the job. The year prior there was a target at 1450 or so and I had some ammo to burn so I tried to see if I could even tag it a single time. Never touched it.

That's my point. There comes a range where the cartridge is no longer effective. The flight time and the distance overpower the BC of the bullet and your odds of hitting a target drop off very steeply. I think that is also Frank's point about a 6.5 caliber to a mile. Just because it gets there doesn't matter if the slightest breeze dashes your hopes of hitting a target. There's a reason people shoot 338 and bigger to a mile. Bigger bullet, magnum velocity, high BC bullet. Even then you really have to be on your game at those distances.

I know the OP and he's asking a reasonable question. My answer is, I've not seen anyone advocating 45MOA mounts over 20MOA mounts, at least not for 6.5 calibers. Even if they did all that really does is maximize your scope travel. That caliber isn't suited to distances much past maybe 1100-1200yds though so its sort of a solution in search of a problem. If you put the same scope on a 338LM and you want to shoot to 2000 yards you will need all the travel you can get, but that's another story. The 20MOA mount is more than sufficient for what you will be doing, even when you venture past 1200.

With my 185gn load moving at 2760 I would need to be at roughly 8800 feet to keep it from hitting the wall before a mile. That's just a quick calculation. Im at roughly 300ft above sea level and in normal conditions it takes me 28.3 mils to reach a mile (verified) with the 308. I hit the "wall" right around 1200-1250 yards. I have moved to 30moa or 40moa across most of my guns so i can actually dial the whole dope instead of dialing some and then holding the rest which I have to do with only 20moa base. 100 yard zero is no problem with any of my optics.

 

[delixe]

I have a Steiner Military 5-25 in a Spuhr 13 mil (44.4 MOA) mount.
With a 100 yard zero I have a mil left before the erector bottoms..
In hindsight, I wish I had opted for a mount with less cant (no regrets about buying a Spuhr, though) since I have yet to find a range within driving distance where I need even half the 26.5 mils of elevation I have available. Mostly the erector stays in the first 5 Mils of travel (local 600 yard range) and once in a while I wonder if I'm going to have a problem down the road from the erector spring losing tension by being nearly fully compressed all the time. Materials have come a long way, and spring steel today is supposed to be very resilient, but it can't be doing it any good.

 

[6.5 GUY]

With my 185gn load moving at 2760 I would need to be at roughly 8800 feet to keep it from hitting the wall before a mile. That's just a quick calculation. Im at roughly 300ft above sea level and in normal conditions it takes me 28.3 mils to reach a mile (verified) with the 308. I hit the "wall" right around 1200-1250 yards. I have moved to 30moa or 40moa across most of my guns so i can actually dial the whole dope instead of dialing some and then holding the rest which I have to do with only 20moa base. 100 yard zero is no problem with any of my optics.

That's what happened to me as well even with a 30 moa base on my 7mm-08. One full turn on a double turn Kahles K312, which is basically almost half the total value of the scopes elevation range. I had a little more before but changing loads around to using a 168 SMK going 2670 @ 20' from the muzzle that's all I have now. Honestly though, my eyes have issues sometimes doing load development at my 100 yard range, it goes in and out of focus (blurry) and I don't think I'd like having my erector all the way down just off the bottom, that could just make it worse for me?

Although further out I've never had any issues hitting what's in the cross hairs. Mostly my shooting is in the 300-600 yards range only because that's what I have available out my front door, but I have access to a mountain top where I shoot over two valley's to a mountain hill side behind my house that gets me out to 1300+ yards with no problem.... other then the hike in the winter months because I can't drive up there.

 

[DOA]

Wonder if the actual trigger pullers in the field have these nonsense arguments...

 

[Redmanss]

Wonder if the actual trigger pullers in the field have these nonsense arguments...

They don't. They typically also don't get one say into what they carry for a living either. Aside from now having to pay for my own match ammo, being a civilian with choice is fucking awesome.

 

[Pappasniper]

I run 20MOA bases on 308 and 300WM, NF 3-15 and 5.5-22 , never ran out of adjustments, always could see my targets. 1000-1400 yards