Leveling a scope is dumb

#51
FWIW.....Once you mount your scope, it's worth shooting up a tall, narrow, straight target with a target at the bottom, and dialing up your elevation to see if you track up the line or off to L or R. Tall target testing works super good enough for me to remove that potential error variable when i don't hit my target. 🤷‍♂️
 
#53
Matches Malone said:
Mmmkay. But this being the internet and all, that validates jack shit.

are you a place holder in PRS? Are you in Ko2m? Something? No? I have to assume you lob rounds at a target, giggle about it and go home. That doesn’t not set the accuracy standard.

And it doesn’t change the fact that the scope cap is not always square with the reticle when giving general advice.
Click to expand...

No I don't shoot PRS, I am not gay

What you are saying is that it is 100% IMPOSSIBLE to use the Wheeler system to properly level a scope then?

This is a yes or no question, don't go on and on with a bunch of non-sense.
 
#54
Baron23 said:
So, all these people talking about how the want the scope level “when shouldering” a frakin’ 23 lbs (or more) rifle.
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No, but body mechanics being what they are, the vertical butt of a rifle stock doesn’t necessarily play well with the contours of a shoulder pocket (even in the prone, modified prone, seated behind a bench, off a tripod, whatever). This is why stocks often have butt plates that can be adjusted up/down/left/right and angled some amount left and right as well. Grab your rifle and get behind it. Close your eyes and address the rifle. Pull it in as though you are going to shoot it. No cheating. Keep your eyes closed. Ok, once you’ve built your position, open your eyes. Is your reticle level? Is your bubble level? If your rifle is fit to you, it should be. Many, especially those with no adjustment (or only a cheek height adjustment) will be canted due to the shape of the shooter’s shoulder pocket.

And, when you’ve got 10 targets at varying distances across 100 degrees of terrain, and 90 seconds to hit them all, the bubble level takes a back seat to body mechanics.
 
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#55
The trick is being effecient with your level and sometimes checking it before you get fully into the glass. The more you train your intuition using the level, the more you can skip using the actual level.
 
#56
chevy_man said:
If the reticle and the turret don't align then the scope needs rebuilt and corrected.

The mistake is thinking the outside of the turret is perfectly aligned with the actual erector mechanism and the scope body.

This is why all the levels are nonsense.

Plumb line, dial through range. As long as the reticle follows the line you should be perfect. Shoot a tall target to verify.

An overwhelming amount of scopes that "don't track" are perfectly fine, they're just not perfectly square to the body. Which in reality doesn't matter a bit if the reticle and turrets track together.

It didn't help that most levels are trash. Somewhere here there's a picture floating around of 4 of those Wheeler levels all reading different on the same rail.
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This pic?
IMG_5218.jpeg
 
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#57
kenny1773 said:
No I don't shoot PRS, I am not gay

What you are saying is that it is 100% IMPOSSIBLE to use the Wheeler system to properly level a scope then?

This is a yes or no question, don't go on and on with a bunch of non-sense.
Click to expand...
You sound like the biggest faggot on the hide. You sound so gay that you had to announce your closetedness when nobody fucking asked.

That’s how gay you are. But besides your homo erratic tendencies that you want to bread crumb for everyone, it sounds like you have zero credibility besides “trust me bro.” So you wasted both of our time with that.

No, what I’m saying is that it is 100% impossible that it works for everyone, every scope, or every brand, or that the level that’s made in China is accurate. Some of us want more accuracy than that. But if I had to put a number to it, I’d say more times than not, no, the scope cap is not good enough. Other people here agree as well.
 
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#64
kenny1773 said:
No I don't shoot PRS, I am not gay

What you are saying is that it is 100% IMPOSSIBLE to use the Wheeler system to properly level a scope then?

This is a yes or no question, don't go on and on with a bunch of non-sense.
Click to expand...

Impossible? No. Improbable... yes!

It's more cheap garbage they sell to fudds to get their duplex level to never shoot past 100 yards.

A plum bob and a tall target will always work, without relying on a gimmick.
 
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#71
Baron23 said:
So, all these people talking about how the want the scope level “when shouldering” a frakin’ 23 lbs (or more) rifle.

I’m not talking about your 10 lbs hunting rig SS I know some of the folks advocating this shoot heavy PRS type rifles.

Are you by really shooting off hand (which also means across the body$ with those rifles because if not I wonder why you are worried about cant from your shoulder pocket.

If I shot off hand a lot, I’d put an adjustable butt pad on it and kick the pad’s toe out so rifle and scope are level

I believe NRA high power guys do that.
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Dude

You shoulder the rifle when in the prone position. The comments have nothing to do with shooting offhand.

Your alignment to the rifle when in the prone position can impart a natural cant which can be negated by aligning the reticle to plumb when you are in position.
 
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#73
hlee said:
One wonders what a French warehouse smells like. I imagine stale cigarettes and sour wine…
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Id imagine it smells like "aspiring Frenchmen" from wonderful French colonies like Central Africa 🇨🇫, Chad 🇹🇩, Congo 🇨🇩, etc. Based on my experience in that area of the world, it would be a rarher crisp scent you'd never forget. I might completely wrong.
 
#75
Nik H said:
Dude

You shoulder the rifle when in the prone position. The comments have nothing to do with shooting offhand.

Your alignment to the rifle when in the prone position can impart a natural cant which can be negated by aligning the reticle to plumb when you are in position.
Click to expand...
Well said, I don't know why this is so hard to understand
 
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#76
chevy_man said:
Impossible? No. Improbable... yes!

It's more cheap garbage they sell to fudds to get their duplex level to never shoot past 100 yards.

A plum bob and a tall target will always work, without relying on a gimmick.
Click to expand...
Improbable, lol

Sorry this just goes against everything I have seen in real life. I have a good friend I shoot with that also uses the Wheeler to setup all his scopes and he has no problems either. He has setup 6 guns this way, each gun has had multiple scopes. My sample size is not as large.

This is why I am asking if it is just impossible or are we just lucky, or maybe its something else entirely. Apparently I am completely wrong in what I experience per the pit

Now you all are going to make me pull the plumb line thing back out and double check, here I thought I had found an easier way. Good news is the setup is easy to double check.
 
#77
kenny1773 said:
Improbable, lol

Sorry this just goes against everything I have seen in real life. I have a good friend I shoot with that also uses the Wheeler to setup all his scopes and he has no problems either. He has setup 6 guns this way, each gun has had multiple scopes. My sample size is not as large.

This is why I am asking if it is just impossible or are we just lucky, or maybe its something else entirely. Apparently I am completely wrong in what I experience per the pit

Now you all are going to make me pull the plumb line thing back out and double check, here I thought I had found an easier way. Good news is the setup is easy to double check.
Click to expand...
How does he certify Wheeler’s spirit levels?
How far does he shoot? What are his reasonable accuracy expectations?
 
#79
Did it for almost a week with every level in my garage ....perfect ....put in on my kitchen table and looked outside.....canted ....loosened scope clamp rings and turned scope ....perfect . A week i will never get back but a learning all the same , woodworker tools [levels] vary GREATLY but machinists tool did not .
 
#80
Tokay444 said:
How does he certify Wheeler’s spirit levels?
How far does he shoot? What are his reasonable accuracy expectations?
Click to expand...

I don't know
and
I have seen him hit 4 out of 5 shots at a 6" steel at 1000 yards, with 5 shots total taken
I was able to hit 1 out of 5 with 5 shots total, my misses were not ridiculously off or not all were in the same spot high left or anything like that (my issue was wind)

I could understand that not being 'good enough' for professionals on this site. That is however good enough for me personally, so the wheeler seems to work for me, I can see where it might not work for others, the question is how accurate is good enough to accept the wheeler levelled scope?
 
#81
kenny1773 said:
I don't know
and
I have seen him hit 4 out of 5 shots at a 6" steel at 1000 yards, with 5 shots total taken
I was able to hit 1 out of 5 with 5 shots total, my misses were not ridiculously off or not all were in the same spot high left or anything like that (my issue was wind)

I could understand that not being 'good enough' for professionals on this site. That is however good enough for me personally, so the wheeler seems to work for me, I can see where it might not work for others, the question is how accurate is good enough to accept the wheeler levelled scope?
Click to expand...
The point is, if you have 5 different Wheeler kits, you’re going to end up with 5 different results.
 
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#82
Nik H said:
Dude

You shoulder the rifle when in the prone position. The comments have nothing to do with shooting offhand.

Your alignment to the rifle when in the prone position can impart a natural cant which can be negated by aligning the reticle to plumb when you are in position.
Click to expand...
Yes Nik….dude….I’ve shot right next to you and your butt pad, my butt pad, and every other swinging dick’s butt pad in those clinics were not well outboard and in your shoulder pocket.

You know as well as I do that, and let’s stick with prone, that you set the NPA of the rifle AND you get down on the gun with the same NPA. Your butt pad is straight in line with the rest of your body and is as close to being under your on eye as you can get which…again…ain’t in your shoulder pocket unless you have eye stalks like a crab or you roll your head completely to the side to try to get your eye behind the scope…and you know that’s not something we do.

If it ain’t in your shoulder pocket…which slants down and out and is well outside the width off your head on most human beings…then there is no reason to cant the pad in order to straighten up the rifle.

And dude…I know what the topic of this thread is. You aren’t the only one who can read, ya know.

I bring up off hand shooting because then there is a reason to cant the pad in that case because you are in your shoulder pocket with the rifle angled across your body.

Now I don’t compete and therefore don’t shoot barricades and the like so perhaps there are situations where you would have the pad in your shoulder pocket but even then I don’t see how you get your eye into the scope. Now I’ve watched vids of PRS shooting and it sure seems that the shooters work to position themselves so the rifle is straight out from their body and…wait for it…not in their shoulder pocket.

And, there may be physical restrictions that make it more comfortable to shoot with a little rifle cant and compensate by rotating the scope a bit to get it level. But it’s not from being in the shoulder pocket.


Great attitude…dude. :rolleyes: I’m out.
 
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#83
Don't the 3p guys cant the rifle to bring the weight of the barrel closer to their spine? I think thats one example where the rifle isn't really setup level from the get-go.

With PRS style rifles, I'm not really a fan of setting them up out of level.

Reason being that canted rifle almost by definition is out of balance in relation to gravity. And having a PRS rifle be out of balance in relation to gravity is generally the one thing you don't want to do.

It means you would then constantly be fighting the rifle on props.

If you need to cant the but-pad or the cheek rest etc that doesn't really count because those parts are very light weight.

The 3p guys are canting the barrel which can be like 4-5lbs. But that isn't out of balance, because essentially they are tri-angulating the mass with their bone support, in a way which is much different to how we are shooting precision rifles, using a 1p or 2p rest most of the time.
 
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#85
clcustom1911 said:
Id imagine it smells like "aspiring Frenchmen" from wonderful French colonies like Central Africa 🇨🇫, Chad 🇹🇩, Congo 🇨🇩, etc. Based on my experience in that area of the world, it would be a rarher crisp scent you'd never forget. I might completely wrong.
Click to expand...
A bit sharp, almost sulphurous, with a side of putrid rot and a dash of stale pit.
 
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#86
Darryle said:
Yeah, but people also used to dress and act like the sex they were born
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My son is 9 weeks old, and I enjoy telling people I assigned his gender as male. If they want to create unnecessary buttons, I will push them.

My wife is a younger foreign lady, so I tell people I wanted someone I could impress and control. I also tell them I bought her from her family. This isn't really true. I stiffed them.
 
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#89
Use this to level the scope with your rifle.

210932a1.jpg
210932.jpg


www.midwayusa.com

Arisaka Defense Scope Leveler Combo

The Arisaka Optic Leveler is an inexpensive, easy-to-use tool for leveling scopes mounted in rings or one-piece mounts. The base plate sits on the...
www.midwayusa.com www.midwayusa.com

Then when the scope if mechanically squared with the rifle like the above photo you can put a level on it like then one below. Then suspend a plum-bob downrange with brightly colored mason line.

Align the crosshairs with the string holding the plumb-bob while adjusting and securing the scope level.

785352.jpg
 
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#90
I guess I am asking for flames, but since I don't really care, here goes.

I am far from an expert marksman, but I took like 500 semesters of math and physics, and even though I have forgotten most of it, basic trig is not a big challenge for me. I have to say that I am not sure about the whole leveling business, according to my understanding, which could well be wrong.

Okay, so you're shooting a round that drops 10 feet at x yards, but your scope is canted away from the direction of gravity by one degree. So you think "down" is 10° from where it really is. Unless I'm missing something, that means your horizontal error, assuming everything else works perfectly, is 10 feet sin(1°). Before you tell me 10 feet isn't the hypotenuse, let me just say you should think twice.

So the horizontal deviation or error or whatever is about 2", always in the same direction. For 5°, it's about 10". I think a 5° cant would be pretty obvious to anyone who isn't tanked up, but it would be good to hear from someone who actually knows from experience, which isn't me.

Is any of this wrong yet? I can't see any obvious problems.

So for 6.5 Skinny Jeans at 1000, I get 5" at 1°, assuming a 285" drop. For 3°, I get about 15". So leveling must matter somewhat once you get far enough out for the round you're shooting. Is that right?

But assuming you get your scope level to your rifle to within a fraction of a degree, isn't it going to be a royal pain getting the center of the reticle and the axis of the bore in line, precisely, with the direction of gravity? I mean, if your scope and rifle are aligned, but your bipod is off, you're still off.

Also, it seems to me that aligning your scope with gravity is better than aligning it with the bore. It seems like the maximum error you could get from being canted with respect to the gun would be the horizontal distance from the bore's axis to the scope's axis, because it won't open up downrange. Is that wrong? But if your scope is canted with respect to gravity, you can be a lot farther off.

I've used machinists' parallels to set scopes level with rails, but don't ask me whether the rails were aligned with the receivers or whether the reticles were aligned with the bottom surfaces of the scopes, which I used as reference surfaces.

Seems to me that if you really want to do things as well as possible, you need to align your scope with your gun as well as you can, once, and align the scope with gravity every time you put your gun on a rest. Then shoot to see how far off things are in practice, and rotate your scope to match the error.
 
#91
Buck Wilde said:
I guess I am asking for flames, but since I don't really care, here goes.

I am far from an expert marksman, but I took like 500 semesters of math and physics, and even though I have forgotten most of it, basic trig is not a big challenge for me. I have to say that I am not sure about the whole leveling business, according to my understanding, which could well be wrong.

Okay, so you're shooting a round that drops 10 feet at x yards, but your scope is canted away from the direction of gravity by one degree. So you think "down" is 10° from where it really is. Unless I'm missing something, that means your horizontal error, assuming everything else works perfectly, is 10 feet sin(1°). Before you tell me 10 feet isn't the hypotenuse, let me just say you should think twice.

So the horizontal deviation or error or whatever is about 2", always in the same direction. For 5°, it's about 10". I think a 5° cant would be pretty obvious to anyone who isn't tanked up, but it would be good to hear from someone who actually knows from experience, which isn't me.

Is any of this wrong yet? I can't see any obvious problems.

So for 6.5 Skinny Jeans at 1000, I get 5" at 1°, assuming a 285" drop. For 3°, I get about 15". So leveling must matter somewhat once you get far enough out for the round you're shooting. Is that right?

But assuming you get your scope level to your rifle to within a fraction of a degree, isn't it going to be a royal pain getting the center of the reticle and the axis of the bore in line, precisely, with the direction of gravity? I mean, if your scope and rifle are aligned, but your bipod is off, you're still off.

Also, it seems to me that aligning your scope with gravity is better than aligning it with the bore. It seems like the maximum error you could get from being canted with respect to the gun would be the horizontal distance from the bore's axis to the scope's axis, because it won't open up downrange. Is that wrong? But if your scope is canted with respect to gravity, you can be a lot farther off.

I've used machinists' parallels to set scopes level with rails, but don't ask me whether the rails were aligned with the receivers or whether the reticles were aligned with the bottom surfaces of the scopes, which I used as reference surfaces.

Seems to me that if you really want to do things as well as possible, you need to align your scope with your gun as well as you can, once, and align the scope with gravity every time you put your gun on a rest. Then shoot to see how far off things are in practice, and rotate your scope to match the error.
Click to expand...

Psst!

It’s just a ritual! :ROFLMAO:

And some kind of reassurance to ourselves that we have done everything we could to keep our rifles happy, kinda like obsessively waxing our cars :ROFLMAO:
 
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#92
Baron23 said:
Yes Nik….dude….I’ve shot right next to you and your butt pad, my butt pad, and every other swinging dick’s butt pad in those clinics were not well outboard and in your shoulder pocket.

You know as well as I do that, and let’s stick with prone, that you set the NPA of the rifle AND you get down on the gun with the same NPA. Your butt pad is straight in line with the rest of your body and is as close to being under your on eye as you can get which…again…ain’t in your shoulder pocket unless you have eye stalks like a crab or you roll your head completely to the side to try to get your eye behind the scope…and you know that’s not something we do.

If it ain’t in your shoulder pocket…which slants down and out and is well outside the width off your head on most human beings…then there is no reason to cant the pad in order to straighten up the rifle.

And dude…I know what the topic of this thread is. You aren’t the only one who can read, ya know.

I bring up off hand shooting because then there is a reason to cant the pad in that case because you are in your shoulder pocket with the rifle angled across your body.

Now I don’t compete and therefore don’t shoot barricades and the like so perhaps there are situations where you would have the pad in your shoulder pocket but even then I don’t see how you get your eye into the scope. Now I’ve watched vids of PRS shooting and it sure seems that the shooters work to position themselves so the rifle is straight out from their body and…wait for it…not in their shoulder pocket.

And, there may be physical restrictions that make it more comfortable to shoot with a little rifle cant and compensate by roaring the scope a bit to get it level. But it’s not from being in the shoulder pocket.


Great attitude…dude. :rolleyes: I’m out.
Click to expand...
Everyone is built differently. I always have a natural cant, so I do it my way. It works.

My point is that leveling the scope when the rifle isn't in its natural position is not the end.

You brought up shooting offhand, not me. I was merely responding to that. Sorry, that ruffled your feathers.
 
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#93
Edsel said:
Psst!

It’s just a ritual! :ROFLMAO:

And some kind of reassurance to ourselves that we have done everything we could to keep our rifles happy, kinda like obsessively waxing our cars :ROFLMAO:
Click to expand...
Well that just ruins everything!

To get back to rituals, I saw some guy saying to align the vertical crosshair of the scope to a plumb bob, but he didn't say how to make sure you hold the rifle level while you're shooting it. Personally, I can't look at a level AND a reticle at the same time. I wonder if anyone has managed to place a vertical reference inside a reticle.

Okay, I figured it out. Stick an accelerometer from a phone in the scope and display the degree of cant inside the reticle. Now I just need to patent it and keep the Chinese from stealing it.

I don't get the plumb bob thing. Unless your house was built by crackheads, there ought to be dozens of vertical lines in it to align stuff to without hanging things from strings. I certainly HOPE my window frames aren't a degree out of perpendicular.
 
#95
Never owned a scope level.
Always installed my own optics by eyeballing.
Always seem to be on target...whether its 22 precision at 250yds or 30-06 at a mile.
So i am fucking good or lucky, according to the "experts".

Ive seen folks get obsessed about it. Hey...if it feels good...do it.

Unless you are hydrocephalic.....your brain and eye will pretty naturally line shit up straight pretty fucking close.
 
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#99
armorpl8chikn said:
Never owned a scope level.
Always installed my own optics by eyeballing.
Always seem to be on target...whether its 22 precision at 250yds or 30-06 at a mile.
So i am fucking good or lucky, according to the "experts".

Ive seen folks get obsessed about it. Hey...if it feels good...do it.

Unless you are hydrocephalic.....your brain and eye will pretty naturally line shit up straight pretty fucking close.
Click to expand...
At those ranges you are almost a one man mortar crew lol
 
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#100
Here is how I feel. If there is one guy here who shoots really well at long distance, and others attest that he is not full of it, and he has numerous guns without super-level scopes, then I will forget all about obsessive leveling. I don't want to waste any more time working on guns than I already do.
 
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