A new gadget came in the mail

[bladeracer]

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/194429206805

I like adjustable mounts and bases

I want to see how precisely it tracks more than anything else, and I can't make it myself for $200.

It's not rated to handle recoil, especially not with an enormous scope strapped to it. Would likely be fine on low-recoil centrefire rifles, but they shoot so flat they wouldn't need this, this is more for mortars

The 10-40x56 Visionking has a total of 42-minutes of elevation adjustment, so I can't even zero it on the RPR's 30MoA rail under 100m. This gadget is supposed to give me 90MoA of elevation.

It's very, very, very windy and quite wet today, but I couldn't resist a quick play with it

First up, it has a very short rail so I had to use QD risers to get enough rail length to mount the scope. A smaller scope that lets you get the rings closer together would be okay. Even with the risers the scope is lower than my normal scope mounted on the AR15 rear-sight carry handle. I didn't measure the height but I had to drop the comb a little.

Then I bore-sighted the rifle at about 50m as it's too windy to set up even steel targets. The RPR's rail gave me a zero about 150mm low, at the bottom of the scope's turret. I brought the rail up 42 clicks, or 10.5MoA to get me zeroed, nice so far.

I had a 200x400mm plate still standing at about 183m, everything else had blown over. I checked my DOPE sheet for Eley Standard and dialed up another 100 clicks for 25-minutes. Annoyingly, it is set up for 11-minutes per revolution, so two revolutions plus 3MoA. It doesn't have a zero stop either, though the turrets are resettable. So my current zero is one revolution up from the bottom, then back two clicks, annoying but not a deal breaker.

I allowed about a plate width of wind from the left and sent one. I didn't see a splash but I might've heard a faint ding over the wind howling through the pines just above my head. A second shot gave me a nice splash on the steel. Very impressive, but it could be a fluke. I fired three more to empty the mag with one more clear hit.

I wound the dial way up, too far to bother counting the revs, but it does have plenty of adjustment in it.

When I get some calm weather I'll give it a good test to see how well it tracks as I wind it up. I might build a frame 2m tall to hold a strip of paper and see how close each group is to the centerline as I dial it up 5MoA at a time. 100MoA is 1454mm high at 50m which is close a 450m zero, and 500m zero only needs around 1620mm high at 50m.

[womble]

That rear monopod looks good. Does it fold away ?
In serious though, thats a sweet set up. They are a nice rifle. Those things really are a bargain for what you get.

[bladeracer]

That rear monopod looks good. Does it fold away ?
In serious though, thats a sweet set up. They are a nice rifle. Those things really are a bargain for what you get.

The "pod" is just a folding fore grip, very handy with 25rd mags (restricted to 15rds here) as the rifle barely balances on the bipod and mag, but more useful when lying on the slope behind a rise. I make a fist of my left hand, which goes on the ground under the butt stock, rest the "pod" in the "cup" of my fist, and get a very nice monopod that is adjustable just by clenching my fist, much like a bag, without needing a bag.

Agreed about the bang for buck, and it's real hoot shooting with the AR15 sights instead of a scope. The scope is absolutely enormous, but it's only on there for this test, the AR Optics 4.5-18x40 is far more compact, and lighter.

Yesterday, I measured the scope above bore at 3.145", built the target, loaded a stack of mags, got the rifle out, did the trajectory chart...then decided a 5km bush walk with the grandkids would be more fun

Annoyingly, it was more fun, even in the rain

Hopefully today I'll get a chance to test the mount. My very, very basic test when I got it didn't exhibit any obvious lateral drift at the 183m target while winding it up, but I wasn't shooting (due to extreme wind), just eyeing it.

I zeroed and did the chart with Eley Standard instead of CCI Standard Velocity, though I don't think the Eley has the consistency for shooting much past 300m. But I'm only testing the mount at this point and don't mind burning up the twice-the-cost-half-the-accuracy Eley. Lost another tree yesterday down across a fence, so that'll be fun clearing it with the kids today.

When I shoot the actual DOPE out to 500m I might use the Eley Edge. I don't have somewhere with LoS to the target from 50 to 500m from one position, so I'll have to do that from different positions, with different winds, but that's how field shooting differs from range shooting anyway.

[bladeracer]

It has been pointed out to me that the mags may not be legal in all states.
They are 25rd mags restricted to 15rds, sold by Cleaver, and excellent value (also sold at other places for twice the price, or more). I think all states allow 15rd detachable rimfire mags so they should be legal everywhere, though WA might freak that they look similar to MP5 mags. One day I'll finish drilling the 5rd, 10rd and 15rd witness holes.

I have had some BX15's on backorder with Cleaver for over a year, they finally came out of Border Force this week so should be in-hand next week. The BX15 is the best Ruger mag in my opinion.

[bladeracer]

15mph wind out there just now, so no precision testing, should be a fun Silhouette practise though.

[bladeracer]

I had my grandkids here for a fortnight so I avoided any shooting, I didn't want them to feel left out, they're allowed to shoot on private property under supervision up their way. Going to try to get them junior licences so next time they come down we can have some fun. I did manage one very quick 60rd Silhouette practice while Rose had them at the pool in town though. They went home thoroughly disillusioned about how much fun walking is, we walk everywhere

I finally managed to get out tonight just before dark to confirm zero with the RPR with Eley Edge at 50m in fairly still air. The 30-minute rail on the RPR is annoying with this 10-40x56 scope due to limited elevation. It has a total of 42-minutes, so even set at the bottom of the turret I still need to wind up about 10-minutes of the mount elevation to get a 50m zero (without shimming the rings). I didn't check the mount setting before putting the rifle away but I think there's still plenty of elevation left for testing. Just need an hour without any wind now.

Received two 10rd BX15 mags on Friday after a year's wait. Except both are restricted to bloody 9rds! And for $69 each. Not impressed at all.

[bladeracer]

Hot and very humid this today, but no wind for a while.
I managed to get this test done just before the wind started coming in hard and even blew the target over just after the final group. I had to put it up again to shoot the final groups after bring it back down to ensure return to zero. Now it's very windy and raining

I found a place under the oak trees out of the sun, and behind the sheds to minimise any wind (any light breeze could only effect the final 19m of bullet flight). Because I'm shooting so high I set up the target in front of a big dead tree. I drew a plumb line up the board to try to minimise cant, but the board kept moving slightly with the breeze and I had to adjust it several times.

All shots were aimed at the top point of the diamond at the bottom of the target board. Ignore the two groups immediately above it, I was trying to decide if I could get a bit more elevation out of the mount by adjusting the scope. The group aimed at the top left corner of the tape on the right side of the page was my final confirmed zero, about 7mm high and 4mm right at 50m. Overall, I'm very impressed with this $195 mount. I zeroed it 45-minutes up from the bottom of adjustment, and it gave me another 102-minutes of elevation for this test. With an adjustable rail to allow zeroing the mount at the bottom, there's almost 150-minutes of adjustment in the mount alone, plus 100+ in the scope. From a 50m zero that should be good to around 900m even with subsonic ammo.

I dialed in 5-minutes and started shooting 5rd groups, trying to keep the reticle aligned with the plumb line - a mistake. The target board was leaning back against the tree, and was not quite perpendicular to my shooting, so the plumb line was actually leaning toward the left slightly, forcing me to twist the rifle uncomfortably to keep the reticle aligned. I should have mounted a bubble on the scope and just shot the groups - oh well. If I can get another still day I can shoot a 50m zero group, then a 100MoA group and use a plumb line to see if there is any actual drift - I don't believe there is. After the fourth group I could no longer see the bullets hitting within the 40-power scope's field-of-view. The 11-Minutes-per-revolution was bloody annoying - 5, 10, 11+4, 11+9, 22+3, 22+8, 33+2, 33+7, 44+1, 44+6, 55 (yay!), 55+5, 55+10, 66+4, 66+9, 77+3, 77+8, 88+2, 88+7, 99+1.

But my groups steadily climbed up the board, veering very slightly left, by about 35mm at 100-minutes, due certainly cant added by myself.

The increasing cant also made the groups open up toward the end of the test but some were still pretty decent. At 30-minutes a 14mm group, 65-minutes was 17mm, and at 100-minutes it was still a 24mm group.

My estimates of group centres gave me steps of between 54mm and 74mm, with an average step of 69mm over the 20 groups. The tightest step by far was the last at 54mm (close to the end of travel), so I discounted that one as an anomaly. Five-minutes is 73mm at 50m, so the graduations are under-size, about 95% of a minute. 27.6mm at 100m instead of 29.07mm - so it's been graduated at the 1"-at-100yd that is so commonly used (a minute is actually 1.047" or 26.6mm at 100yd, or 105% of an inch). So dialing up 10-minutes on the mount actually only raises it 9.5-minutes, dialing 25-minutes raises it 23.75-minutes, dialing 100-minutes raises it 95-minutes. This is a test that everybody has to do with their scope as well, to determine exactly what it's adjustments are.

So, very impressed with this gadget

[bladeracer]

I forgot, the last target is the three groups I shot to confirm it returned to zero from the 100-minutes.

[womble]

Most impressive

[bladeracer]

I should point out that it is printed on the dial "1/4" 100yds", so it never claimed it worked in minutes - the Ebay seller does claim it is graduated in minutes though.

Adjustable mount.JPG (78.48 KiB) Viewed 4035 times

I believe it was actually intended for use on air-rifles to aid zeroing at relatively close ranges?
I don't think it was ever intended to act as an adjustable mount for shooting at extreme ranges. Which is why it's about a quarter to a tenth of the price of something that is designed for that purpose. Up to the end of the test yesterday I've fired over 200rds with this and it returned to zero from 100-minutes just fine. It does appear to be made to precise-enough tolerances that it can be used in this way, at least my example is. Basically I just need to add 5% when dialing this mount up to my required minutes.

This test confirmed that it is graduated very precisely to one-inch-per-100yd, or "minutes-less-5%" (actually 95.5% of real minutes), so if I calculate I need 38 minutes of elevation for a 250m shot (2762mm), I add 5% to the 38 "inches-per-100yd", so plus 1.9 (10% of 38 is 3.8, divide by two), for a total of 39.9 "inches-per-100yd". Four clicks per "inch-per-100yd", so I can go 39.75 or 40 "inches-per-100yd" (159 or 160 clicks - 2760mm or 2778mm) to be within 2-16mm of what I want. I know that +5% is more than (the +4.5%) I actually need, so I round down a click to 39.75.

But even 16mm is nothing in a group about 250mm in diameter. An imperceptible 3mph headwind will push the bullet down about 13mm at that distance.

A 450m shot requires 91.5-minutes elevation (from a 50m zero) or 11970mm (actually 11976mm). 91.5 plus 5% is (9.15/2=4.575 or 4.6 rounded) 96.1 "inches-per-100yd" or 12009mm - within 39mm. If I knock off a click for rounding the 4.575 up it drops me back to 11980mm.

This mount is accurate enough to let people shoot out to very long ranges with scopes that have very limited elevation adjustment. For example, my 10-40x56 scope only offers 42-minutes of total elevation adjustment, 21 up from centre, 21 down. On my RPR .22LR with its 30-minute rail I can't zero this scope closer than 100m (unless I shim the rings), the reticle will not come up high enough to zero at 50m. If I use an adjustable mount to allow me to zero it at 50m, with the turret fully down, the scope only has enough adjustment to dial out to around 250m. Using an adjustable mount to zero the scope at the bottom of the turret at 200m on my 6.5x55mm with the 147gn ELDM, the scope would still allow me to dial out to 1200m or so. Using this mount as well the limited scope adjustment will stretch it out well past 2500m. I don't know that this mount will withstand that level of recoil though, I think I'll only be using it on .22LR


This exercise is also a great example of why I hate people using the "one-inch at 100 yards is a minute-of-angle". One-and-one-twentieth-of-an-inch at 100 yards is a minute-of-angle. One of the rifle manufacturer's sites I was looking at last week advertised a guaranteed sub-MoA and stated the rifle is at least "capable of .99" at 100yds" with factory match ammunition. Even 1.046" is still sub-MoA.

[bladeracer]

Pretty damp today, but no wind.

20220129_184117b.jpg (591.04 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

I didn't bother mounting bubbles, I shot a group at 50m, wound up the mount 100-"inches-per-100yds" and fired another group. Shot number two was a squib that dropped a few inches low so I fired a sixth.
Today I used Eley Standard just because I have a lot more of it than Edge, and I had three audibly weak loads out of forty rounds fired today.
The group couldn't be much more plumb above the first group, it's maybe 5mm to the right. Height was 1340mm above group one, so 24mm lower than the Eley Edge yesterday.

20220129_183704b.jpg (222.19 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

Bottom group is my before group, top group is after going up and coming down 100-minutes. Not a great group, but it's in the right ballpark

20220129_184232c.jpg (15.41 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

Then I swapped to the Ruger American Target which is set up with an adjustable rail and zeroed at 100m (with CCI Standard Velocity) at the bottom of the scope's turret. This gives the full seven revolutions of elevation - 105-minutes. It actually has 106-minutes but is zeroed one click up from the bottom, with three clicks left at the top above 105-minutes. I didn't bother altering the zero and just shot some groups - the 18-power scope is pathetic after looking through the 40-power My before group was 104mm high and 32mm to right of aim.

20220129_185610b.jpg (209.73 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

Then I came up seven turns, 105-minutes and fired a group. These went over the top of the target board into the tree. Height was _about_ 1645mm above aim, less the 104mm of zero offset, about 1541mm of height. Drift to the right was about 50mm, less the 32mm zero offset, about 18mm. But the group wasn't great, and hard to measure as it's in the curve of the side of the tree and more than two-meters above ground. I'll have to raise the target board about 600mm so I can see above the grass to aim right at the foot of the board, perhaps tomorrow.

20220129_185619b.jpg (291.22 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

To be 104mm high at 50m this Eley Standard will be zeroed around 95m. 105-minutes of adjustment reaches out to 507m from this zero. 105-minutes at 50m is 1526mm high (my group was at 1541mm high), so we can see that the AR Optics 4.5-18x40 scope is graduated to actual minutes.
Then I came back down from 105-minutes and fired some groups.

20220129_190421b.jpg (219.17 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

These were 30mm to right and 99mm and 101mm above aim, so a perfect return to zero.

As annoying as this mount is (eleven-inches-per-100yd revolutions, and graduated in one-inch-per-100yd instead of minutes), it makes up by giving you almost 150 "inches" of adjustment, about 143-minutes, on top of whatever your scope gives you. It'll be going onto the American Target I think. I can wind the mount all the way down, wind the scope turret all the way down, mount both onto the adjustable rail, and zero the scope using the rail. Then it'll have the full scope travel on top of the mount travel.

Oh, I totally forgot as it really isn't an issue, but the elevation dial is numbered "backwards", and the index mark is at the front of the turret, not the rear.

20220129_200703b.jpg (329.5 KiB) Viewed 4027 times

As you can see, turning it in the direct of "UP", or clockwise, the numbers go down, not up. This hasn't mattered at all to me so far, but could potentially be an issue for somebody else. I can't really see the numbers clearly enough to read them anyway without glasses. It's zeroed at the number "4" as I haven't reset the turrets. So I just give it a full turn until "4" again, being 11-inches, then count by elevens, then go past by however many more inches I need by simply counting how many numbers pass the index mark, I don't need to read the actual numbers. If you did find it an issue I'm sure you could very easily print an adhesive label and wrap it around it.

If you want to be able to see the index mark from a shooting position behind the scope you will have to scribe one yourself, not at all difficult.

[bladeracer]

I've now heard about people using this specific mount very successfully on low-recoiling varmint rifles up to the .17 Hornet, with thermal optics. I think it might work fine on the .204 as well, but I'll have to try it on the .223 just to see if it holds up to the recoil, I don't know that it will, even with a lighter 550gm scope than the massive 1060gm 10-40x56 currently strapped to it. But if it does then it becomes even more useful than only being suitable for the smaller stuff.

I like PRS-style shooting, and especially the growth of .22LR PRS competition. Centrefire PRS tends toward flat-shooting cartridges, where even 20MoA of scope adjustment is all you need to get from a 200m zero out to 750m or more. But on a .22LR with a flat rail, 20MoA of adjustment won't even get you out past 150m from a 50m zero. The issue is that an elevation-adjustable rail or mount like this starts at about $700, and goes up from there. Which doesn't exactly entice people to try it out to see if they like slinging .22's at targets they can barely see. This might offer a cheap alternative to get people out there. The design has some foibles as it is a work-around, but it's manufactured to tight tolerances that make it viable for this.

I have another of these coming, exactly the same design, except it has 200mm of rail (instead of 90mm) to allow me to mount a scope without needing the risers. I'll use that on the Ruger American Target as that's the rifle I've set up for long-range. And I'll swap the short one onto the .223 and put some rounds through it to see if it holds up to the recoil, good excuse to do some load development with new bullets. After a few hundred centrefires I'll put it back on the .22LR and see if it still behaves as it does currently.

I suspect the reversed elevation scale is a QC issue. It appears that the two turrets have been printed with their scales, but then the windage turret has been tagged "UP - Down" and the elevation turret has been tagged "L-R". I tried to confirm this by removing the turrets to swap them over, but whoever did up the screws is far stronger than I am. The instructions say they're easily removed to re-zero the turrets. If I can swap them over, then some simple stickers on the face of them to indicate direction would fix it. Not being able to remove them though means having to print scales to wrap around the turrets, more difficult but not insurmountable, and black text on a white background would also make them easier to read.

The turrets have a diameter of .864", so a circumference of 2.714". Just a matter of printing a strip with a scale marked with 43 lines (44 segments), with a number every fourth line, cut it out, wrap it around the turret, and adjust the printer scaling until it fits perfectly. The strip is .160" in width. Although it would be a lot easier to do if you could remove the cap

[bladeracer]

I mounted this rail on the Ruger American Target as it's my preferred long-distance .22LR. Ruger mills the dovetail into the sides of the receiver, not along its length, so you can't slide mounts on from the back, you have to use two-piece mounts with separate clamps. I was a bit restricted but it worked out okay.

192022171427.jpg (376.54 KiB) Viewed 3848 times

192022171451.jpg (370.47 KiB) Viewed 3848 times

I used a dovetail to pic rail adaptor which gave me a bit more length to the rear, then mounted the adjustable rail on that. With its very short rail so far forward I used a one-piece pistol mount backwards to get the scope further rearward. Not too bad.

Then I centred the scope windage, wound the elevation turret to the bottom, and boresighted at 50m using the rail only. My boresight was 200m left and 140mm low, boresighting well to the left seems to have become my default recently.

Had an eye test last week and the first indications of a cataract in my right eye are apparent, but nothing to worry about just yet hopefully. But having done a lot with the 40-power scope recently, it takes some getting used to 18-power

Fired 50rds of Aguila Rifle Matchbto see if this rifle plays any better with them. Best were .805" and .92", the rest were 1.02" to 1.86", so no better than the RPR.

Then I tried 50rds of Federal F510 high-velocity, as it shoots very well in the JW25A. Three nice groups of .58", .635", and .78", the rest being 1.175" to 1.93", but I pulled one of those badly. Second worst group was 1.77". Probably averaged around 1.20".

Then 50rds of CCI Standard Velocity, best of .73", with five groups under the inch, four groups stretching out to 1.225", and a huge 1.80" group with another pulled shot. Probably averaged around one-inch.

I finished off with 20rds of Eley Edge to finish a box - .605", .82", 1.1215" and 1.14".

I didn't measure scope-bore offset but there is no cheek weld at all with the stock I have on the rifle. I'll have to swap on one with an adjustable rest.

[Biscuits]

Interesting to see how you get on with this if you do some long range work with it.

I bought this last time I was in Sydney, for about $800. Rated for recoil of big stuff. Haven't used it yet though.

https://watersrifleman.com/elr-base/

As an FYI, every rifle is different but for 100m plus, my 22 likes RWS R100.

[bladeracer]

Interesting to see how you get on with this if you do some long range work with it.

I bought this last time I was in Sydney, for about $800. Rated for recoil of big stuff. Haven't used it yet though.

https://watersrifleman.com/elr-base/

As an FYI, every rifle is different but for 100m plus, my 22 likes RWS R100.

Still winds have been rare recently here, and when I do notice it's dropped off, it's blowing again by the time I get out into the paddock, very frustrating

I've mentioned before that there's no dirt around here, it's all grazing land, so you can't walk your bullets onto a gong, if the bullet doesn't hit the gong there is nothing to indicate where it went. For the .22LR, I have gongs I set out to 500m, randomly, but at rough 50m intervals (I just stick them in the ground as I walk out to the 500m mark, then I lase their ranges for shooting). I can generally put a bullet on a 125mm gong in a couple of shots at 200m if the wind isn't too gusty, and with that, I can work my way out without wasting too much ammo. Increasing the distance at about 50m intervals let's me get out to 350m fairly reliably on gongs. Past 350m, even light breezes really open groups up, making gongs more frustrating than fun. I mainly shoot at larger plates past that distance, but I'm getting a feel for what size gongs I can make for reasonably reliable hits at 400m, 450m and 500m. I don't know if Rimfire PRS has specific target sizes in their rules. I found some US notes a while back that said targets are usually about 2" at 100yd, 5"-square at 200yd, 12"-square at 300yd, and 20"-square at 400yd, or about 2MoA, 2.5MoA-square, 4MoA-square, and 5MoA-square. Minutes are angular, or circular, and your groups should be circular. A 1MoA circular target is significantly smaller than a 1MoA square target, less than 80% of the area. The diagonal of a 20" square target is 28.28", the diameter of what the circular target would be before the four sides are cut off. The 5MoA square is going to catch a lot of bullets that would've missed a 5MoA circle.

For practicing, I would determine the diameter of group you can consistently (not your average) hold with your rifle and ammo at that distance, and make circular gongs of that size. Then practice until you can hit them reliably. Hitting a 50mm gong five times at 100m is harder than putting a 50mm 5rd group on a sheet of paper, especially if your first shot misses. Long-distance shooting is far more about reading wind and ranging than it is about inherant accuracy of the rifle and ammo.

For any flat-shooting centrefire, with a flat rail, any scope with decent elevation adjustment (50MoA up and down) should be fine out past 1000m or so, requiring less than 50-minutes of elevation. With a 30-minute rail you can probably reach 1500m, requiring around 80MoA.

Using a scope with 100MoA of total adjustment with a rail that let's you zero at the bottom of the turret at your minimum range can give you good coverage. 6.5x55mm (or Creedmoor) zeroed at 200m with the 147gn ELDM (.351G7) at 2700fps drops around 9MoA at 500m, 32MoA at 1000m, 68MoA at 1500m, 126MoA at 2000m, and 202MoA at 2500m.

With a flat mount and a hunting zero of 200m, I can dial out to around 1300m, with the BDC holdover stretching out to 1500m in a pinch. With a 50-minute rail to allow me to zero at 200m at the bottom of the turret, I could stretch that out to around 1800m (1950m with the BDC).

But if I were only using the rifle for ELR shooting, say 1000m minimum, I would use a rail that allows me to zero at 1000m, so I could dial out to 2000m (and holdover to 2200m), but at 500m it would be shooting 3300mm high and of no viable hunting use.

I couldn't justify an $800 mount unless I were shooting 2500m or more, I would probably just spend it on a scope with more adjustment, something like the $7500 March Genesis with its 400-minute elevation adjustment would be nice
http://marchscopes.com.au/genesis/

R100 is good, but not as good as CCI Standard Velocity or Eley Edge, for me with my rifles, and it's ridiculously expensive. R100 is about $350 a brick, and $3000 a case, double the price of the Eley and four times the CCI, and more expensive than I can shoot most of my centrefires. And I don't know that there is any stock of R100 as I can't find a price for it, Cleaver list it but I don't know if they have stock. Even a 250rd session would cost $175 with R50, which takes a whole lot of the fun out of it

For longer distances I've been using CCI Standard Velocity and Eley Edge, but I've been trying quite a bit of Federal F510 high-velocity with very good results. Mathematically, it shouldn't be any better, and transitions to subsonic by 40m. That 40m of supersonic flight does reduce bullet drop by about 8MoA at 500m, and the bullet drifts a little further in wind than the CCI, but it seems to group a little better at longer ranges. It doesn't group quite as well as close range, but it falls apart less at long ranges. And it's even cheaper than the CCI. I've probably only shot a few bricks of it at distance, nothing compared to the CCI, but I'm gaining data every time. I get a lot of enjoyment from trying to ding steel with .22's

My JW25A is a little more accurate than my Rugers, but I couldn't bring myself to mount this contraption on her