Do You Zero Scope When You Switch Between Garden/club?

[dangerousdan 16]

Hi,

 

In my garden I will only be shooting about 10m. At the HFT club I will be shooting anywhere between 10 to 50m. In time I may try different clubs with FT out to longer distances.

 

Will I need to rezero/adjust my scope when I switch between shooting in the two locations?

 

I was going to zero my scope tomorrow for the 10m garden target. When I attend the club will this mean I am shooting high or low at the longer targets? I have been reading up on scopes but not sure I understand how the zeroing really works yet.

 

At the club should I zero at a mid range (between 25m and 35m), then use the mildots on the scope for compensating at shorter or longer distances?

 

Thanks

Edited September 27, 2013 by dangerousdan

[stealthy1 3,964]

You need to have the distance you want to shoot to so you can fine tune your aim points

[dangerousdan 16]

But I want to shoot at varying distances? Sorry I'm not sure I understand.

[stealthy1 3,964]

If you want to shoot out to 50mtrs, first zero your scope to 25/30 mtrs, then work out your hold over using your mildots to hit a target at 50mtrs

[dangerousdan 16]

Hold over means aim high yes? So when shooting at a shorter distance i do the opposite and aim low?

 

How much does a pellet fall by over 50m?

[stealthy1 3,964]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGUzQX2UcqM explained by our regular explainer

[dangerousdan 16]

Thanks for that. I knew to aim high at longer distances but never knew I had to aim low in the middle range and then aim high again at very short ranges. That's very counter intuitive. No wonder I couldn't hit short/medium range targets very well last week at the club.

 

In the video, Si suggests that zero-ing at 19 yards eliminates need to hold under at all. Is this recommended and is it the easiest for beginners?

Edited September 27, 2013 by dangerousdan

[pianoman 3,587]

I'd say it is easier to begin with 19 metres for beginners. And you should always zero and check-zero your rifle before every hunting foray, wherever it takes place.

 

In what I call 'Trajectory Mapping' you need to establish as precisely as you can, the looping flight path of your pellet from the muzzle of the rifle to the impact of your furthest target you can confidently shoot to. The best way to find this is to begin with an optimum zero for hunting. For me, it's 30 metres for my .22 rifles and 40 metres for my .177. Shooting a series of targets from 10-metres and out in stages of 5-metre increments to 50 metres is the most effective way to realise a visual picture of your calibre's flightpath; and how it rises and falls over the distance.

 

Once you have this 'trajectory map' of your ammo's performance accurately logged on paper and committed to memory, you will have an optimum zero that you can successfully adapt to changing ranges over your permissions.

 

Edited to add:

I always zero my riflescopes at ranges in metres, not yards. The metre being a tad longer gives me a bit more finesse in aim-distance/range calculations when I'm hunting.

 

Never found a rabbit yet that was willing to oblige me by appearing at my exact zero distance!

Edited September 27, 2013 by pianoman

[dangerousdan 16]

I've just downloaded the Hawke ChairGun software and have been playing about with it. Definitely learnt something here.

 

I'm finding the software quite useful too. If I set the zero range to 30 yards, its telling me I'd be within half an inch high or low of the target between about 8 to 35 yards. This would seem to be the ideal setting for me at the moment. Amazed that at 50 yards the pellet will drop nearly 4 inches, which is more than I thought.

 

What's also surprising is I thought these guns could shoot 100 yards or more, yet the software is saying the pellet would drop over 40 inches at that distance.

 

If I set the zero distance at 20 yards to eliminate hold under then I'd seem to need half an inch of hold over at 10m and the same at 30m. At 50m I'd need over 4 inches of hold over!

 

I'm surprised the trajectory is so curved at these fairly short ranges. I can see why people want FAC level guns now.

[Acuspell 329]

Dan - look at your rifle and scope from the side.......the sight sits about 2" higher than the hole through the barrel. At close ranges, you are looking through the sight at the target, the barrel is looking at the target from a viewpoint 2" lower - that is why you need to lift it up a bit to hit the target - the sight has been set to make the barrel look at the taregt further out...30 yards ish. It takes that 30 yards for th epellet to go from 2" under the sight line, to coincide with the sightline. (SIMPLIFIED - don't complicate it at this stage folks with talk of primary and secondary....let's go one step at a time!)

 

You have seen the graph on Chairgun of the arc of flight from a rifle.The interesting thing is, EVERY calibre and velocity follows the same curve, the distances vary, but the shape of the curve remains constant. That is because it is the effect of gravity that causes the projectile to fall, gravity acts on all projectiles the same, regardless of how fast they are travelling. One good example of this is:

 

Take a rifle pointing parallel with the ground and a bullet held next to the muzzle. If the bullet held beside the muzzle is dropped at precisely the same time one is fired out of the muzzle THEY WILL BOTH HIT THE GROUND AT THE SAME TIME. One by your feet, the other some distance down the field, how far down the field will depend on the velocity, it does not depend on the weight, projectile weight MIGHT dictate the velocity - but it is the velocity that establishes how far down the field the bullet travels before gravity has pulled it to the ground. The time it takes to fall to the ground is the same, a bullet travellin gfaster can get further down th field before the clock runs down. The bullet dropped by the muzzle takes the same length of time to fall to the ground.

 

You set your zero so as to counteract the effect of gravity - you have a bit of choice as to how you want to try and cheat the laws of physics, but they always win in the end!

Edited September 28, 2013 by Acuspell

[pianoman 3,587]

FAC makes for a flatter trajectory Dan, true enough. But, having established you need four inches of holdover to reach 50 yards, you only need now to find out what that four inches looks like in the field through your scope and on your reticle. And you are there!

[dangerousdan 16]

Great stuff this!

 

It helps alot to visualise it on the software to be fair. According to the software I should be able to zero my scope at 12 yards in my garden and that is equivalent to a 33 yard zero which is my optimum for the 1" kill zone.

 

Just got to put it all into practice now!

 

Thanks everyone

 

Pianoman, I'm sure my next question at some point will be how to use mildots!

Edited September 28, 2013 by dangerousdan

[Acuspell 329]

I don't know if you saw my post above because you were posting at the same time!

 

Once you have "roughed" your scope settings out in Chairgun - then go and put targets up and do it for real, because Chairgun does NOT take into account any pellet walk you might get. Only practical shooting will show you this. besides it will help you get a mental picture of what to do instinctively at different ranges - if close, give it a bit of holdover. If 20 yards ish, you need to aim low a bit.

 

Once you have done it all on the flat - find a steep hill. It can be in the woods, or it can be a steep field - do the same thing, put targets out and see how the upward and downward shooting angle affects your impact point. WHY? because if you are shooting down a bank at a rabbit, you are going to shoot over the top if you don't practise first and see what up and down angles do........the range to use to work out your aiming point, regardless of the angle, is THE HORIZONTAL DISTANCE TO THE TARGET....this is easy for a tree, you just measure to the base of the tree, give or take the length of the branch. On a hill, the horizontal range is burying a tunnel into the hill, or sending a spirit level out into the air over the rabbits head, but it is still only the horizontal distance that gravity pulls the pellet to ground by.

[stealthy1 3,964]

Good to see your sorted

[Craig Fosse 286]

I can't really add a lot more here mate apart from don't take chairgun for 100% right it's very try complicated with a lot of values, u still need to set targets up and use it as a guide not the gospel truth.