Sighting in Question

I was reading Deer & Deer Hunting magazine the other night and in an article on deer rifles, the guy was discussing sighting in a rifle. He said that when sighting in, if you hit to the right, you move your crosshair right. It you hit high, you move 'em high. Is this guy on crack or am totally wrong thinking that this is the opposite of what you do. I thought if you hit right, you moved left, if it's high, you moce low. Who's on crack, me or him?


Jim M.

The bullett goes where the bullett goes! The only thing you can adjust is the scope. So you move the crosshairs to point at where the bullet is hitting!

BTW, you going to be around this weekend. I may be down that way?

I didn't read the article, but there are two basic ways of moving the crosshairs.

1. The easiest way is to shoot a group out of a vise. Keep the gun in the vise with the crosshairs on the center of the target, & then move the crosshairs from the center of the target (point of aim) to the center of the group (point of impact). In that case, you do just like the guy said - you move the crosshairs to the group. Of course you check & adjust as needed.

2. The other way is to shoot a group, then adjust. Shoot another group, then adjust. In that case, you shift the point of impact towards the point of aim.

Either way works. Solely based on what I've seen you post in the past, I would hazard a guess that you ain't on crack...

Have a good one!

Man, now I'm really confused. If I'm wanting to hit dead center at 100 yards and my bullet is hitting 2 inches right, don't I adjust my scope 2 inches to the left? : I've always shot three times, located the center of the group and moved my crosshairs toward the intended point of aim. I think I may be on crack. :speechles


Jim M.

here is a quick and dirty way.

Place rifle on your rest. Fire 1 round.

get SAME aming point, move cross hairs ontop of bullet mark.

You are there

DO NOT try this without a solid rest be it old sandbags or what ever. If your rifle moves it will not work 100%

No Jim, You are doing it right. You move your scope or rear sights the way you want the bullet to go.

However. The method described above to adjust a rifle that is firmly clamped in place works exactly as described. You shoot and with the rifle still clamped in place you move the scope to put the crosshairs on the bullet hole and you have the bullet hitting where the scope is looking.

Most of us do not have a good place to clamp and shoot so we do as you do and shoot three bullets and then move the crosshairs the direction the bullet needs to go.

Two different procedures with the same results.

Thanks Guys, I got it now.

I've kicked the habit.


Jim M.

Hey Jim, just my .02 worth. I teach long range shooting and I also have all students wait five minutes between shots to allow the barrel to cool off. As the barrel heats up the groups/shots will loosen up and you don't get a true "cold bore" shot like you will on the stand with a first shot. Most folks shoot too much too fast when sighting in especially with the thinner hunting barrels and they don't take the heating up process into consideration.

Cooling barrell

Chuck,

You make a point that others have made in the past, but which cannot be overemphasized.

I have a Rem. 700 ADL in 7mm-08 - I had a hard time getting it to zero prior to opening of gun season. I was so unsure about how good it was that I've hunted with my son's rifle more than I have with this one.

After reading your post recently, I took the rifle back to the range this past Saturday. I fired a round which was almost dead on horizontally, but about 2" high. I waited a full 5 minutes and fired another round. A dime would have just about covered the two holes. I fired one more and it was off about a half inch (shooter blame, I'm confident).

Made my adjustments and fired another shot after at least 5 minutes cooling. Waited another 5 and fired one more - a dime would just about cover those 2 shots. I'm now a happy, confident hunter (if I could just see a dadgum deer ).

Anyway, this long post is to encourage those who have ignored excellent advice in the past (as did I ) to heed the good recommendations from people on here who know. Thanks Chuck, erifle and others.