[HardingM14]

. That being said, the same way shouldering a pistol doesn’t change it to a rifle, does accidentally calling it a rifle change it to one?

Have to ask the atf. They might have walked back their shouldering the brace sbr bs.

 

[Andyw328]

Have to ask the atf. They might have walked back their shouldering the brace sbr bs.

Depends which agent responded to which letter from which guy who just had to write them , which became codified into law. Sorry, regulations. Which carry long prison sentences, and have all the force of law, just, ya know, some guy makes a decision based on his gut feeling rather than have people vote on it. So for all we know you’re right, and they may have backpedaled, forward pedaled, and did a backflip on the issue by now. (Jk about the backflip, we all saw the internal memo about the atf being fatties and the fear of pictures circulating working as anti-atf propaganda)

 

[Andyw328]

The barrel is just a tube. It doesn't care how it's held. As long as you are holding gun in the same plane as the optic and there is now weird offset like on a Garand, up down right left are still relevant. Now if your 45° hold is actually 30° or 60°, that's a different issue.

youd have to see it to understand what I’m saying I guess. The way the reticle is positioned, “down” on the elevation is actually giving you diagonally down and to the left. “Right” on the windage is giving you diagonally down and to the right. It’s obvious when laid out like that, but when you’re just shooting thinking “ok shots need to come down” it can be easy to forget that aspect. Especially when you can’t see the hits because they’re a football field away and you don’t have a spotting scope

 

[Jackofalltrades03]

youd have to see it to understand what I’m saying I guess. The way the reticle is positioned, “down” on the elevation is actually giving you diagonally down and to the left. “Right” on the windage is giving you diagonally down and to the right. It’s obvious when laid out like that, but when you’re just shooting thinking “ok shots need to come down” it can be easy to forget that aspect. Especially when you can’t see the hits because they’re a football field away and you don’t have a spotting scope

I saw your setup and I've helped a buddy set up his just like yours. You have to have the gun laid over 45° then it's set just as it would be normally.

I've oriented Optics in all sorts of positions. You have to keep the reticle square to the earth. Otherwise you're beating your head against the wall.

 

[MuppetMeat4Me]

To rephrase what Jack is saying...

If an optic is oriented in relation to gravity such that the reticle and turret adjustments are square, and it is mostly centered above the barrel (and dead center would be nice, but practically speaking, not that significant), you're good. If the optic is mounted with a 45 degree offset, and you rotate it 45 degrees to use it, and it's still above the barrel (it should be pretty close, it should be fine. If you're not rotating it 45 degrees to shoot it, that's probably pretty uncomfortable.

From a geometry standpoint, the problems most people have in terms of scope level, isn't whether the scope itself is precisely leveled in relation to the 'level' reference point of the rifle, but the consistency of level during shooting itself, and that variation really shows up at distance, where gravity and the vertical angular offset built into the optic/barrel alignment to compensate for vertical drop then gets tilted away from fighting gravity, and simply driving lateral error, and impact will drift horizontally towards the tilt, and slightly lower, based on the degree and direction of the tilt.

As such, if you're sighting in at distance, you probably want to first level your target, and shoot something with grid lines, assuming your reticle allows that with horizontal/vertical lines, so you can eliminate variations of tilt during shooting as much as possible, unless you've got a level you can see on the inside of your scope. I have heard of such things, but never had one.

 

[Andyw328]

To rephrase what Jack is saying...

If an optic is oriented in relation to gravity such that the reticle and turret adjustments are square, and it is mostly centered above the barrel (and dead center would be nice, but practically speaking, not that significant), you're good. If the optic is mounted with a 45 degree offset, and you rotate it 45 degrees to use it, and it's still above the barrel (it should be pretty close, it should be fine. If you're not rotating it 45 degrees to shoot it, that's probably pretty uncomfortable.

From a geometry standpoint, the problems most people have in terms of scope level, isn't whether the scope itself is precisely leveled in relation to the 'level' reference point of the rifle, but the consistency of level during shooting itself, and that variation really shows up at distance, where gravity and the vertical angular offset built into the optic/barrel alignment to compensate for vertical drop then gets tilted away from fighting gravity, and simply driving lateral error, and impact will drift horizontally towards the tilt, and slightly lower, based on the degree and direction of the tilt.

As such, if you're sighting in at distance, you probably want to first level your target, and shoot something with grid lines, assuming your reticle allows that with horizontal/vertical lines, so you can eliminate variations of tilt during shooting as much as possible, unless you've got a level you can see on the inside of your scope. I have heard of such things, but never had one.

I found that if I was going to have to make the same holds anyway, it wasn’t worth the hassle. I was just thinking of something to do with it in the middle of the night and went with my first gut reaction as soon as the thought crossed my mind. I’ve had great success doing that, but also great failures. The latter can be great teachers. I understand what you guys are saying, and my best response is I wasn’t truly holding the gun at 45 degrees, or the Mount isn’t truly 45 degrees, OR neither of those things matter and whatever angle I needed so the reticle lined up as if it were just optimally sitting on top of the gun, i wasn’t getting. More trouble than It’s worth, I’m afraid. That thing cost a lot of my $5 too.

 

[brianns]

In regards to holding the rifle at 45degrees, your optics mount may not hold your optic over the bore axis when tilted to 45 deg depending on the geometry of the mount and where it's attached. For gravity to work as relied upon in the vertical you need the scope to be over the bore axis or you will still chase windage as you go out in distance. So just check your rig so you know if if you are achieving the relationship or not. If not find out how far you can shoot and still be in an impact area you can learn to depend on. For example if you stay in a 6 in diameter area out to 50 yds maybe that's ok if that's all you need for a back up sight.

 

[bandit]

Some optics are nice and make it easier to hit the target/bad guy/enemy/paper plate/deer/squirrel, etc. But nothing beats some practice with iron sights to keep your skills sharp.

 

[boltaction]

Hello, Sorry, but...
You're to late to the party, my friend.
The OP is Missing In Action...

 

[Andyw328]

Hello, Sorry, but...
You're to late to the party, my friend.
The OP is Missing In Action...

My apologies, I thought I read all the replies and answered everything. I was a little depressed and have had multiple issues zeroing different optics on my socom II, aside from this zeroing issue on my mk18 experiment. Let me see what I missed

 

[Andyw328]

Some optics are nice and make it easier to hit the target/bad guy/enemy/paper plate/deer/squirrel, etc. But nothing beats some practice with iron sights to keep your skills sharp.

I practice with irons and made sure to go out of my way to get what I perceive to be the best ones on the market (diamond head). I just really liked the idea of a 45 degree canted 3x prism. And the funny part is, I zeroed it 25/300 perfectly, then got annoyed when I couldn’t get POA = POI @ 100 yards, failing to realize I was trying to make a 25/300 zero operate as if it were a 100 yd zero, and in doing so I ruined the zero. I can zero it correctly again, but I figured why bother and just left the EOtech on. It’s a MK18, the EOtech pings steel at 300yds, and I know the closeup holds just fine. In regards to iron sights, I couldn’t agree more. I’m a big proponent of optics on pistols, and have found that once you get acclimated to them, your iron sights shooting improves exponentially. This only applies to pistols, not rifles. I also (semi)recently found a pistol that shoots so well (or I’m able to utilize it well enough) that I get no appreciable difference from an RMR vs irons, so I took it off and have been running just irons.
Thanks for the reply.

 

[Andyw328]

I just had a major epiphany, thanks to bandit. I sold my WASR to get this socom II, with the logic of “I have a small 5.56, and a bigger 7.62. If I’m gonna have a bigger 7.62 it should be meaningfully bigger.” So the idea of 7.62x51 over 7.62x39 seemed obvious. I’ve been just having quite a hard time getting the socom as accurate as I’d like, but bandit’s comments about irons made me realize something critical - I’m treating my socom II like a semi auto sniper rifle, and not a battle rifle. I just threw a vortex razor red dot on it (well, removed the viper 1-6 and removed the 45 degree mount for the razor and made it primary) and I instantly feel a huge sense of relief. I enjoyed shooting this thing with irons at the beginning, but then figured “it’s a .308 so I gotta use it to hit small coins at 600 yards” (to be hyperbolic). I have to redefine my relationship with this rifle, and having a 2 MOA dot reflex optic to essentially be a cleaner version of irons seems to be just the ticket. I’m quite excited to go shoot this thing again. Also, I know the viper + cantilever mount + 45 degree canted mount don’t weigh that much, but having them all taken off and replaced with just the razor dot ? I can 100% feel the difference in weight. I think I just solved my socom II problems, which all consisted of unrealistic expectations. This thing has a 16” barrel and a chassis with a pistol grip and adjustable stock, i chose exactly what I wanted as an AK replacement then forgot what I got it for.
Sorry to rant. This is a huge realization for me.
Thanks bandit !!!

 

[Andyw328]