Percentage of hunters will try to take out the last bit of accuracy for their favourite hunting rifles, and for this, they will try switching bullets and other techniques. All of you guys must have experienced the situation when you throw away .2 and 1.2 MOA only because of your scope alignment. You find many fancy kits out in the market to mount a scope to level but though you have many options some of you still seem to be in trouble, so we will now be talking about how to level a rifle and why it actually matters.
Why does leveling matter?
In cases when your scope is not completely vertical, your bullet will either impact on the right or the left. The direction of impact will depend on the direction of the cant. 3.7 inches of error will be found in a five-degree cant at a distance of 300 yards. When you first think about it, it might not seem like that much of a trouble but as we go into it, you will get the point. Like, in a situation when you are hitting a 10-inch vital area you would either have to shoot less than 1 MOA (minute of angle which is 3 as the distance is 300 yards) or take the risk of missing a shot.
Let’s think that your cant is at 5 degrees then the impact of your group will be 3.7 inches right and before you risk missing, you will have only 1.3 inches of vital area. This must have given you an understanding that you must shoot either less than 1 MOA or 2.6-inch groups at the distance of 300 yards. If you are low on budget you can find a collection of scopes below $300 which will have a range even more than 300 yards. When we look on the other side of it, without the cant you can still connect even by shooting at 3 MOA. So, after going through this you might have understood why does it actually matter to level the scope, and now let’s go and look into how to level the rifle?
This is a simple technique to level your rifle without any trouble:
- First and foremost, check if the rifle is clear as well as unloaded.
- Use a bipod to put the rifle upright on.
- Now is to install scope ring or bottom halves and don’t forget to tighten.
- It’s time to put the scope in the rings, tighten up the rings and top halves but make sure it is still movable and can still rotate.
- If you have an elevation nod cap then you can now get rid of it (just for now of course)
- The spirit level must be placed on a rifle top surface which you know has to be timed to the bores of 12 o’clock and flat.
- It’s now time to level the rifle and don’t forget to do it from left to right.
- After ensuring that it is all flat on the knob’s top, place the crossways of the other level on top of the elevation knob.
- In case the protective cap is a lot flatter than the knob then you can just leave the cap screwed down and then you can place the level on top of it.
- Now you just have to adjust the scope until the level on it goes in, complete match with the level on the rifle.
- After that, you should now be careful and go slow when tightening the ring tops, and remember to do it until they get sung enough to hold the scope.
- Check the manufacturers recommended torque and completely tighten the rig tops according to it.
- Now you do the shouldering, which is nothing but to shoulder your rifle and now you make sure if the reticle appears to be leveled when the rifle is up.
- If you find that your scope is not still leveled compared to the rifle then loosen the screws and repeat the steps.
- While doing the final 4 steps make sure you keep an eye on the level.