Leupold Question

[Duckmasta]

All, I have a VX3i scope. I just noticed the eyepiece was loose when I was tinkering around. It started to loosen and a twist to the right put it back in place. Is this normal? Attached a picture of the area I am talking about.

thanks

 

[manitou1]

That is your focus. Focus it to your eye's liking then lock it with the knurled ring.

 

[Duckmasta]

That is your focus. Focus it to your eye's liking then lock it with the knurled ring.

Thanks for the quick response. Obviously I’m new to this. I do have a side focus on my VX3i. Is there a reason for 2? Also doesn't the focus make the reticle clearer or is more like a focus on a set of binoculars?

 

[manitou1]

The side adjustment is parallex, not a focus, although it seems like it. Parallex affects how your crosshairs appear vs their actual location/relation to aiming point.
You can do this at home. Try taking your normal cheek weld while looking through your scope with your rifle in a stationary mount. For lack of better terms "wiggle" your head up and down, side to side. You will see your reticle moving, sometimes a couple inches or more on the target. You can see from this that if you do no have consistant cheek weld from shot to shot, just how much it can affect groups/accuracy. Now do the same exercise while adjusting your parallex until very little reticle movement is noted. Many scopes have a distance scale on the parallex knob... many are only ballpark. You won't alleviate all reticle movement, but you want to get rid of as much as possible. Don't use that scale on the parallex knob, but instead let your eyes determine when your parallex is good. Sometimes a scope will be less focused when you have parallex set... no problem. This is when you go to your eyepiece adjustment and focus your scope to your eye.
This procedure can make a difference between 1.5" groups at 100 yds and .5" groups if you can fullfill your part of the equation.
Hope this helps. Not the most technical explanation, but in laymen's terms.
I should add that prallex needs to be adjusted with varying distances.

 

[Duckmasta]

The side adjustment is parallex, not a focus, although it seems like it. Parallex affects how your crosshairs appear vs their actual location/relation to aiming point.
You can do this at home. Try taking your normal cheek weld while looking through your scope with your rifle in a stationary mount. For lack of better terms "wiggle" your head up and down, side to side. You will see your reticle moving, sometimes a couple inches or more on the target. You can see from this that if you do no have consistant cheek weld from shot to shot, just how much it can affect groups/accuracy. Now do the same exercise while adjusting your parallex until very little reticle movement is noted. Many scopes have a distance scale on the parallex knob... many are only ballpark. You won't alleviate all reticle movement, but you want to get rid of as much as possible. Don't use that scale on the parallex knob, but instead let your eyes determine when your parallex is good. Sometimes a scope will be less focused when you have parallex set... no problem. This is when you go to your eyepiece adjustment and focus your scope to your eye.
This procedure can make a difference between 1.5" groups at 100 yds and .5" groups if you can fullfill your part of the equation.
Hope this helps. Not the most technical explanation, but in laymen's terms.
I should add that prallex needs to be adjusted with varying distances.

Thank you very much for this explanation. It helped me immensely.