Well, it happened to me again - loss of zero on hunt. After scratching my head for years and wondering why the heck this would happen, I made a shift a couple few years back after reading Form’s and others posts.
I started swapping out equipment that had failed, and focussing on proper mounting. Maybe the biggest lesson is to test your own equipment. Which I have started doing - for the most part.
Anyway, to kill any suspense, deer were still harmed in the making of the trip, and no trophies were lost. But a friend pulled about an 8 year tag (don’t quote me) for a mule buck. I went down with a doe tag to assist, and we decided since we were hunting together to just use my rifle which he has hunted with and shot prior.
After a few days hiking and banging around, he nailed his buck with solid hits in quite windy conditions out to 450.
Next time I went to use the rifle was just filling the doe tag, but it required belly crawling far further than it is ever worth doing for a doe. The rifle took some gentle impacts along the way, and sure enough on a 320 yard shot on a bedded doe, the bullet whistled right over. I adjusted and got the doe, but then testing at 100 yards, the zero had shifted about 3 inches up and 1.5 inches right.
Key here being that I never gave this unit a test myself since re-mounting it this fall. And I suspect that the weak link here will be the Talley’s (the only gun I have them on is my Fieldcraft as I don’t love how high the either mounting options are). We shall see as I am remounting and testing, with a few new options as I know of too many Talley LW failures.
I ordered a set of the DNZ direct mounts and a Leupold Backcountry Base with Ken Farrell rings.
Rifle setup:
Barrett Fieldcraft 6.5 CM threaded
Talley low rings (degreased, and then loctited at 35in/lbs on the action and 18in/lbs on the rings. I will up both of these if I try the Talleys again)
SWFA 3-9
All that to say, anyone found any good mounting options for the Fieldcraft asides from what I have/have now ordered?
Thanks all,
I started swapping out equipment that had failed, and focussing on proper mounting. Maybe the biggest lesson is to test your own equipment. Which I have started doing - for the most part.
Anyway, to kill any suspense, deer were still harmed in the making of the trip, and no trophies were lost. But a friend pulled about an 8 year tag (don’t quote me) for a mule buck. I went down with a doe tag to assist, and we decided since we were hunting together to just use my rifle which he has hunted with and shot prior.
After a few days hiking and banging around, he nailed his buck with solid hits in quite windy conditions out to 450.
Next time I went to use the rifle was just filling the doe tag, but it required belly crawling far further than it is ever worth doing for a doe. The rifle took some gentle impacts along the way, and sure enough on a 320 yard shot on a bedded doe, the bullet whistled right over. I adjusted and got the doe, but then testing at 100 yards, the zero had shifted about 3 inches up and 1.5 inches right.
Key here being that I never gave this unit a test myself since re-mounting it this fall. And I suspect that the weak link here will be the Talley’s (the only gun I have them on is my Fieldcraft as I don’t love how high the either mounting options are). We shall see as I am remounting and testing, with a few new options as I know of too many Talley LW failures.
I ordered a set of the DNZ direct mounts and a Leupold Backcountry Base with Ken Farrell rings.
Rifle setup:
Barrett Fieldcraft 6.5 CM threaded
Talley low rings (degreased, and then loctited at 35in/lbs on the action and 18in/lbs on the rings. I will up both of these if I try the Talleys again)
SWFA 3-9
All that to say, anyone found any good mounting options for the Fieldcraft asides from what I have/have now ordered?
Thanks all,