grappling_hook
WKR
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2019
- Location
- Alaska
Everything was coming together at the range today after lots of tinkering with my ultralight ultralight rifle setup, so I thought I'd do one of the quick/dirty/fun drop tests I've been doing, this time including the Primary Arms SLx 5X MicroPrism. I have it mounted on an AR platform with a Shaw portless ultralight barrel in .223 Wylde, Tennessee Arms Company carbon/poly lower, SOLO upper, Smoke Composites handguard, grip, and buttstock, and a Larue MBT2 trigger. All of the PA Microprism mounts are loctited/torqued properly, except the crossbolts aren't loctited for easier switching between pic mounts. The rifle weighs 4 lbs 14.6 oz with suppressor, optic, and sling. Adding 10 in the magazine gets it to 5 lbs 3 oz. More awesome ultralight ultralight builds are here.
Ammo was 77gr Sierra Tipped Matchiking in Nosler brass with 23.0gr of Ramshot Tac.
Simple process on my end-- take a gun that is shooting 1.5 MOA or less for 10-20 shot groups, do some drops, shoot again to see if it still shoots within the group. If it does, or even if pretty close, I call it good. This is not a dialing scope and I'm not @Formidilosus, so I'm not doing any test of tracking, return-to-zero, or anything fancy. Just making sure it still puts holes within the normal group size after drops. It's fast and fun and I've started doing it with all my setups.
Today, I did drops of 52" high onto a folded yoga mat on top of packed uneven gravel with a little snow on it. I don't always go to 52", but this is a really light rifle and knew from past drops it could handle it (I did this test previously with a Nightforce NX8 on this same rifle). I like the PA 5x MicroPrism overall. It's made to be set-and-forget with 0.25 MOA per click adjustment. The click adjustment is a little finnicky and it's not a consistent 0.25 adjustment per click. That said, it did great on the drop testing once set.
Did 5 shots under 0.5 MOA to get started. Then a drop on the top from 52" and shot. Group size didn't increase. Shot five more, group increased to 0.7MOA. Dropped from 52" on the right side, and shot with no increase in group size. Dropped from 52" on left, no increase in group size. Passed! For fun, I put another 8 quick shots down. The image started to swim due to heat and the group opened up to 0.9'ish MOA, which is still plenty good for my purposes. Decided that was a wrap on testing, so I did a zero adjustment and put 5 more on a new target to get ready for whatever is next.
Pictures of the process are below.
The rifle:
The drop location:
Rifle and yoga mat after a side drop:
First five shots at this target:
Same target, sixth shot after a 52" drop on the top of the PA Microprism (landed almost in the center of the 5-shot group):
Shot five more rounds without any drops; group increased to 0.707 MOA:
Then did 52" drop on the right, shot, then 52" drop on the left, and shot. Results are the shots are still in the main group:
I was having fun, so kept going to make it a 20-shot group, the last bunch shot fast. Group size increased, but still less than an inch, so I'm happy:
Let it cool enough to see clearly again, then dropped a couple of more times for fun, then two clicks up and two clicks right to zero, with five shots to verify:
fin
Ammo was 77gr Sierra Tipped Matchiking in Nosler brass with 23.0gr of Ramshot Tac.
Simple process on my end-- take a gun that is shooting 1.5 MOA or less for 10-20 shot groups, do some drops, shoot again to see if it still shoots within the group. If it does, or even if pretty close, I call it good. This is not a dialing scope and I'm not @Formidilosus, so I'm not doing any test of tracking, return-to-zero, or anything fancy. Just making sure it still puts holes within the normal group size after drops. It's fast and fun and I've started doing it with all my setups.
Today, I did drops of 52" high onto a folded yoga mat on top of packed uneven gravel with a little snow on it. I don't always go to 52", but this is a really light rifle and knew from past drops it could handle it (I did this test previously with a Nightforce NX8 on this same rifle). I like the PA 5x MicroPrism overall. It's made to be set-and-forget with 0.25 MOA per click adjustment. The click adjustment is a little finnicky and it's not a consistent 0.25 adjustment per click. That said, it did great on the drop testing once set.
Did 5 shots under 0.5 MOA to get started. Then a drop on the top from 52" and shot. Group size didn't increase. Shot five more, group increased to 0.7MOA. Dropped from 52" on the right side, and shot with no increase in group size. Dropped from 52" on left, no increase in group size. Passed! For fun, I put another 8 quick shots down. The image started to swim due to heat and the group opened up to 0.9'ish MOA, which is still plenty good for my purposes. Decided that was a wrap on testing, so I did a zero adjustment and put 5 more on a new target to get ready for whatever is next.
Pictures of the process are below.
The rifle:
The drop location:
Rifle and yoga mat after a side drop:
First five shots at this target:
Same target, sixth shot after a 52" drop on the top of the PA Microprism (landed almost in the center of the 5-shot group):
Shot five more rounds without any drops; group increased to 0.707 MOA:
Then did 52" drop on the right, shot, then 52" drop on the left, and shot. Results are the shots are still in the main group:
I was having fun, so kept going to make it a 20-shot group, the last bunch shot fast. Group size increased, but still less than an inch, so I'm happy:
Let it cool enough to see clearly again, then dropped a couple of more times for fun, then two clicks up and two clicks right to zero, with five shots to verify:
fin
