Trijicon Tenmile 3-18x44mm Field Eval Q&A

[WyoWild]

I use the underside of the scope body (the flat part) and then cross reference that with the elevation turret with the cap removed.

I'd reach out to Trijicon, they have great CS in my experience.

 

[NSI]

I use the underside of the scope body (the flat part) and then cross reference that with the elevation turret with the cap removed.

This is the way.

-J

 

[manitou1]

How do you acheive level using the scope body?

The aftermarket wedges?

Strap a steel ruler to the flat under side of the turret bulge and place levels on each side. Use rubber bands to strap it to the scope.

I also put a steel rule strapped to my pic rail and use magnetic levels on that to. Again... rubber band.

This way you have a level gun and a level scope.

I then hang a plumb bob (string with a big steel nut as a weight) from a curtain rod across the room and while the gun and scope are clamped level in my gun vise, I look through the scope to make sure the reticle is level also.

Just mounted a Ten Mile scope yesterday with this process.

 

[Bbell12]

I bought through OP via amazon so should be an easy exchange. I'm seeing that @Bbell12 is having the same issue with his.

No - I have not checked tracking due to how severely off it was (to me at least) its either reticle turret/scope body and very canted reticle or its straight reticle in reference to a plumb line but a very canted scope.

I did have the same issue. I also mounted my scope using the same process you described above.

I ended up calling Trijicon and talked to a very knowledgeable person in the scope department. They promptly sent me a shipping label to send in the scope for evaluation. After confirming the issue they sent me a new scope. Their customer service is top notch and have won me over as a customer for life so definitely give them a chance to make it right, I bet you won’t be disappointed.

 

[Slamfire94]

I did have the same issue. I also mounted my scope using the same process you described above.

I ended up calling Trijicon and talked to a very knowledgeable person in the scope department. They promptly sent me a shipping label to send in the scope for evaluation. After confirming the issue they sent me a new scope. Their customer service is top notch and have won me over as a customer for life so definitely give them a chance to make it right, I bet you won’t be disappointed.

Thank you so much. Are you able to message me and let me know who you worked with at Trijicon? I was also considering just buying two more scopes for a total of 3 and just keeping the best one. The retailer said that would be fine to do...

 

[Shortschaf]

I did have the same issue

how many degrees were they off (if you tried measuring that at all)?

I always level the reticle. Have never checked the housing or turret ever at all.

So (being too lazy to check my own), I'm curious how much I could be overlooking

 

[Bbell12]

how many degrees were they off (if you tried measuring that at all)?

I always level the reticle. Have never checked the housing or turret ever at all.

So (being too lazy to check my own), I'm curious how much I could be overlooking

I’m not sure how many degrees off it was but it was definitely far enough off to notice with a plumb line.

I don’t get too scientific anymore after having chased many a rabbit hole in the past when it comes to leveling a scope. I level the rifle, level off the top cap, and then check plumb. If it’s close to plumb after mounting then I roll with it. If not, I don’t mess with it anymore and I go straight to customer service because I don’t care to waste any more time messing with it.

The levels that Defensive Edge makes (UM sells them) come with a really concise manual for mounting a scope that I recommend.

 

[Slamfire94]

felt like I needed to provide an update. Can’t is nowhere near as severe as I thought. Between my jacked up eyes and a super crappy level I thought it was way worse. Ordered 4 more Tenmiles today (not joking) so I’ll compare those as well.

 

[Shortschaf]

Thanks for the update.

Id wager your reticle is perfectly aligned with your erector. The amount of cant you have there is well within the tolerances of trying to level off of the scope body with a jig and mini-bubble-level.

 

[Scottf270]

Asking a question. Are folks "leveling" the scope to the gun then shouldering the gun and then seeing the reticle canted? We all have a tendency to pull a rifle into our shoulder and this can cause us to can't the rifle which cants the scope as well. Is the cant visible with the rifle and scope locked down and both showing level?

 

[Slamfire94]

Asking a question. Are folks "leveling" the scope to the gun then shouldering the gun and then seeing the reticle canted? We all have a tendency to pull a rifle into our shoulder and this can cause us to can't the rifle which cants the scope as well. Is the cant visible with the rifle and scope locked down and both showing level?

yes. This is the case for me.

 

[ddowning]

Leveling the reticle to the GUN is NOT NECESSARY. The error created is not noticeable in real applications. There is some theoretical error, but it cannot be noticed with 99% of field rifles by 99.99% of shooters in field conditions. Leveling (actually plumbing) the RETICLE AND AND AND the ERECTOR TRAVEL to gravity is ABSOLUTELY CRUCIAL.

Personally, I level the reticle to gravity and match a bubble to it. Then I put it in the rings, so when I mount the gun with my natural cant the reticle is level. Then level the reticle to a plumb line and lock the thing in place. Dial whatever the max is you will likely shoot with that gun. If it is still with a click of the plumb line you are golden. If it is off more than that you should start over and repeat the test to check for human error in testing. If results show repeated error then it is likely the scope. At that point it gets fixed/replaced.

Leveling the scope to your natural gun cant will eliminate tension in the wrist and hand. Pulling the gun to the rear to keep it from bouncing off your shoulder during recoil is important to spotting your own shots. The only other good solution is to adjust the gun to you with an adjustable angle buttplate. Most lightweight hunting stocks are not equipped with those though.

I know this is off topic, but it is being discussed and in my opinion (and experience) there is a lot of bad information floating around about this topic.

 

[Slamfire94]

Leveling the reticle to the GUN is NOT NECESSARY. The error created is not noticeable in real applications. There is some theoretical error, but it cannot be noticed with 99% of field rifles by 99.99% of shooters in field conditions. Leveling (actually plumbing) the RETICLE AND AND AND the ERECTOR TRAVEL to gravity is ABSOLUTELY CRUCIAL.

Personally, I level the reticle to gravity and match a bubble to it. Then I put it in the rings, so when I mount the gun with my natural cant the reticle is level. Then level the reticle to a plumb line and lock the thing in place. Dial whatever the max is you will likely shoot with that gun. If it is still with a click of the plumb line you are golden. If it is off more than that you should start over and repeat the test to check for human error in testing. If results show repeated error then it is likely the scope. At that point it gets fixed/replaced.

Leveling the scope to your natural gun cant will eliminate tension in the wrist and hand. Pulling the gun to the rear to keep it from bouncing off your shoulder during recoil is important to spotting your own shots. The only other good solution is to adjust the gun to you with an adjustable angle buttplate. Most lightweight hunting stocks are not equipped with those though.

I know this is off topic, but it is being discussed and in my opinion (and experience) there is a lot of bad information floating around about this topic.

Leveling the reticle to the gun is not necessary UNLESS you have elevation built into a scope base. I.E - a 20MOA pic rail. If you have a 20MOA rail like most long range guys are using then it is ABOSOLUTELY necessary to make sure the reticle is not only plumb to the scope base/turret and the Earth by using a plumb bob, but also to the gun or whatever device that has elevation built into it.

Failure to do so will turn elevation into windage and windage into elevation when dialing and will only get worse with distance.

 

[ddowning]

Leveling the reticle to the gun is not necessary UNLESS you have elevation built into a scope base. I.E - a 20MOA pic rail. If you have a 20MOA rail like most long range guys are using then it is ABOSOLUTELY necessary to make sure the reticle is not only plumb to the scope base/turret and the Earth by using a plumb bob, but also to the gun or whatever device that has elevation built into it.

Failure to do so will turn elevation into windage and windage into elevation when dialing and will only get worse with distance.

In theory, yes. In practice, no. Scope bases, rings, all the little pieces inside a scope that no one knows exactly what they are and do except optical engineers all matter more.....and....more than that.....the barrel....wait for it.....it's not....perfectly straight. Wait, what????!!!!! The barrel is bent way more than the miniscule amount a tiny bit of cant is going to cause with your 20 or 30 MOA scope base. Make the erector travel plumb and level and the scope will work. If you want, you can shoot the gun sideways. If you mount the scope with the vertical turret pointing the same way as the ejection port, put a bubble on the tube, and make the bubble centered when the erector travel for up/down is perfectly plumb the error is very easy to quantify. The horizontal offset (which would be height over bore in a normal configuration) is easy to account for. If your height over bore is 2" and you zero the gun to shoot 2" to the right of point of aim, it will hit 2" right from zero to infinity barring the other effects of windage. You can then use your turrets to account for drop as normal and they will function exactly the same as if the scope was mounted with the reticle perfectly plumb above the bore.

You could also zero windage to be on at an arbitrary range. Say you zero windage at 1000 yards. Your zero will be off 2" at the muzzle, get closer to zero until 1000 yds and then start diverging until it is 2" off in the other direction at 2000 yds. This is with the gun canted 90 degrees. The offset can be calculated and accounted for with a ballistic calculator in order to actuallyshoot the gun on its side. There are other real life things that can effect it like the barrel being bent, muzzle sag, barrel whip, and other things that we ALL compensate for by twisting turrets.

In addition, if you take this extreme example and assume it's all unaccounted for, unknown error, with a 100 yard zero and a 2" unaccounted for cant, the error at 1000 yards is 18" or around 3mph wind.

No one is unknowingly canting their scope 2" to the side of the bore. As I stated in my first post. The theoritcal is very real. In practical application you will not shoot the difference.

Another strong argument for my method is this. Say you naturally cant the gun 2 degrees and your height over bore is 2". You set the scope up based on level gun/level scope. You dial on 10 mils to shoot 1000 yds. You level the scope and while you aim and squeeze you float back to that natural 2 degree cant. You're now aiming off over 12.5" horizontally.

My method. Worst case. You zero at 100 yards. Your horizontal offset from a 2 degree cant is 0.069799" or just over 1/16". You naturally hold the reticle level. The offset at 1000 yards with 10 mils of drop (because we zero at 100 yards and it diverges from there) is 0.628191" or just over 5/8". Even if I screw up and cant the gun 2 more degrees my miss is 13 1/8" and your miss is 12 17/32".

There is no reason to buy a bunch of tooling and do a bunch of time consuming scope leveling to guns. Use feeler gauges or playing cards if you want it reasonably close to satisfy your ocd. Then put a level on the scope tube and make the reticle and erector travel plumb to gravity and center the bubble.

I am sorry for being flippant, but people want to make the easy stuff hard and the hard stuff easy when it comes to long range shooting. I wish I could get back the hours I spent agonizing over stuff that doesn't matter. This is one of those things that is counterintuitive in the real world.

 

[MilkhouseMafia]

@Formidilosus is this Trijicon worth the $$ buying new or find a clean demo/used option? What about the NX8 you also drop tested?

Q&A for the Trijicon 3-18x44mm Tenmile. Review Trijicon Tenmile 3-18x44mm FFP Field Eval

Is the Tenmile worth the $$ new or better to find a clean demo/used option? Same with the NX8 you drop tested?

 

[Tahoe1305]

@Formidilosus is this Trijicon worth the $$ buying new or find a clean demo/used option? What about the NX8 you also drop tested?

Is the Tenmile worth the $$ new or better to find a clean demo/used option? Same with the NX8 you drop tested?

The tenmile can be had for $1k on Amazon right now. Optics planet on occasion for less than $900. Haven’t seen many used less than that.

 

[Formidilosus]

@Formidilosus is this Trijicon worth the $$ buying new or find a clean demo/used option? What about the NX8 you also drop tested?

Is the Tenmile worth the $$ new or better to find a clean demo/used option? Same with the NX8 you drop tested?

I wouldn’t have an issue with used for either.

 

[awcopeland]

FYI, optics planet has these scopes on sale right now. Until the end of the month you can use code JANEND for an extra 9% off. Came out to just a touch over $1k w/ shipping and tax.

 

[MilkhouseMafia]

FYI, optics planet has these scopes on sale right now. Until the end of the month you can use code JANEND for an extra 9% off. Came out to just a touch over $1k w/ shipping and tax.

I see they’re drastically marked down - didn’t see if Trijicon is discontinuing or updating and OP needs to purge current inventory for the new models?

 

[rileybassman]

I see they’re drastically marked down - didn’t see if Trijicon is discontinuing or updating and OP needs to purge current inventory for the new models?

They have been on really good sales off and on since black Friday