Newbie to dialing.

[williaada]

Bought a new scope this year and sited it in, and have used it for hunting this year with holdovers since I was unable to verify dialing.

I have used a couple of apps and I get the following details:
7.4 inch drop
9 clicks with 1/4 marks for MAO

So does this mean I do 7 whole numbers or is it 2.5 total on the dial?

Thanks for helping me understand this.

 

[pyrotechnic]

Sounds like you're scope is in Minutes Of Angle with every click being 1/4 MOA. MOA is an angular measurement equal to 1/60th of a degree. Every 100yds that angle covers 1.047 inches so at 1000 yds making a 1 MOA correction should move your reticle 10.47 inches. Since it is so close it's easy to just think of an MOA being an inch at 100 yds.

I reccomend not to think in drop in inches or clicks, strictly in MOA.

For example, you zeroed at 100 yes and reset your turrets to read "zero". You now have a target at 500yds and you look at your ballistic app. It tells you your correction for that distance is 12 MOA under your environmental conditions. All you do is spin your turret to read 12 MOA and you are set (not counting wind).

You could try to count 48 clicks, but that would be horribly inefficient or you could look at your 62.8 inches of drop and divide by 5" (the linear value of an MOA at 500 really 5.235) to get back to your 12 MOA but that doesn't make any sense when your app gives you that number already.

That's a quick down and dirty. There's alot of information out there if you do some googling. Hope it helped.

 

[williaada]

Thanks for explaining. I used the inches just as point of reference to help get a feel for the moa drop. I will now try and verify the moa’s match with the apps.

 

[pyrotechnic]

Just keep in mind that you need a distance in order to correlate your inches of drop with an angular measurement such as MOA. It's missing from your OP and I'm assuming that the distance in your example is 325yds as that is where your 7.4" is equal to 2 1/4 MOA (9 clicks).

 

[std7mag]

Should be easy to change your app to show you MOA instead of inches.

 

[williaada]

Just keep in mind that you need a distance in order to correlate your inches of drop with an angular measurement such as MOA. It's missing from your OP and I'm assuming that the distance in your example is 325yds as that is where your 7.4" is equal to 2 1/4 MOA (9 clicks).

Sorry the cal from the app was 300yrd. Rifle zeroed at 200yrds

 

[Addicting]

The app is only as good as the data you input. Unless your shooting over some type of chrono and figure that speed plus the distance it was from the muzzle you will be off. Best case it will get you on paper. Always shoot distance to verify your data.

 

[Carl]

What scope with what reticle do you have?

What bullet, at what speed, and where will you be shooting?

I can put something together if you can share that.

 

[BucksnDucks]

Sounds like you're scope is in Minutes Of Angle with every click being 1/4 MOA. MOA is an angular measurement equal to 1/60th of a degree. Every 100yds that angle covers 1.047 inches so at 1000 yds making a 1 MOA correction should move your reticle 10.47 inches. Since it is so close it's easy to just think of an MOA being an inch at 100 yds.

I reccomend not to think in drop in inches or clicks, strictly in MOA.

For example, you zeroed at 100 yes and reset your turrets to read "zero". You now have a target at 500yds and you look at your ballistic app. It tells you your correction for that distance is 12 MOA under your environmental conditions. All you do is spin your turret to read 12 MOA and you are set (not counting wind).

You could try to count 48 clicks, but that would be horribly inefficient or you could look at your 62.8 inches of drop and divide by 5" (the linear value of an MOA at 500 really 5.235) to get back to your 12 MOA but that doesn't make any sense when your app gives you that number already.

That's a quick down and dirty. There's alot of information out there if you do some googling. Hope it helped.

Pyro,
Excellent concise explanation!!!! I've listened to guys spend half an hour on MOA and just confuse the hell out of everyone. Well done

 

[WapitiBob]

Clicks are clicks.
Your app will tell you clicks, or mils, or moa correction, or any combination. You set it in the settings.

 

[williaada]

What scope with what reticle do you have?

What bullet, at what speed, and where will you be shooting?

I can put something together if you can share that.

I am shooting .284, 150gr ttsx, 2875fps, Zeiss v4 conquest ZMOAi-1 6x24 I do most my shooting near cedar springs, mi. Zero is 200yrds

Thanks for your help.

 

[WYWINCHESTER]

It took my old mind while to comprehend the MOA concept. I found a formula on Snipers Hide. A very interesting read for quick, close, dial up. Don't want to confuse you, so figure one out at a time. Just another tool in your tool box.

Alternate Range Weaponized Math

Weaponized Math developed by Marc Taylor has changed the way we gather data for our rifles. Doping your rifle has never been so easy.

www.snipershide.com

 

[Carl]

First things first, once you get the scope zero’d at 200, you’ll want to “reset” the turrets to the read “0” when the scope is zero’d. I’ve never used this specific scope, but I’m sure Zeiss provided instructions.



There’s lots of ballistic apps you can use. I’m going to use JBM Ballistics here because it’s free, browser based, and easy for me to take screen shots:

https://www.jbmballistics.com/cgi-bin/jbmtraj-5.1.cgi

It will look like this:





Then I’ll:

• Select your bullet from the library. Normally I prefer to enter the BC by hand, but I didn’t quickly find it on Barnes website so I used the one JBM had instead
• Enter your muzzle velocity
• Sight height can effect the results a little, I set it up a bit higher their default, that’s a pretty large scope and its probably mounted higher than typical
• Set the range increment to 20 yards
• Set the zero range to 200
• Checked the “Std. Atmosphere at Altitude box” and entered 1000 ft for altitude
• Change the column units to MOA
• Hit Calculate

It’ll output this:



That’s a lot, I’ll take a closer look at a small section:





Ignore the second drop column, it’s just a duplicate.



So, at 100 your “drop” is listed as 1.5 MOA, which being positive in value is ABOVE your point of aim. If you are zero’d at 200, you’d dial 1.5 MOA DOWN to be dead on. At 200 your already zero’d. At 300 the drop is listed as -2.3 MOA. Your scope adjusts in .25 MOA increments, so that’d round to 2.25 or 2 ¼ MOA however you want to think of it. And so on, your corrections from 100-500 would be:

100 - (Down)1.5

200 – 0

300 – 2.25

400 – 5

500 – 8.25



You can obviously apply it to all the in between values on the chart as well.



Having done the work of zeroing the rifle, resetting the turret to zero, and calculating the ballistics as I showed, you have what you need to dial for a dead on elevation hold for various distances. If you want to shoot something at 400 yards, twist the turret to “5”, shoot, and return the turret to “0”.



The windage column tells you how far your bullet would drift at a given range in MOA, in a 10 mph 90 degree wind. Being a second focal plane scope, the hash marks in the reticle are only accurate at 24 power. When it comes to holding wind, you could hold the full value if the scope is on 24x, you could hold half the value if the scope is on 12x, or you could dial the windage turret but that’s hard for me to recommend.



Now, all of this is only as good as the inputs, and the sensitivity to bad input increases exponentially with range. Out to 500, it’s pretty easy to swag it, at 1000 if you want to be accurate you’d probably have to fine tune the velocity and/or BC. Either way, before you use something like this in the field you’d want to confirm it on the range several times over.



Hope that helps.

 

[williaada]

First things first, once you get the scope zero’d at 200, you’ll want to “reset” the turrets to the read “0” when the scope is zero’d. I’ve never used this specific scope, but I’m sure Zeiss provided instructions.



There’s lots of ballistic apps you can use. I’m going to use JBM Ballistics here because it’s free, browser based, and easy for me to take screen shots:

https://www.jbmballistics.com/cgi-bin/jbmtraj-5.1.cgi

It will look like this:


View attachment 207633


Then I’ll:

• Select your bullet from the library. Normally I prefer to enter the BC by hand, but I didn’t quickly find it on Barnes website so I used the one JBM had instead
• Enter your muzzle velocity
• Sight height can effect the results a little, I set it up a bit higher their default, that’s a pretty large scope and its probably mounted higher than typical
• Set the range increment to 20 yards
• Set the zero range to 200
• Checked the “Std. Atmosphere at Altitude box” and entered 1000 ft for altitude
• Change the column units to MOA
• Hit Calculate

It’ll output this:

View attachment 207631

That’s a lot, I’ll take a closer look at a small section:


View attachment 207632


Ignore the second drop column, it’s just a duplicate.



So, at 100 your “drop” is listed as 1.5 MOA, which being positive in value is ABOVE your point of aim. If you are zero’d at 200, you’d dial 1.5 MOA DOWN to be dead on. At 200 your already zero’d. At 300 the drop is listed as -2.3 MOA. Your scope adjusts in .25 MOA increments, so that’d round to 2.25 or 2 ¼ MOA however you want to think of it. And so on, your corrections from 100-500 would be:

100 - (Down)1.5

200 – 0

300 – 2.25

400 – 5

500 – 8.25



You can obviously apply it to all the in between values on the chart as well.



Having done the work of zeroing the rifle, resetting the turret to zero, and calculating the ballistics as I showed, you have what you need to dial for a dead on elevation hold for various distances. If you want to shoot something at 400 yards, twist the turret to “5”, shoot, and return the turret to “0”.



The windage column tells you how far your bullet would drift at a given range in MOA, in a 10 mph 90 degree wind. Being a second focal plane scope, the hash marks in the reticle are only accurate at 24 power. When it comes to holding wind, you could hold the full value if the scope is on 24x, you could hold half the value if the scope is on 12x, or you could dial the windage turret but that’s hard for me to recommend.



Now, all of this is only as good as the inputs, and the sensitivity to bad input increases exponentially with range. Out to 500, it’s pretty easy to swag it, at 1000 if you want to be accurate you’d probably have to fine tune the velocity and/or BC. Either way, before you use something like this in the field you’d want to confirm it on the range several times over.



Hope that helps.

Thank you this makes much more sense!

 

[cahunter805]

First things first, once you get the scope zero’d at 200, you’ll want to “reset” the turrets to the read “0” when the scope is zero’d. I’ve never used this specific scope, but I’m sure Zeiss provided instructions.



There’s lots of ballistic apps you can use. I’m going to use JBM Ballistics here because it’s free, browser based, and easy for me to take screen shots:

https://www.jbmballistics.com/cgi-bin/jbmtraj-5.1.cgi

It will look like this:


View attachment 207633


Then I’ll:

• Select your bullet from the library. Normally I prefer to enter the BC by hand, but I didn’t quickly find it on Barnes website so I used the one JBM had instead
• Enter your muzzle velocity
• Sight height can effect the results a little, I set it up a bit higher their default, that’s a pretty large scope and its probably mounted higher than typical
• Set the range increment to 20 yards
• Set the zero range to 200
• Checked the “Std. Atmosphere at Altitude box” and entered 1000 ft for altitude
• Change the column units to MOA
• Hit Calculate

It’ll output this:

View attachment 207631

That’s a lot, I’ll take a closer look at a small section:


View attachment 207632


Ignore the second drop column, it’s just a duplicate.



So, at 100 your “drop” is listed as 1.5 MOA, which being positive in value is ABOVE your point of aim. If you are zero’d at 200, you’d dial 1.5 MOA DOWN to be dead on. At 200 your already zero’d. At 300 the drop is listed as -2.3 MOA. Your scope adjusts in .25 MOA increments, so that’d round to 2.25 or 2 ¼ MOA however you want to think of it. And so on, your corrections from 100-500 would be:

100 - (Down)1.5

200 – 0

300 – 2.25

400 – 5

500 – 8.25



You can obviously apply it to all the in between values on the chart as well.



Having done the work of zeroing the rifle, resetting the turret to zero, and calculating the ballistics as I showed, you have what you need to dial for a dead on elevation hold for various distances. If you want to shoot something at 400 yards, twist the turret to “5”, shoot, and return the turret to “0”.



The windage column tells you how far your bullet would drift at a given range in MOA, in a 10 mph 90 degree wind. Being a second focal plane scope, the hash marks in the reticle are only accurate at 24 power. When it comes to holding wind, you could hold the full value if the scope is on 24x, you could hold half the value if the scope is on 12x, or you could dial the windage turret but that’s hard for me to recommend.



Now, all of this is only as good as the inputs, and the sensitivity to bad input increases exponentially with range. Out to 500, it’s pretty easy to swag it, at 1000 if you want to be accurate you’d probably have to fine tune the velocity and/or BC. Either way, before you use something like this in the field you’d want to confirm it on the range several times over.



Hope that helps.

Excellent info! Be sure to test your rifle/scope on paper at distance also. You may need to slightly change you velocity/BC to match your drops better.

As a side note- Carl what zero do you normally run?

 

[Carl]

As a side note- Carl what zero do you normally run?

Dead on at 100.

I used to dial in .5 mil for a 200 yard zero while hunting, but I stopped. Doing something different in the field than I do on the range is an invitation to make a mistake.