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Hi I am new to playing around with the turrets on a Vortex 6.5x20x50, I know its not the best but

Rude Robert

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Minuteman
Feb 24, 2011
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Well If I have a 200 yard zero how many clicks in general( I know, it's for me to see if I even have enough adjustment to hit targets at 800 or so yard), I have plans to buy a Night Force scope. My wife has an operation here in May so for now I need to play with this scope to get an idea on how it works. I only have used iron sights when I was in the Army in the 80's, and a 3x9 on my deer rifle. I don't know anyone either who knows anymore than I do and I don't know anything. I watched last night a youtube video of a ranger sniper teaching his friend and he had a 100 yard zero but was using his dope to hit targets out to 968 yards I think it was. I was just wondering if my scope even had that ability to make enough change like that. My scope is in mills. I have a Leupold 8.5x25x50 and it has a nice reticle for squirrels very thin lines on it. Once I put a 200 yard zero on it, year ago the little cross hairs basically could bring me as far out for a 500 yard shot and it did. I never had the need to do anymore then that. There is a range that is a hour away from me that is out to 1000 yards but you need to be a member which I plan to do once the wife gets back to work as she will be out they say for at least 6 weeks. I have a vpr-m-06Md and the Mill dot is pretty clear but its not the real scope that I wanted but it will do for now. Thank you for your help and suggestions.
 
Zero the rifle at 100. You should be able to dial out to 800 with no problem if there’s nothing strange going on. Measure or estimate the speed of your bullet, download a ballistic calculator on your phone, research how to input data for your rifle. The calculator will tell you what to dial.
 
With my 6.5 CM and a 100 yard zero, it's a 20 minute dial up to get to 800 yards, and an additional 9 to 9-1/2 minutes to reach 1000 yards.
 
Screenshot_20230430_054036_Strelok Pro.jpg
This is just a starting point.
Good luck
 
Cool thank you guys. To get 20 minutes of angle, what does that mean as far as turning my turrets though? Is that like 20 clicks up?
 
From what I understand thus far is, my scope is 1/4 inch per click to get up to 1 Moa I need four clicks. I need 80 clicks to get the 20 minute angle would that be "Basic" understanding? To reach 800 yards? This is with a 100 yard zero.
 
Then with the additional 200 yards to get to 1000 yards I would basically needs an additional 36 to 40 clicks?
 
From what I understand thus far is, my scope is 1/4 inch per click to get up to 1 Moa I need four clicks. I need 80 clicks to get the 20 minute angle would that be "Basic" understanding? To reach 800 yards? This is with a 100 yard zero.
I thought you said your scope was in mils? Don’t count clicks. Count mils or moa depending on what your scope uses. Generally if the scope has 4 clicks to the next number it’s MOA, if it has 10 clicks to the next number it’s mils. You need to know the measurement before you can calculate anything.
 
Sorry it is mills I was watching you tube too trying to get a visual and the guy was doing both.
 
Your scope is fine. Its more important that you learn how to adjust and use it as that will translate to any scope out there.

For a 6.5 Creed:
Roughly 9 mils to 1000 yards. Every rifle will be unique depending on ammo, barrel, etc., but that will be the ballpark. May be less, may be more.

Slowly walk your way out from 100 to 200 to whatever range you want, collecting data along the way. (use the steps below).

As Precision Underground mentioned, zero at 100. Set your zero so that your turrets read 0 Up and Down and 0 Left and Right. (learning how to set your turrets is good practice too--I still screw it up). Confirm your zero.

THEN:

Go watch this video to dope and learn your rifle. Its good practice.

Go here and get the sheet:

Go take a class. Its better money spent than chasing equipment. Lots of Vortex haters out there. Don't let it get to you. Shoot your gear and learn it. You will not be held back by your gear.
 
Sorry it is mills I was watching you tube too trying to get a visual and the guy was doing both.
If the guy in the video was counting clicks, choose a new video immediately. Counting clicks is like measuring 4 cups of water by pouring and counting it 1 OZ at a time. It would work but it makes no sense. The turrets have numbers on them so you don’t have to count clicks.

It all seems mystical and complicated, but it really is not hard at all once you learn how to do it. Once you set up the rifle you’ll set your turret on the scope so it always starts at zero. You will have downloaded and learned how to use a ballistic solver like Hornady 4DOF. Once you have prepared and set it all up you just tell the solver the yardage you want and then dial the number it gives you. It will say something like “5.5 Mils”. You then turn your turret to 5.5 (by looking at the number, not counting clicks)and shoot the target.
 
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Cool thanks I want to take a class too, My wife has an operation coming up in 2 weeks so she will be out of work for 6 weeks for sure. After that i will be looking at something. There is a range here in north Texas that is 800 yards but in order to use it, you have to take their 400 dollar class and basically pass it so that you to fling rounds 3000 miles away(my wording) but in some sense, probably not too far off. I want to take it as their tell you its a day course and you need to bring your instructions for the scope paper to write on ect. So I think it would be a great experience. I want to play with the scope and get it down because I want that night force scope and if this will get me started. Right now, I probably need to get my scope back to 100 yards, I have shooting 1 mill dot down as I was hoping that was close for 200 yard zero as my range is only 100 yards. Thanks for the help and suggestions, Robert
 
Cool thanks I want to take a class too, My wife has an operation coming up in 2 weeks so she will be out of work for 6 weeks for sure. After that i will be looking at something. There is a range here in north Texas that is 800 yards but in order to use it, you have to take their 400 dollar class and basically pass it so that you to fling rounds 3000 miles away(my wording) but in some sense, probably not too far off. I want to take it as their tell you its a day course and you need to bring your instructions for the scope paper to write on ect. So I think it would be a great experience. I want to play with the scope and get it down because I want that night force scope and if this will get me started. Right now, I probably need to get my scope back to 100 yards, I have shooting 1 mill dot down as I was hoping that was close for 200 yard zero as my range is only 100 yards. Thanks for the help and suggestions, Robert
A class will be well worth it.
 


Also a good read with a lot of good info written by the "Tallest Motherfucker on this Island".

T
 
Pretty sure your scope has MOA turrets. There are no Viper 6.5-20x50's that use MRAD. Vortex sells a Mil-Dot version that has a MRAD based reticle, but MOA turrets.
 
Good morning yes I went back and checked, I was right the first time lol. I is Moa but the are trying to explain the mill dot in mills at power level 14 and how to read it. It is 0400 getting ready to walk out the door to go to work, I should still be able to adjust out to 800 yards too I assume? I am just trying to figure out if I have enough adjustment to go up as I can't seem to grasp how many turns it would actually take. Since I don't have access to that long range yet. Academy has a really good guy that set up my scope and everyone that I seem to talk to in the city all talks about him. When he set it up it was pretty much even from left to right, I just had to adjust the elevation. I did set both turrets to zero. I have always set up for a certain range and leave it, always wanting to play with stuff and the knobs on my other scopes, just never was able to get to a longer range to do so, until I moved. Well anyways I just don't know how much it would take to move up on the turrets(basically) from a 100 yard zero. I know i can see really good out to 600 yards as I a building that look at and read some things off of the building just don't know about the adjustment for bullet placement out to 1000 yards or even if it is possible with this scope. It is a a 34mm tube, anyways thank you and I need to run, Robert
 
Pretty sure your scope has MOA turrets. There are no Viper 6.5-20x50's that use MRAD. Vortex sells a Mil-Dot version that has a MRAD based reticle, but MOA turrets.
This. Your scope more than likely has a mil dot reticle, but MOA turrets.
 
I am totally confused. The thread title says Vortex but the OP describes a Leupold.

Please explain, asking for a friend.
 
It was really humid today, I mowed the yard and used the weed eater too, now i am drinking a cold beer since the wife is now asleep. From what I think I am understanding a bit more is my mill dot scope if used at the power 14 setting which is where I have it. The reticle is shows/reads in mills so you can judge distance or size of objects if you learn to use it. The scope level and windage are in MOA. I probably should go to the range tomorrow and just zero my scope at 100 yards, although I would rather have a 200 zero or close to it. Looking at my chart it is 3.96 inches from mile dot to mill dot basically. In order to hit the bullseye at 100 yards, I have to place the mill dot above the cross hair and put it on the mark so I would be shooting 3.6 inches high at 100 yards. I don't know where it would hit at 200 yard although I would like to find out. From a couple of vides from National shooting foundation they suggest 100 yards is okay for shooting out to longer ranges. I am going on a prairie dog hunt this coming weekend and the guide recommended a zero of 200 yards as he has a method that he uses with his clients to shoot out to 700 to more, as he doesn't usually want to shoot any closer then 500. Which is why I went with him. I have have my ar 15 in 556/223 and I have a 200 yard zero and on my scope has the cross hair marks down to 500 yard. It suggested with normal 223 rounds and a 200 yard zero, it should be in the ball park for a 500 yard hit. 9 years ago after setting it up for a 200 yard zero and shooting a couple ground squirrels with it I was good. Then, I came across one using my range finder sitting on a big rock at 500 yards. I laid my back pack down, I had to make a few quick corrections for the windy conditions in the desert I creamed my first long range ground squirrel on shot number 4, using my vmax 50 grain bullet and I was hooked at shooting longer distance. Then California banned all the good things that liked my ar15 for and made us change it up so badly that it was just too hard to shoot it well in my opinion. So I locked it up and it sat for probably 7 years until we finally moved to be closer to the grandkids. Now, my Ar is back from the dead, and it is one of the onces that are going with me to the hunt along with the 6.5. A year ago when I had booked this hunt, I had plans on getting the rifle and the night force scope too, but with the wife health issues things haven't work out as well as I planned. I wasn't going to even go, but she said that she would be mad, since I bought the rifle I need to go. The guide called me and asked me too if I had any smaller rifles as he had a friend that is having issues with the dogs and I let him know that i have 2 22rl so I am taking those too. All in all, it should be fun. I am thinking though is to make a quick trip and drop my 6.5 to 100 yards, I don't know as I am going to leave my Ar at 200. What do you guys suggest, thanks for your help, Robert
 
Test to see if I can attach a picture I was trying to send a picture of the reticle instructions from my phone but it says that it is too big lol
 
I have both, what I shot the squirrel with was my Leup 8.8x25x50 mounted on a Larue quick release mount. My intention was to buy the Vortex to try and learn some things with it and then buy the Night force but then my wife came down sick and and with doctor after doctor visits is now set up for an operation. I have always just iron sights but once I made that long shot I wanted to do more, so I got the bug lol. Sorry for all the confusion I have a lot of stuff going on, and since my wife is now pushing me to go, I'm trying to get some information to that might help me out some. I was going to go to the long range class a few months ago, but then the when doctor after doctor started leaning toward an operations I was planning on cancelling too. Last few weeks she told me to go, so I even have a lot of 6.5 being delivered hopefully in time as I leave on Friday morning. I have a few hundred rounds but I even stopped buying ammo for it as the talks of the operation increased. So in a nut shell I am going to wind it. The guide was already going to show me some things the scope too so not all will be loss. Kind of wished I had that Night force, well maybe in a few more months I get it., thanks for reading, I am off tomorrow but I am still getting up with the wife at 0215 as she is still going to work. Crazy she is tough and everyone at work as being telling her too. I just hope that she doesn't hurt anymore,
 
As mentioned already, you have a scope with two different units of measure, Minutes of Angle(MOA) on the dial turrets and the reticle is in Millradians(Mils). This is like mixing inches with centimeters. You must convert one or the other to the same unit to make this work.

If you decide to use the reticle for holdovers, you will need to calculate in mils. If you decide to dial, you will need to use MOA. There is 3.4 MOA to 1 Mil.

For example, if you would like to shoot to 400 yards, the ballistic app or chart shows something like 7 MOA. If you want to use the reticle, 7/3.4 = 2.1 mils. That's two dots below center on the reticle.
 
I would suggest downloading a ballistic calculator on your phone. You can easily switch from MOA to MRAD and if you are just shooting for fun the time it takes doesn't really matter. The biggest thing, which others have hit on is not thinking about anything in inches. Inches is a linear unit of measurement. MOA and MRAD are both angular. Which actually makes things really easy. If you drop is 7 MOA, dial to the number 7 on your turret. It does not matter if you are zero'd at 50 yards, 100 yards, or 200 yards as your overall elevation travel will be determined by the alignment of your rifle, rings, and mounts. The distance you zero at does not change the max distance you can dial. The toughest part is having the MRAD reticle that needs to be at 14x to be a true mil dot. If you had a scope that has matching turret/reticle, you would be able to measure your misses at distance with the reticle, and adjust accordingly with the turrets. Not saying it is impossible, but it makes things a bit more time consuming is all and a bit tougher to learn on.

One additional note, if you only have access to a 100 yard range and want to be zero'd closer to 200, just sight in at 50. You will be a little high at 100 and just a touch low at 200 is my guess.
 
Best thing to do is upgrade your scope to Mil/Mil or MOA/MOA. The cheaper route is to carry a calculator to do the conversions between your reticle and turrets or create a conversion chart.

MOA = MIL x 10.8 / pi
MIL = MOA x pi / 10.8

T
 
Well think you, in time my hopes its that Nightforce for sure. Thank you for all of your help, Robert
 
Best thing to do is ditch the mil/moa setup.
They can be made to work, but require a lot more thinking.
My recommendation, invest some money here, they are very good, but dated scopes. They are excellent for learning the ins and outs of using a riflescope correctly. I recommend the mil/mil model.
 
Well If I have a 200 yard zero how many clicks in general( I know, it's for me to see if I even have enough adjustment to hit targets at 800 or so yard), I have plans to buy a Night Force scope. My wife has an operation here in May so for now I need to play with this scope to get an idea on how it works. I only have used iron sights when I was in the Army in the 80's, and a 3x9 on my deer rifle. I don't know anyone either who knows anymore than I do and I don't know anything. I watched last night a youtube video of a ranger sniper teaching his friend and he had a 100 yard zero but was using his dope to hit targets out to 968 yards I think it was. I was just wondering if my scope even had that ability to make enough change like that. My scope is in mills. I have a Leupold 8.5x25x50 and it has a nice reticle for squirrels very thin lines on it. Once I put a 200 yard zero on it, year ago the little cross hairs basically could bring me as far out for a 500 yard shot and it did. I never had the need to do anymore then that. There is a range that is a hour away from me that is out to 1000 yards but you need to be a member which I plan to do once the wife gets back to work as she will be out they say for at least 6 weeks. I have a vpr-m-06Md and the Mill dot is pretty clear but its not the real scope that I wanted but it will do for now. Thank you for your help and suggestions.
Well, good time to learn and not be so "new"

Go to this site:


Put the data on your rifle, zero, and environment (just make some reasonable enviro numbers up, yeah) and you can see how many mils or moas you need to come up for 800 yards (clicks ain't really the way to look at it)

Cheers
 
I will get this book next week for sure, thank you. I went to the range and since my scope was 3.6 inches high I brought is down 3 and a half MOA. I was just left of the bullseye so I moved it .5 MOA and I was touching the Bullseye then I went up .5 Moa and I am hitting the top part of the bullseye. My breathing needs to slow down more but I did all of this in 6 shots, so my rifle currently has 32 rounds through it. From what I can gather if I have a 100 yard zero and at(of the top of my memory), at 1000 yards the bullet will drop basically 39 feet. For the sake of discussion, How many MOA would I have to go up to basically be even close to be able to hit something at that distance? Thank you again for all of your help, Robert
 
I will get this book next week for sure, thank you. I went to the range and since my scope was 3.6 inches high I brought is down 3 and a half MOA. I was just left of the bullseye so I moved it .5 MOA and I was touching the Bullseye then I went up .5 Moa and I am hitting the top part of the bullseye. My breathing needs to slow down more but I did all of this in 6 shots, so my rifle currently has 32 rounds through it. From what I can gather if I have a 100 yard zero and at(of the top of my memory), at 1000 yards the bullet will drop basically 39 feet. For the sake of discussion, How many MOA would I have to go up to basically be even close to be able to hit something at that distance? Thank you again for all of your help, Robert
WTF. I give you a link to a free and very nice ballistic calculator so you can determine drop at…well, any distance.

And you ignore it and just want someone else to spoon feed some dope to you?

I don’t get it…maybe it’s me.
 
I agree. You should be able to handle putting in the data into the ballistics app. If you get stuck, just let us know and we can lend a hand.
 
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I am sorry I don't do forums like this too much, I didn't see a link. I will go look again. I didn't know that was a link sorry, thank you for posting it, I will look at it now, Best regards Robert
 
I am sorry I don't do forums like this too much, I didn't see a link. I will go look again. I didn't know that was a link sorry, thank you for posting it, I will look at it now, Best regards Robert
Ok, cool.

If you go to that site (Hornady), you will see there is a "Standard" ballistic calculator and the 4DOF (DOF = degrees of freedom...and, its just a more sophisticated calculator).

1683666234887.png


I'd suggest the 4DOF. At the top of the page with this calculator, there is a link to a description of all of the fields you need to fill in and the fields it will output. If you get stuck, come back with what parameter is not clear and someone here will steer you straight.
 
lol I must have done something wrong it says that I need to go up basically 192.1 MOA. I don't even know if have that much adjustment. I need to go out there tomorrow morning and see. I need to turn the knobs a bit to check. I know that I am zeroed so all I need to do is turn up the elevation and see if I can even get that many MOA out of it. I believe for the most part that is fairly close to what my scope would need to be able to adjust too, just to give me an Idea of what I would be able to do with it. Thank you for all your help,
Robert
 
lol I must have done something wrong it says that I need to go up basically 192.1 MOA. I don't even know if have that much adjustment. I need to go out there tomorrow morning and see. I need to turn the knobs a bit to check. I know that I am zeroed so all I need to do is turn up the elevation and see if I can even get that many MOA out of it. I believe for the most part that is fairly close to what my scope would need to be able to adjust too, just to give me an Idea of what I would be able to do with it. Thank you for all your help,
Robert
You did something wrong
 
lol I must have done something wrong it says that I need to go up basically 192.1 MOA. I don't even know if have that much adjustment. I need to go out there tomorrow morning and see. I need to turn the knobs a bit to check. I know that I am zeroed so all I need to do is turn up the elevation and see if I can even get that many MOA out of it. I believe for the most part that is fairly close to what my scope would need to be able to adjust too, just to give me an Idea of what I would be able to do with it. Thank you for all your help,
Robert

For a shot at 996 yards (which is my actual distance to the 1k berm)

Hornady Dof says this with the 135 A-tip.

Screenshot_20230511_124117.jpg


Something in your setup is way off.
 
For a shot at 996 yards (which is my actual distance to the 1k berm)

Hornady Dof says this with the 135 A-tip.

View attachment 8139250

Something in your setup is way off.
Yep, with Berger 140 HT to 1,000 (and not being weird with environmentals) I'm getting 27.4 MOA/8 MRADS/287 inches

@Rude Robert - don't suppose you know how to capture and post an image of your inputs to the ballistic calculator?