Fiftydriver
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To all,
Some of you may know that I have been waiting to test these adjustable rings for quite some time now. The hang up has been that I wanted to test them on my 338 Kahn but I recently sold my 7mm AM. What does this matter, well, both were sharing the same bolt!!!
I have had the replacement bolt but just needed to machine it to the proper dimensions to work in the 338 Kahn. I have been accurizing receivers for the last couple weeks and started machining bolts last weekend and remembered the bolt for the 338 Kahn so I decided I had waited long enough and chucked up the bolt, dialed here in and made the needed cuts to make her come into spec with the 338 Kahn rifle.
The scope I was using for this test was my old Burris Black Diamond 6-24 Ball. Mil Dot. Good scope, nothing great. She had been worked loose by alot of pounding from my 50 BMG so it was sent back to Burris for a tune up and seems to be back on track now.
It had been quite a while since I shot my Kahn so I cornmeal formed 50 new cases and loaded up my standard load in these fresh cases.
Load specs are:
300 gr SMK
105.0 gr H-50BMG
Fed-215
OAL: 3.895"
Ave. Velocity: 2990 fps
This is a pretty mild load. I can push 3100 fps pretty easily in this rifle and probably a bit more but this milder load is EXTREMELY easy on cases and is very consistant with extreme spreads generally in the low teens for a 10 shot string.
I cleaned the bore after the corn meal forming and rechecked everything on the mounting system to make sure everything was tight and ready and packed everything up and headed out to the range.
I filled two gallon milk jugs and was going to use these to zero on at a reasonable distance and then work off that zero using the exbal program and the vertical adjustment in the rings alone. I wanted to see how precise the rings would be at differnet ranges. Since I would dial in for each shot, I set the exbal program to predict windage in Mil so I could just use the horizontal stadia for windage. Turned out to work pretty well.
I got up to the range and it was windier then I had hoped but I was there and wanted to see how the system worked. I set the two milk jugs out on the side hill and drove around the draw and set up. Ranged the jugs and they were 410 yards.
I visually bore sighted the rifle to the jugs as I had yet to even fire the rifle with these rings mounted. Set the scope on 18x which is where I was going to leave it for all testing.
The first shot was dead on horizontally but landed below the jug. Got to looking and the fourth line down on the Ballistic Plex portion of the scope was right on the impact when the main reticle was centered on the jug. I simply adjusted the vertical adjustment until the main crosshairs came down and centered the impact hole. This will save you alot of shots in the field when setting up cold at long range.
Second shot absolutely demolished the jug. Lined up on the second jug and it to took a center hit and was turned into mist for about 20 square yards!!
Put the cap back on the Black diamond and packed her up and drove to a longer range shooting position.
At this point, this is how the rifle was set up. The scope was zeroed at 410 yards, well, minute of milk jug anyway at 410 yards. The Adjustment on the rear Ivey ring was set at the "0" moa setting.
All adjustment from this point would be predicted by the Exbal program and then dialed directly into the ring adjustment. The scope was never touched again.
I found a nice target rock that was a bit smaller then a milk jug. Ranged it with the Swari and got a 1091 yard measurement several times.
Plugging that into the Ebal program it predicted an increase in elevation of 19.75 moa was required for a center hold. Windage, again was listed in Mils and was 1.50 mils with the estimated 13 mph wind from my 10 o'clock.
I loosened the ring locks, dialed in the 19.75 moa into the rear ring and snugged the locks back down. As I settled into the rifle I noticed that a heard of pronghorns had moved into the area near the target rock. I watched them for a bit thinking it sure would be nice to have it be October as there was a nice buck in the herd and I was all set up and dialed in!!!
Finally the herd moved out of the area and I lined up on the rock. centered the main crosshair and then slide the rock to the right on the horizontal stadia until it was bracketed between the first and second mil dot for the proper windage hold.
I recovered from the recoil just in time to see to my total suprise, the rock turn to gravel!!! And then the resounding SMACK came back to my position.
I will admit I was a bit amazed. No totally amazed to be honest. I figured it was a fluke but I had already begun to like what I was seeing with these rings.
SInce that target was GONE, I had to find another one to shoot at. I wanted a bit more range and found a nice red piece of sandstone jetting up out of the side hill. The rock was about a foot tall and 2 feet long. About the size of a yotes main body.
Ranged the rock and found it was 1340 yards. The angle of the wind was close enough I did not mess with it but it had picked up so I listed it as 15 mph instead of 13 mph.
Shooting angle was still pretty much level, within a degree or so at least.
Exbal reported it would take 29.75 moa from the 410 yard zero to be centered and windage was 2.50 mils.
I lined up on the rock and again slide the target to the right on the horizontal stadia until it was bracketed between the second and third mil dots.
At the shot I recovered from recoil and watched the bullet land just on the bottom edge of the rock and on center horizontally. Again, I was very impressed, amazed actually!!!
Loaded another round and this time held on the top line of the rock, same windage hold and centered the rock. Chambered another round and repeated the center hit!!! I was still impressed!!!
With the wind conditions and the shooting position I was in, this was about as far as I could reach out as there were livestock in the area the prevented me from shooting into my really extreme range areas.
Still, I figured I could test the rings at shorter ranges as well and see how they held up. So far I was impressed.
I was glassing the valley bottom when I scanned across a gopher mound with several pups sunning themselves on the mound. I had to see if I could hit them. They were still pretty small, about the size of 1/2 a pop can so I was not expecting much. Really, the mound was the target.
Ranged the mound at 803 yards. The shooting angle was down about 3 degrees so I also plugged this into Exbal. Shooting at this target the wind was coming from my 9:00 position as well.
With all the data entered into the exbal program, it listed 10.25 moa above zero and 1.5 mils into the wind. For this adjustment I would be turning the adjustment dial in the opposite direction as the two previous range tests as this was a shorter range.
As such, I made it a point to return the adjustment dial to the 410 yard "0" position and then dial up from that point so that the adjustment would be consistant with the other adjustments.
Its kind of like a regular scope adjustment. You should always dial past your intended point and come back to it in the same direction every time to keep the spring tension in the scope consistant.
There is no spring tension in this adjustable ring system but there has to be some play between the mechanical lever and the caming surface or they would not move as freely as they do. DO not get me wrong, they are a tight fit and it takes some torque to turn the dial but it seems to me that to be as consistant as possible you should always adjust to your setting from the same direction.
For me that is from the "0" side and adjust up.
I made the adjustment and lined up on the mound. By this time one of the pups had moved to the lower part of the mound but two were still sunning themselves on the top of it.
I held for the recommended windage again and let a big SMK rip toward its target. At 800 yards, flight time is pretty short so you better get back on target or you will miss the action. Luckily I did just in time to see the center of the mount erupt in wet black dirt. We had just received 2" of rain three days earlier. The surface of the dirt was dry but under the crust it was still quite wet.
The two pups on top of the mound were lauched several feet into the air along with about a shovel full of the loose, wet dirt. The lower pup was blown down the hill several feet.
When everything came back to earth and stopped rolling, I counted three little fur balls beating feet back to the hole and out of sight!!! I almost felt bad but it was pretty **** funny to watch to be honest. I hate to image what that would be like but the evil side of me sure likes to watch it.
Not a hit but in all honest, I hit right where I was aiming!!!
All in all I am extremely impressed with the consistancy and precision of these rings. I still need to do alot more testing such as repeatablility at long range and then test out to some serious ranges. 1500, 2000, and 2500 yards.
This will tell me much more then I know know for for now. I will say the intital test of the IVEY 150 MOA adjustable rings has totally suprised me with their precision and predictability.
SO far very good product. Only issue is that your cheek weld is pretty high with the MBR Tooley style stock. If I were designing a rifle specifically for these rings I would either use an adjustable cheek piece or if that was not an option with the stock choice, simply use something to increase the height of the cheek piece.
It is not a big deal to be honest, I found no discomfort shooting the rifle but this is a heavy rifle. A lighter rifle may prove more difficult to shoot accurately with this head position.
So far, passed first test with an "A" in my book.
More testing to come soon.
Back to work!!
Kirby Allen(50)
Some of you may know that I have been waiting to test these adjustable rings for quite some time now. The hang up has been that I wanted to test them on my 338 Kahn but I recently sold my 7mm AM. What does this matter, well, both were sharing the same bolt!!!
I have had the replacement bolt but just needed to machine it to the proper dimensions to work in the 338 Kahn. I have been accurizing receivers for the last couple weeks and started machining bolts last weekend and remembered the bolt for the 338 Kahn so I decided I had waited long enough and chucked up the bolt, dialed here in and made the needed cuts to make her come into spec with the 338 Kahn rifle.
The scope I was using for this test was my old Burris Black Diamond 6-24 Ball. Mil Dot. Good scope, nothing great. She had been worked loose by alot of pounding from my 50 BMG so it was sent back to Burris for a tune up and seems to be back on track now.
It had been quite a while since I shot my Kahn so I cornmeal formed 50 new cases and loaded up my standard load in these fresh cases.
Load specs are:
300 gr SMK
105.0 gr H-50BMG
Fed-215
OAL: 3.895"
Ave. Velocity: 2990 fps
This is a pretty mild load. I can push 3100 fps pretty easily in this rifle and probably a bit more but this milder load is EXTREMELY easy on cases and is very consistant with extreme spreads generally in the low teens for a 10 shot string.
I cleaned the bore after the corn meal forming and rechecked everything on the mounting system to make sure everything was tight and ready and packed everything up and headed out to the range.
I filled two gallon milk jugs and was going to use these to zero on at a reasonable distance and then work off that zero using the exbal program and the vertical adjustment in the rings alone. I wanted to see how precise the rings would be at differnet ranges. Since I would dial in for each shot, I set the exbal program to predict windage in Mil so I could just use the horizontal stadia for windage. Turned out to work pretty well.
I got up to the range and it was windier then I had hoped but I was there and wanted to see how the system worked. I set the two milk jugs out on the side hill and drove around the draw and set up. Ranged the jugs and they were 410 yards.
I visually bore sighted the rifle to the jugs as I had yet to even fire the rifle with these rings mounted. Set the scope on 18x which is where I was going to leave it for all testing.
The first shot was dead on horizontally but landed below the jug. Got to looking and the fourth line down on the Ballistic Plex portion of the scope was right on the impact when the main reticle was centered on the jug. I simply adjusted the vertical adjustment until the main crosshairs came down and centered the impact hole. This will save you alot of shots in the field when setting up cold at long range.
Second shot absolutely demolished the jug. Lined up on the second jug and it to took a center hit and was turned into mist for about 20 square yards!!
Put the cap back on the Black diamond and packed her up and drove to a longer range shooting position.
At this point, this is how the rifle was set up. The scope was zeroed at 410 yards, well, minute of milk jug anyway at 410 yards. The Adjustment on the rear Ivey ring was set at the "0" moa setting.
All adjustment from this point would be predicted by the Exbal program and then dialed directly into the ring adjustment. The scope was never touched again.
I found a nice target rock that was a bit smaller then a milk jug. Ranged it with the Swari and got a 1091 yard measurement several times.
Plugging that into the Ebal program it predicted an increase in elevation of 19.75 moa was required for a center hold. Windage, again was listed in Mils and was 1.50 mils with the estimated 13 mph wind from my 10 o'clock.
I loosened the ring locks, dialed in the 19.75 moa into the rear ring and snugged the locks back down. As I settled into the rifle I noticed that a heard of pronghorns had moved into the area near the target rock. I watched them for a bit thinking it sure would be nice to have it be October as there was a nice buck in the herd and I was all set up and dialed in!!!
Finally the herd moved out of the area and I lined up on the rock. centered the main crosshair and then slide the rock to the right on the horizontal stadia until it was bracketed between the first and second mil dot for the proper windage hold.
I recovered from the recoil just in time to see to my total suprise, the rock turn to gravel!!! And then the resounding SMACK came back to my position.
I will admit I was a bit amazed. No totally amazed to be honest. I figured it was a fluke but I had already begun to like what I was seeing with these rings.
SInce that target was GONE, I had to find another one to shoot at. I wanted a bit more range and found a nice red piece of sandstone jetting up out of the side hill. The rock was about a foot tall and 2 feet long. About the size of a yotes main body.
Ranged the rock and found it was 1340 yards. The angle of the wind was close enough I did not mess with it but it had picked up so I listed it as 15 mph instead of 13 mph.
Shooting angle was still pretty much level, within a degree or so at least.
Exbal reported it would take 29.75 moa from the 410 yard zero to be centered and windage was 2.50 mils.
I lined up on the rock and again slide the target to the right on the horizontal stadia until it was bracketed between the second and third mil dots.
At the shot I recovered from recoil and watched the bullet land just on the bottom edge of the rock and on center horizontally. Again, I was very impressed, amazed actually!!!
Loaded another round and this time held on the top line of the rock, same windage hold and centered the rock. Chambered another round and repeated the center hit!!! I was still impressed!!!
With the wind conditions and the shooting position I was in, this was about as far as I could reach out as there were livestock in the area the prevented me from shooting into my really extreme range areas.
Still, I figured I could test the rings at shorter ranges as well and see how they held up. So far I was impressed.
I was glassing the valley bottom when I scanned across a gopher mound with several pups sunning themselves on the mound. I had to see if I could hit them. They were still pretty small, about the size of 1/2 a pop can so I was not expecting much. Really, the mound was the target.
Ranged the mound at 803 yards. The shooting angle was down about 3 degrees so I also plugged this into Exbal. Shooting at this target the wind was coming from my 9:00 position as well.
With all the data entered into the exbal program, it listed 10.25 moa above zero and 1.5 mils into the wind. For this adjustment I would be turning the adjustment dial in the opposite direction as the two previous range tests as this was a shorter range.
As such, I made it a point to return the adjustment dial to the 410 yard "0" position and then dial up from that point so that the adjustment would be consistant with the other adjustments.
Its kind of like a regular scope adjustment. You should always dial past your intended point and come back to it in the same direction every time to keep the spring tension in the scope consistant.
There is no spring tension in this adjustable ring system but there has to be some play between the mechanical lever and the caming surface or they would not move as freely as they do. DO not get me wrong, they are a tight fit and it takes some torque to turn the dial but it seems to me that to be as consistant as possible you should always adjust to your setting from the same direction.
For me that is from the "0" side and adjust up.
I made the adjustment and lined up on the mound. By this time one of the pups had moved to the lower part of the mound but two were still sunning themselves on the top of it.
I held for the recommended windage again and let a big SMK rip toward its target. At 800 yards, flight time is pretty short so you better get back on target or you will miss the action. Luckily I did just in time to see the center of the mount erupt in wet black dirt. We had just received 2" of rain three days earlier. The surface of the dirt was dry but under the crust it was still quite wet.
The two pups on top of the mound were lauched several feet into the air along with about a shovel full of the loose, wet dirt. The lower pup was blown down the hill several feet.
When everything came back to earth and stopped rolling, I counted three little fur balls beating feet back to the hole and out of sight!!! I almost felt bad but it was pretty **** funny to watch to be honest. I hate to image what that would be like but the evil side of me sure likes to watch it.
Not a hit but in all honest, I hit right where I was aiming!!!
All in all I am extremely impressed with the consistancy and precision of these rings. I still need to do alot more testing such as repeatablility at long range and then test out to some serious ranges. 1500, 2000, and 2500 yards.
This will tell me much more then I know know for for now. I will say the intital test of the IVEY 150 MOA adjustable rings has totally suprised me with their precision and predictability.
SO far very good product. Only issue is that your cheek weld is pretty high with the MBR Tooley style stock. If I were designing a rifle specifically for these rings I would either use an adjustable cheek piece or if that was not an option with the stock choice, simply use something to increase the height of the cheek piece.
It is not a big deal to be honest, I found no discomfort shooting the rifle but this is a heavy rifle. A lighter rifle may prove more difficult to shoot accurately with this head position.
So far, passed first test with an "A" in my book.
More testing to come soon.
Back to work!!
Kirby Allen(50)
