Sighting in a Mil/Mil Scope

I have shot with people a few times who when sighting in a Mil/Mil scope will still go to the target and measure how far away it is from bullseye in inches and then try to convert it into Mils in their head. Because of this I decided to do a write up on sighting in a Mil/Mil scope. It is extremely easy when done right. You start off with your blank target.

Edited by Chris Farris II - May/11/2012 at 09:37

Good one, 

Very good post CFII.  Well done.

That is good information, CFII.  Of benefit for all...

Simple yet accurate,way to go CFll

Chris Farris II wrote: I have shot with people a few times who when sighting in a Mil/Mil scope will still go to the target and measure how far away it is from bullseye in inches and then try to convert it into Mils in their head. Because of this I decided to do a write up on sighting in a Mil/Mil scope. It is extremely easy when done right. You start off with your blank target.     You will then get a steady rest and fire your first shot off. The key here is a steady rest and slow steady trigger pull. If done right this will only take 2 shots so make sure it counts. You then squeze the trigger and let the gun do the work. Now You simply look at the target and see how much you missed by.     In this case your initial shot was more than 3.5 mils to the right but not quite 4 and a little less than 6 mils low. The key here is to forget about inches or any other linear measurement. Just measure with the scope, after all that is what it was designed for. Now go ahead and make your adjustments 3.7 mils to the left and 5.7 mils up. Now reaquire your target and verify your adjusments. If done properly your next shot should be in the bullseye.     This method can be used in many other circumstances also. Say you are out with some friends plinking some steel at some pretty good distances. Will you be able to measure an exact hit with it at 500 yards or more, probably not. However, when dealing with winds gusting and varying in MPH it can help a lot. You shoot and see the wind has pushed your bullet a little farther off the target than you anticipated. Instead of dialing in your windage, because the wind is varying, just measure it with your scope and hold however far off your splash in the dirt was to the side of the target in the opposite direction. It makes for very fast and very accurate adjustments/corrections in many shooting conditions. You have the equipment, use it to your advantage!

Thanks Chris. I'm a novice to the mil/mil scope concept. If my beginning understanding in relation to your post is correct, would the following logic work in your "shot pushed off by the wind" example? If the wind blown shot hit at a visible spot in the dirt, could you just look and see which mil dot was at the impact point in the dirt and simply use that particular mil dot as your new"crosshair"? (your new aiming point)

rd7fox, in practice, it can be hard to see how far off the impact is. If a the range is far though and especially if there's dirt or snow you can see the impact. I find I really need to try to control recoil and keep the target area in the scope. I also can't just tell right away. If I can tell where it hit then after I get a good sight picture again I can measure okay. It's nice if you have a spotter, but then usually they won't have glass with a mil reticle and you'll hear something like it was "2 feet to the left" so you get to do a little calculating!

rd7fox wrote: Thanks Chris. I'm a novice to the mil/mil scope concept. If my beginning understanding in relation to your post is correct, would the following logic work in your "shot pushed off by the wind" example? If the wind blown shot hit at a visible spot in the dirt, could you just look and see which mil dot was at the impact point in the dirt and simply use that particular mil dot as your new"crosshair"? (your new aiming point)

Yes, that is correct. However as stated above you have to work on maintaining your sight picture through the shot and recoil. The smaller the caliber the easier this is to do. With practice you can for the most part do it with most setups if you are properly setup behind the rifle to absorb the recoil. Having someone else spot for you helps a lot. Me and a friend of mine who also happens to run a 5-20 usually go out together and shoot side by side prone. We will take turns spotting for the other one while they shoot. That makes it fast and extremely simple. I shoot and even if I lose my sight picture I have someone beside me calling off my misses in mils (Not inces or feet). No conversions needed there. There are also a few spotting scopes or binoculars out these days with Mil reticles in them.  

Edited by Chris Farris II - May/16/2012 at 09:20

Very nicely done, Chris.

Edited by koshkin - May/16/2012 at 15:06

typo...

koshkin wrote: Very nicely done, Chris. I can't help, but to emphasize again: try to avoid thinking in linear units when shooting or spotting.  Make sure that both the shooter and the spotter use reticles with the same angular units (either mils or MOA) and just stay with linear angular units.  I bet that both speed and precision will go up. ILya

I saw it too Dan.

yep,  and if it's a FPP scope, it doesn't matter which power setting it's on.

At the class I took a couple weeks ago, one of the instructors was trying to use both linear and angular measurements to explain stuff to a couple students.  Finally I could not take it any more and said just forget the linear measurements, all you are doing is confusing yourself and these guys.  Just think in the mils or moas and stop trying to turn everything into inches. 

He never did get it though, he just kept arguing with me about it and trying to explain it to the other students just making it worse. 

You can sight any scope in two shots as well.

After bore sighting, set your gun up in a vice or solid rest of some sort and fire a shot.  Make sure to note exactly where your crosshair was when the trigger broke.  Then set up the gun in the vice so the cross hairs are exactly where they were when the shot broke.  Then use your adjustments and move them while looking through the scope so the crosshairs move right to the hole in the paper.  If you did it right and your gun did not move when you were making the adjustments, your next shot should be right on POA to POI. 

The 2-shot sight-in is another cool thing about having matching turrets/reticle, esp. with an FFP scope.

The circle is now complete. When I left you, I was but the learner; now *I* am the master.

Younglings, younglings gather 'round... Mind what you have learned. Save you it can!

Had a great experience with that same angular measurement concept recently. I was sighting in a Ruger Mk III Tgt. 22 Long Rifle recently at 50 yds. The optic was an el cheapo plex-reticled 2x Barska. I always measure the subtensions of all of my multi-stadia reticles from simple plex to Ballistic Plex. The plex subtension in that optic was measured at 15 SMOA, x-hair to plex post tip. I then acquired the steel tgt. at 50 yds. through the optic, and shot once. I measured it with the reticle and it appeared to be 15 MOA high and left. With the 1/2 MOA finger-adjustable turret, i cranked in 30 clicks down and right. There were 4-1/2" bolts holding the plate onto the frame, and i aimed at one of them and hit it on the next shot. I love applying multi-stadia reticles as a measuring device for both downrange zeroing and rangefinding, and find this stuff not only educational, but also quite rewarding.

I would make one modification to the process, kinda. Rather than fire a round or 2 at the target, then adjust; i recommend a group of at least 3 rounds. If the rounds aren't grouping, no amount of turret spinning will fix the problem.

I cannot tell you how many times i have seen novice shooters chasing bullet holes at the range (shoot 1 round, dope change, shoot 1 round, another dope change, shoot another round, another dope change...) because they were zeroing, pulled a shot, and doped for the pulled shot, not the good shot.

What i do is fire one shot, make sure i am on paper, then fire 2 more, same point of aim. If they group, take the center of the group and adjust on that center. If one or more was a pulled shot, you'll know when you squeeze, throw that one out, and shoot another to replace it.

I highly discourage the "1 shot and adjust" method unless you are quite certain of the quality of the shot. I ain't that good , I group before i adjust.

And forget inches, in the real world nothing has 1-inch grip squares superimposed. If you need a grid, you're doing it wrong.

Since most guys start with a 100yd zero, measuring the adjustment makes sense if they have a scope with MOA adjustments vs MIL. Of course they could also convert the mil error to MOA and then make the adjustment but that gets tricky with something like 3.375 X 1.5 mils =  5.062 MOA. Easier to measure the target.

sscoyote wrote: I then acquired the steel tgt. at 50 yds. through the optic, and shot once. I measured it with the reticle and it appeared to be 15 MOA high and left. With the 1/2 MOA finger-adjustable turret, i cranked in 30 clicks down and right. There were 4-1/2" bolts holding the plate onto the frame, and i aimed at one of them and hit it on the next shot.

This worked? I thought that if you had 1/2MOA adjustments that is what it is a 100yds. And at 50yds each click would be 1/4 and not 1/2.

Sparky wrote: sscoyote wrote: I then acquired the steel tgt. at 50 yds. through the optic, and shot once. I measured it with the reticle and it appeared to be 15 MOA high and left. With the 1/2 MOA finger-adjustable turret, i cranked in 30 clicks down and right. There were 4-1/2" bolts holding the plate onto the frame, and i aimed at one of them and hit it on the next shot.  This worked? I thought that if you had 1/2MOA adjustments that is what it is a 100yds. And at 50yds each click would be 1/4 and not 1/2.

My bad, I was thinking 15 inches and not 15 MOA.

So using this method, you can develop your own dope for known ranges.  At a known distance, use the method described above to establish your zero for the range desired (i.e. 200 meters).  Move to the next known distance (say 300 meters), fire your group, make the necessary adjustments and you have the number of clicks you need to come up for that particular distance.  Continue the process until you've filled out your data book for the ranges you are interested in.  In the end, you'll have the clicks necessary for the known ranges and the holdover for that particular load/ammo lot.