What distance to zero scope?

[Jimsc]

Sorry if this is a dumb question but I am new to air gunning.  I will be shooting mostly at 20-50 yards.  I have an R9 with a Leapers 3-9x32 scope.  Also does it make any difference what power the scope is set to when zeroing?  Thanks for your help!

[Geoff]

there is a program called chairgun.  it is a free program.

once you enter your pellet weight and pellet speed it will show you the path.   from there you can select the longest "kill zone" if that is what you are looking for

[nced]

Sorry if this is a dumb question but I am new to air gunning.  I will be shooting mostly at 20-50 yards.  I have an R9 with a Leapers 3-9x32 scope.  Also does it make any difference what power the scope is set to when zeroing?  Thanks for your help!

With my .177 R9 and 8ish grain dome pellets I zero at or near the apex of the pellet flight. For my setup that means either 25 yards for "at the apex" or 30 yards where the apex at 25 yards will be about 1/8" above the zero distance at 30.

The idea "for me" is to only need to remember the amount of holdover for the close and far shots without also having to remember holdunder . As mentioned in another reply, the free Chairgun software plus a chrony is useful to get a ROUGH idea of the trajectory, however I've found that I still needed to shoot groups at various distances to verify the Chairgun calcs! Here is one of my "trajectory verification targets" shot a while back with my R9 set up at a certain tune level..........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
As you can see from this 175 shot target, while the groups aren't especially tight it was still useful for showing that with a 30 yard zero I could hit the 1/2" diameter circle most every time from 15 yards to 35 yards simply by "aiming on". This target that was shot "hunter class field target style" ( as shown with my avatar), and this particular target also showed the effect of shooter fatigue as well as the VERY RARE need to readjust my barrel pivot tension.

I found the need to shoot such targets to verify my poi whenever I change my tune level, scope, scope mounts, whatever.

I guess that I really don't shoot these targets much anymore since I mark my scope sidewheel or AO with permanent marker on PVC electrical tape like this.........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
The yellow tape is marked so the different mill dots represent the holdover used after sharply focusing on the target. After focusing if the "pointer" is between the two "+" marks I hold "crosshair on". If the pointer is at a single "." I know to hold "one lower dot on". If the pointer is at ".|." I know to hold between the first and second lower dot.......so on and so forth. When I used an AO scope like this with a duplex reticle it was marked like this.......
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

The bottom line is that ,IMHO, a test target needs to be shot to verify and Chairgun calcs and a chronograph is needed to input data into Chairgun. I do have to say though that while Chairgun might not calculate the actual point of impact at various distances when shooting a recoiling piston gun, it's still a useful program for determining the GENERAL trajectory curve. The pellet from every barrel will probably have a different ballistic coefficient due to the rifling/swaging and the BC is one of the parameters used by the software to calculate the pellet ballistics.
Again, the "+" meant "aim crosshair on", the "." meant aim "tip of lower duplex reticle on" and so on and so forth.

I do hope that this diatribe helped more than confused the question!

The "downside" of my labeling method is that the marks are good for only one magnification and one gun setup. My brother on the other hand actually marks the AO of his scopes with yardage NUMBERS by rangefinding at 12x. Then he remembers where to hold relative to the marked focus distance.

Anywhoo.......if you zero for 30 yards with a stock .177 R9 and shoot 8.4 grain JSB Exact or 7.9 grain die lot marked and dated Crosman Premier pellets from the 1250 count box you simply need to be within 15 to 30 yards of your squirrel to hake a head shot which is what my test target proved to me.

[grobe1458]

all my rifles are zeroed for 20 yards which gives me another zero at 35-38 yards and 1mil or less at 50 yards.

[Nod]

Jimsc, here's the link to Chairgun.   http://www.hawkeoptics.com/chairgun.html

[Jimsc]

Thanks for all your input.  Ed I am really impressed with your detailed presentation.  I will aspire to be as good as you ha ha.

[nced]

Thanks for all your input.  Ed I am really impressed with your detailed presentation.  I will aspire to be as good as you ha ha.

LOL....ya can't believe all you read !   

[Scotchmo]

Medium powered rifle (10-15 fpe) with medium elevation mounts - 25 yards should work.

High power rifle (20 fpe) with high elevation mounts - 30 yards should work.

Your zero will not change when you change the magnification.

[gard72977]

With my 10.5 FPE HW77 I like a 30yd zero for plinking.

[grobe1458]

I took a look at 25 & 30 yards with mine and I didn't see the advantage of either zero. so I guess it's more of a preference and what works for you.

[Motorhead]

Without all the technical hoopla ... set zero @ 25 yards and then test your hold OVER / UNDER required at closer and further ranges.
As you become more obsessed with greater accuracy and willing to set up cheat charts etc ... keeping it simple for now would be my suggestion.

[grobe1458]

Without all the technical hoopla ... set zero @ 25 yards and then test your hold OVER / UNDER required at closer and further ranges.
As you become more obsessed with greater accuracy and willing to set up cheat charts etc ... keeping it simple for now would be my suggestion.

what would be the advantages of 25 yards over 20 or 30?

[gard72977]

Without all the technical hoopla ... set zero @ 25 yards and then test your hold OVER / UNDER required at closer and further ranges.
As you become more obsessed with greater accuracy and willing to set up cheat charts etc ... keeping it simple for now would be my suggestion.

what would be the advantages of 25 yards over 20 or 30?

No hoopla and keeping it simple

[DragonKiller]

nced - can you give a link for that target sheet you used please! I cant find it on any of the free/printable target sites that I know of.
Or maybe attach a image of a clean blank target sheet. Thanks!

[grobe1458]

Without all the technical hoopla ... set zero @ 25 yards and then test your hold OVER / UNDER required at closer and further ranges.
As you become more obsessed with greater accuracy and willing to set up cheat charts etc ... keeping it simple for now would be my suggestion.

what would be the advantages of 25 yards over 20 or 30?

No hoopla and keeping it simple

can you explain on how it is keeping it simple? I'm asking what is the advantage of 25 & 30ft with shorter zero range over 20 with a longer zero range

[nced]

nced - can you give a link for that target sheet you used please! I cant find it on any of the free/printable target sites that I know of.
Or maybe attach a image of a clean blank target sheet. Thanks!

My targets are my own concoctions made using my CAD software, but I have created PDF files if you want them. All my targets are sized for 8 1/2" x 11" "letter size" and are free if you email me at
nced27572xzx@hotmail.com (delete xzx).

A bit of a story concerning my targets:
I started out with the 100 bull targets and found it useful for getting a handle on my shot consistency if I only shot 1 pellet per bull like this target with 1/4" diameter bulls that I shot Hunter Class Field Target style (like my avatar) upstairs at 18 yards........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
LOL....amazing how far off some of the hits are!
Here are a couple 100 bull targets I use........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

Then I noticed that when shooting FT killzones (or critters) that they don't have grids or centerlines to aim at so I made up some targets with 30 "empty bulls"  to kinda simulate shooting a short range standard 60 shot field target match. With this target I shot 2 pellets per bull for a total of 60 shots..........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

Here are a couple 30 bull targets I use.......
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

Back in May I even took my 30 bull target with 1/2" diameter killzones to my back yard practice lane and shot this target at 30 yards HFT style.........
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

[tjcib]

Good stuff.

Just mounted my scope to my disco .22 and trying to decide where to zero. Want to take it to an indoor range, but that max is 25 yards. Would like to do 17-20 to get that 2nd zero around 37 yards, with less than a .25 inch poi change between the two.

Still figuring it all out. Wish my range had a chrony

[ancient1one]

Ed I am going to email you and take you up on some of your home made targets. The last one with grids and lines is the one I would like to try. 100 targets per sheet of paper will definitely save some paper and trees.

As DragonKiller said I cant find anything like that in the free/printable target sites. Ive been eying your targets for awhile.. Thanks

[woogie_man]

I have my rifle zeroed at 50 yards.  Was able to shoot quite a bit and found that at 25 yards I have a 1 mil hold under, other than that everything else is either right on our hold over.  At 75 yards I have a two mil holdover, then at 100 have a four mil hold over.


Shoot shoot and shoot some more, get to know your rifle.

[William]

Here is a link to a bunch of targets I have saved over the last year or 2, everything from AG to PB, 10 meter to site in and pics of squirrels etc. Just about any target for shooting 0 to 100 yards.
None of these are my own and I don't remember where I got half of them. Most do have advertising and web links on them, but I take no credit for any of them.

Target download link... http://www.webexpressplus.com/downloads/targets.zip

William