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need some scope help

1K views 17 replies 10 participants last post by  catchysumfishy 
#1 ·
went to the range today and took a ruger number 1 with a 3by9 leupold. Last year this rifle shot fine. Was shooting one inch groups at 100 yards. The only adjustment that I made was that I noticed that Carters had not aligned the scope perfectly when mounting it. I loosened the torx screws and properly aligned the scope. So fast foward to today, the rifle was all over the place. It was shooting 5 inch groups at 100 yards. Anyone have any thoughts as to whats going on? Oh yeah, I am shooting a 300 win mag with 180 grain corelock.
 
#5 ·
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that if you have changed nothing else, the problem is with what you changed. Try it again and make sure you have not over-tightened something or left it too loose. Next step is trying another scope.

My No. 1 is sensitive to the barrel heating up. If for some reason it is wandering around when the barrel is hot but not before then let it stay cool.
 
#6 ·
Use a torque driver when tightening the rings, and make sure your rings are alligned. Ive found Leups to be sensitive to this, and its a common problem. I had the same thing happen to me on a Remington 700, and couldnt figure it out. I took it to a retired gunsmith I know, and he knew exactly what the problem was. He used two rods the same diameter as the scope that had pointed ends to align the rings, then lightly honed them and torqued them in sequence, then bore sighted it using a cool laser/mirror setup. Took it out to his backyard range, and it was 2" high and three clicks to the left at 100 yards. Corrected for the left, and thats where its been every time since. That was three years ago.
Lesson learned for me. I dont install my own scopes anymore.
 
#16 ·
Use a torque driver when tightening the rings, and make sure your rings are alligned. Ive found Leups to be sensitive to this, and its a common problem. I had the same thing happen to me on a Remington 700, and couldnt figure it out. I took it to a retired gunsmith I know, and he knew exactly what the problem was. He used two rods the same diameter as the scope that had pointed ends to align the rings, then lightly honed them and torqued them in sequence, then bore sighted it using a cool laser/mirror setup. Took it out to his backyard range, and it was 2" high and three clicks to the left at 100 yards. Corrected for the left, and thats where its been every time since. That was three years ago.
Lesson learned for me. I dont install my own scopes anymore.
Lapping Rods
 
#10 ·
Interesting that you had this problem at Carters...... I just returned from a hunt with a number of customers. On this hunt we also had a sportsmans marksmanship class taught during the middle of the day, which although made for a very long day, everyone agreed that the class was time well spent.

Four or five of the scopes there had been installed by Carters, EVERY one of them had some issue, either not level crosshairs, loose screws or what not. After the first day on the range, we spent an evening after the hunt, performing tuneups on everyone's guns.

I normally only trust ME to work on my guns. Then, if it isn't right, I can only hold me accountable. No axe to grind with Carters, but they are very busy, and if you do the work yourself, if something DOES happen, you are that much more experienced to deal with it.

We haven't had that good of luck with corelokt's and winchester either, the federal's seem to work better as far as consistency.

MM
 
#11 ·
You don't need Carter's to do this. Anyone can do this very well if you use the following products, and it's easy. Wheeler engineering has some really great products for scope mounting, which you can get at Carter's or MidwayUsa.com There is what's called the "level level." It's two levels, one of which you place in the receiver of the gun, and the other you place on the top of the scope when you're mounting it. Get the bubble centered on the one in the receiver, then rotate the scope until the bubble's centered there, and then use one of Wheeler's torque wrenches to tighten it down with about 18-20 pounds of torque.

Then there is the scope mounting kit, which has those two tubes that taper down to a point. Place them in your rings, and adjust the rings until the two points touch, and you're ready to put your scope in, and then do the above.

Having your crosshairs perfectly level to the horizon is critical, because if you don't, when you make only a vertical adjustment to your scope, you have by definition changed the horizontal component as well. The higher your scope is above your bore, the more this is accentuated.

Three very good products from Wheeler engineering.

THE JAMMER
 
#12 ·
good advice from the Jammer there! +1, that level-level is great!

Cabelas also sells the level level, 20 bucks item # xz-22-9552. they have the other items as well.

I also have a piece of 1" hardwood dowel that works very well as the two tubes,plus it is handy for twisting the clamp rings into the base.

You can assemble a pretty smart gunsmith kit for a couple hundred bucks, put it in a cheap plastic toolbox and be the hero at the lease when (not if!!!) someone's gun has issues. That, and maybe I am a sucker for tools..... I can sleep in my box at work!

MM
 
#13 ·
Well its not the scope and its not the ammo. Went back to the range with a couple of other manufactures ammo. Rifle still walked all over the place. It sort of liked federal fusion 180 grains. Shot a 1.5 inch group but still had a couple of wierd fliers. Came home and did a search on ruger #1 accuracy problems and the findings were pretty troublesome. Apparently the trigger sucks, the front scope mount is mounted on the barrel (think about what happens when the barrel heats up) and the two piece stock, namely the foreend screws up the harmonics of the barrel. The silver lining is that the rifle I have is chambered in 300 win mag with a laminated stock and apparently was a limited edition. Its seems this rifle is very desireable to alot of the ruger #1 guys (which I no longer am) and somewhat difficult to locate. If anyone is interested in reading about it here ya go http://www.rvbprecision.com/articles/9/accuracy-tips-for-the-ruger-1
 
#15 ·
Could still be a scope mount issue.

Some No. 1s shoot, some don't, some can be made to shoot. But if yours did last year and does not this year, it seems it is not just because it is a No. 1. In addition to being sensitive to the barrel heating up, mine preferred to be pretty clean, so I had to spend time keeping the copper fouling down.

Be sure the fore-end is not loose.
 
#17 ·
Check the fore end for barrel contact if that has been removed. Make sure the mounting rings aren't right over the adjustments, this can cause them to hang up or backlash. That is they are still changing for a shot or three after an adjustment. Also check for crown damage if there is any chance it got bumped. Moyers makes an adjustable trigger for the No. 1 that works well.

Older Rugers had some barrel quality issues but the newer ones should be fine. As you have probably seen on the web research some No.1s will only get to about a 1-1.5" group while others will shoot at 1/2" or even less.
 
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