Eventually I will have enough saved for a decent dialling scope.
I have done a bit of reading up on mil rads vs MOA.
Which one do you prefer and why?
What sort of reticle do you think works best with each one.
Cheers.
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Eventually I will have enough saved for a decent dialling scope.
I have done a bit of reading up on mil rads vs MOA.
Which one do you prefer and why?
What sort of reticle do you think works best with each one.
Cheers.
Reticle is a matter of preference........MOA would be the standard but i think eye and finger control make all the difference......people blame bad trigger, bad sights..... but it comes down to sight picture and a clean pull of the trigger without moving the gun.
Are you a metric thinker (MM or CM) or an Imperial thinker (Inches yards feet etc)
If metric go with mils... 1 click = 10 mm at 100m
If you are in imperial thinker go MOA... 1 click is usually 1/4 inch at 100 yards.
From that you can reason that 1/4 inch is smaller than 10mm... so M OA should be more accurate...but really 4 mm at 100m is nothing...
Whats the application?
Should have done a poll.
Something's just lend themselves better to metric or imperial. Reloading has the same question,
Everyday stuff I'm metric like most of new Zealand, but not for the other two examples.
I don't know if 1/4 is smaller than 10mm, I don't have to. Don't mix and match, pick one and stick to it.
Moa Moa
Doesn't matter, both work equally well. Thinking in terms of "clicks" works for me, I use a rangefinder and a laminated drop table. Working in clicks sorts out any confusion. With windage, its a hold on the animal, else its too much wind.
Personal preference.
At the end of the day they both do the exact same thing.
Mil rad is a slightly courser adjustment.
Personally I use Mil rad.
I am also careful to think of corrections in Mil, not in inches or cm vs the distance then converted to MOA or Mils.
A 0.1 value adjustment that is always a 1000th the distance I am shooting makes sense to me.
I had a look through a night force shv with an moa/moa reticle which looked like a useful one.
I have always had cheap moa scopes so usually think in that but metric for every thing else.
Hunting and prs style events.
That's a good point.
Great idea!
metric mils- any calcs you make are in multiples of 10, moa is in multiples of 4(if scope is 1/4moa clicks)- for me harder to get me head around............................................ ............
Exactly this for me too. If using a pre-prepared drop table then from a practical standpoint it's all just clicks so it really doesn't matter.
Inherently though I consider Milrads to be the better system, for the same reason that we are metricated and use a decimal system of counting.
Im a metric person but if it goes bang I work in Imperial for some reason. Yards, MPH, inches, thou's etc etc....I think its simply what I started on in the shooting world and it just compounded. In saying that anyone that is good at maths shouldn't have any issue between the two.
Depends what you are using the scope for. A good reticle for shooting targets ( for me ) was a MIL / MIL one with proper hash marks on a FFP scope.
Drift / elevation was easily matched to the fall of shot. So adjustment was either holding off by the number of hash marks or by dialing them in. ( look up GD 2 reticles)
It would be far to "busy " for a hunting scope though.
For me it MIL's for the simple fact that as @ANTSMAN pointed out they are 10 based like our metric system and that's easier on my brain. But as long as the reticle and turret are the same it does really matter. I reckon they need to match for 2 reasons.
(1) When I Zero my rifle I fire a 3 shot group, go up to the target and put a bright orange sticker right in the center of that group then go back to rifle and measure from point of aim to point of impact (sticker) using the scope, then adjust as required. Shoot another group to confirm and usually job done. I have lost count as to how many people I see chasing there tails trying to sight in using a ruler and trying to work out how many clicks to adjust (Especially with MOA scope's and our metric range)
(2) When shooting at distance if you can spot your shots and have a miss you can measure this with scope and adjust aim accordingly. Easier with no math if MIL/MIL or MOA/MOA.
When I was first trying to learn about MILs it was confusing because most info was written by Americans who use MIL with yards/inches, which IMO ruins its simplicity. (not much of an issue if using a ballistics calculator where you just follow whatever it tells you)
They will tell you that a MIL = 3.6" at 100y (which is technically correct but more difficult than it needs to be)
I will tell you a MIL is a 10cm circle at 100m, and each .1mil click = 1cm
Use Mils and meters to make it as simple as possible if not relying on a ballistic app-
For example distance to target with MILS and ranging in Meters = Target size in CM, divide by Target size in MILS, x 10 = distance to target in meters
If you used MIL and yards, then distance to target = Target size in Inches, divide by target size in MILS, x27.7 = distance to target in yards.
Trying to work that out off hand is much easier in MILS / Meters
MOA MOA for me, but doesn’t really matter which really as both are just angles. As other say, it’s easy to overthink this, but you can just think in clicks and have a drop chart taped to your stock. I don’t like busy reticles and measuring adjustments using mil dots isn’t my thing.
Don’t forget that drop charts are only as good as the info used to produce them. Differences in temp, pressure, altitude, azimuth and even spin drift all have to be accounted for, esp at long range. Some of those factors make very little difference but they all add up. That’s why I’m not a fan of CDS type reticles too. I don’t see the point of having a good quality dialling scope and then limiting accuracy to the set parameters dictated by the dialling system.
I did a test in the US on temp effects with my .300 Win Mag. Can’t remember exact temps now, but they were about -2C and +24C. At 500 yards there was a 19 inch difference in drop with the same loads. Admittedly that’s a big temp range but it makes the point about the limitations of fixed inputs.
If you gave me a scope in ether it wouldn’t worry me, it’s just a matter of dialing the drop from drop chart or ballistic app.
I’m a old dog and the 15+ years since I have had dial up scopes I’ve been using MOA and know the system well. My next scope will probably be a Mil/Mil scope because smaller numbers to remember as dial that much shooting at long range.
Eg is was on the hill yesterday shooting goats. I setup for the shot, range 860m and get MOA dialup solution needed 19.66 MOA but dial 19.5 MOA and hold 7 MOA for wind.
If it was a Mil/Mil scope 5.7 Mil and 2 Mil for wind, smaller numbers but the same.
We should never have moved from pounds, shillings and pence. That ruined everything.
At 433m 1 click on a Mil/Mil scope will be 4.33cm (this took me longer to write than to work out)
At 433 yards 1click on a Moa/Moa scope will be............. I honestly have no idea. There is a baby climbing on me and I can't be arsed working it out. I have had 7 MOA LR scopes and One Mil scope.
Both do the same thing. If you have a Mil/Mil or Moa/Moa reticle, match it to a meters or yards range finder. This is the main thing. You want to be able to measure the fall of the shot on the retical and wind that straight onto the turret. If it is not set up this way, in my not so humble opinion (please don't over state the value of opinions) it is not an LR scope. Its just a scope.
My Schmidt and Bender never required a second round when sighting in. Shoot one, measure, wind it on, spot on.
If you have imperial math down, then go Moa/Moa but if not, don't bother. There is simply no argument to justify the more complex math of imperial.
Mil/Mil is so easy and simple to learn, you would be mad not to. The whole idea is not having to think about it too hard so you don't stuff up.
The shootings not so tough. Its the wind and not making fuck ups that is the challenge. Mil gives less scope for fuck ups.
I use MOA and yards but if I was starting over again I’d buy MiL scopes.
my brain has been wired for moa over years of doing the math in my head & you certainly get a finer adjustment in moa than mils.
Having said that mil/mil will work just fine too.
Have both, but most moa/moa.
@Tussock the answer is real quick & easy... 1 inch or if you're really fussy & super accurate shooter you might try to argue 1.14 inches.
Gravity and wind always exert the same dimensions at any one point in time. Mils, inches, MOA, potatoes give it any number you want. It still does the same thing. I don't get the hang-up, especially for hunters. A hits a hit, a miss is a miss. It's just the target usually fucks off after your first go so if you're not shooting stationary targets I struggle to see the difference.
I'd dial 3 potatoes up and an aubergine right if thats what was needed.
A MIL is one fist. Simple enough and saves carrying around the potatoe.
I'm sure hes asking for advice that will allow him to keep his options open.
If you don't think this helps with follow up shots, is it possible there are a few techniques you are not aware of?
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We still use Imperial to measure heads ( Douglas score ) to the closest 1/8th of a inch , the math seems tricky at first but like anything you do it a bit you get used to working it out .
Lots to consider guys.
Thank you for all the advice
I'm happy with either, though I've not used MIL. I prefer MOA as it is a finer adjustment. It is also handy at the range where 7mm holes are about the size of a click and my 24mm dot targets are about 3 clicks. Makes it easy to make adjustments to zero and work out rough group sizes from the bays. I'm happy doing the mental arithmetic to convert in either units or a mixture of the units. The reason I buy MOA is there are more of them on the used market, I'm a cheap bastard.
I have a mixture of Mil and Moa scopes. Its doesn't actually matter a single bit when it comes to having to dial something. Think of it as a number that is actually meaningless; you dial the number calculated by your ballistics solver and do the thing you do (shoot the target). Recording and verifying the data is likely to be more important.
Mixing the two within the same scope is about the dumbest thing you can do. An example of this would be a Mildot reticle with MOA adjustment.
Got to keep the grey matter firing somehow uncle ;)
:smash:
You best to learn both, but there is no need to be an expert in either.
Majority of the scopes, especially low to mid range, uses 1/4 MOA dials. So there is no escape MOA. Also people tend to talk accuracy in MOA. You hear people say their rifle shoots 1 MOA, how often do you hear people say their rifle shows 0.3 Mil?
But the concept of mil is important. For one thing, a lot of scopes have mil dot reticle (even though the majority of them still uses 1/4 MOA clicks). Reticles with MIL based subtention are far more common than otherwise. If you have been high school educated in New Zealand, you would have learned all your maths and physics in metric and decimals. To think of the height of a person or a fence post, the acceleration of the gravitational pull, in terms of metres and calculate everything in decimal is just far more intuitive.
Having said all that, you can actually get by without understanding all that really well. You just need a range finder and a ballistic app on your phone. Do the range reading and then punch numbers in the app. Voila.
But now here is the rub.... if your reticule is in the second focal plane then, unless you are at the precise correct zoom that it is calibrated for, any calculations using reticule divisions is meaning less.