Boresighters

[Diabolus]

I am looking for one for my M1A rifle, I think one that fits in the chamber would be best because the muzzle may be skewed.

Anyone have experience with using a boresighter?

What is a good brand to get?

Thx!

[glockk9mm]

I just bought one yesterday, a bushnell magnetic. I cant get the scope crosshairs to match the boresighters crosshairs.I too would like to know which are the best boresighters.

[ocabj]

Boresighters are a complete waste of money.

Put your target in at 50 or 25 yards. Shoot a round. Get on paper. Adjust accordingly. Do people find it that difficult to sight in a gun?

[C.G.]

Boresighters are a complete waste of money.

Put your target in at 50 or 25 yards. Shoot a round. Get on paper. Adjust accordingly. Do people find it that difficult to sight in a gun?

From someone who bought one and gave up on it shortly thereafter, I wholeheartedly agree.

[Diabolus]

Boresighters are a complete waste of money.

Put your target in at 50 or 25 yards. Shoot a round. Get on paper. Adjust accordingly. Do people find it that difficult to sight in a gun?

Its not difficult to sight in a gun, but it requires several rounds and I rather save the wear and tear on my bolt-action rifle and M1A Supermatch (I switch scopes). Plus, it is something I could do at home before hitting the range.

[metalhead357]

Ahhh, p'a Shaw....

Boresighters are just fine...they aint for brain surgery but save on round counts especially if you're using fully adjustable rings

I picked up a cheapo one from Walmart that slips into the barrel and projects the lil red laser outward; I didn't have 50 feet in my lil 1 room studio so I did it at 12 feet ; It'll get you close. Think they're $25 or so at the Big W..............

[Mute]

I haven't come across a boresighter yet that was worth the money. Take the advice above. It doesn't take that long.

[ocabj]

Its not difficult to sight in a gun, but it requires several rounds and I rather save the wear and tear on my bolt-action rifle and M1A Supermatch (I switch scopes). Plus, it is something I could do at home before hitting the range.

Firing the 3-5 rounds it takes to sight in a rifle isn't going to put any extra wear on your gun.

Plus, since you mentioned the bolt rifle, you already have a bore sighter. It's called your eyes. Remove the bolt, look through the bore and adjust the rifle on some sort of rest (mechanical or sandbags) until the bore/barrel is in line with your target or target board. Keeping the rifle in that position, adjust the scope or sights until they are sighted in on your intended point of impact. Look down bore to verify bore is inline with target. That's it. I just cut down your sighting to about 2-3 rounds for a bolt gun.

I watched two younger guys waste 80 rounds trying to sight in a .243 bolt gun at 100 yards. After I noticed they had ran through four 20 round boxes of hunting ammo and going back to their car for more, I asked them about it and they said they couldn't hit the board and were perplexed because Turners had used a laser boresighter to sight in the scope for them. During the next ceasefire I told them to bring the target to 50 yards. I used the method I outlined above, and got them sighted in perfectly in 3 rounds. I would have interrupted their shooting during that first box of ammo, but I try not to bug anyone because 99% of the time, the person I'm trying to help will just shrug me off as if I don't know what I'm talking about.

[xrMike]

Boresighters are a complete waste of money.

Put your target in at 50 or 25 yards. Shoot a round. Get on paper. Adjust accordingly. Do people find it that difficult to sight in a gun?

Heheheh, I was wanting to say something like that too when I first saw this thread last night, but held it back.

[Diabolus]

Firing the 3-5 rounds it takes to sight in a rifle isn't going to put any extra wear on your gun.

Plus, since you mentioned the bolt rifle, you already have a bore sighter. It's called your eyes. Remove the bolt, look through the bore and adjust the rifle on some sort of rest (mechanical or sandbags) until the bore/barrel is in line with your target or target board. Keeping the rifle in that position, adjust the scope or sights until they are sighted in on your intended point of impact. Look down bore to verify bore is inline with target. That's it. I just cut down your sighting to about 2-3 rounds for a bolt gun.

I watched two younger guys waste 80 rounds trying to sight in a .243 bolt gun at 100 yards. After I noticed they had ran through four 20 round boxes of hunting ammo and going back to their car for more, I asked them about it and they said they couldn't hit the board and were perplexed because Turners had used a laser boresighter to sight in the scope for them. During the next ceasefire I told them to bring the target to 50 yards. I used the method I outlined above, and got them sighted in perfectly in 3 rounds. I would have interrupted their shooting during that first box of ammo, but I try not to bug anyone because 99% of the time, the person I'm trying to help will just shrug me off as if I don't know what I'm talking about.

Thanks for the input, but I disagree that firing 2-3 rounds from any gun will not cause wear - especially a high end bolt-gun.

[ocabj]

Thanks for the input, but I disagree that firing 2-3 rounds from any gun will not cause wear - especially a high end bolt-gun.

Ok. Yes, every round fire will cause wear, but how significant or insignificant is this wear in the grand scheme of things?

When are you planning to rebarrel any of your guns? 2000 rounds? 3000 rounds? 4000 rounds? How many times do you swap scopes? Once a week? 3 rounds a week to resight only accounts for roughly 150 rounds annually. How many rounds do you fire annually? Assuming you fire in a 80+8 round match every two weeks for a year with a single rifle, you're already at 2300 rounds. That extra 150 rounds for sighting in isn't going to have much affect as far as accelerated wear. You've already gotten to a point of throat erosion from your actual match use that you'll need a rebarrel soon anyway (depending on your barrel make and quality and your actual accuracy depreciation). Even if you had a bolt rifle chambered in something like 6.5x284 with short throat life and a life expectancy of 1500 or so rounds before accuracy begins to drop off, most likely than not you would have a dedicated scope for the rifle anyway.

But getting back to the boresighting issue, there is no boresighter that is perfect such that it will guarantee that you will have the point of aim = the point of impact. So even then, you're going to need at least 2 rounds to sight in anyway. So you either use 2 rounds to sight in with a boresighter, or 3 rounds without one.

I'm just trying to save you from the headache of putting your faith in a 'tool' that does not work as well as common sense.

[glockk9mm]

Can anyone explain to me why my crosshairs on the scope dont meet with the boresighters? The knob on the scope stops turning before I can get them to meet.

[Mute]

A .308 could probably go up to 10K rounds before you notice any change in accuracy. 5000 rounds if you're fastidious. 2 - 3 rounds or even 10 rounds isn't going to make that much of a difference in wear. This includes a high end bolt gun.

glockk9mm. Your situation depends on the type of scope you have and your mounts. The knobs on most scopes are meant to be used for field adjustments after you have zeroed your scope and rifle. Most have some method of adjusting the reticle separate from the knobs to get the reticle zeroed. You'll need to consult the manual or tell us what kind of scope you have.

[glockk9mm]

glockk9mm. Your situation depends on the type of scope you have and your mounts. The knobs on most scopes are meant to be used for field adjustments after you have zeroed your scope and rifle. Most have some method of adjusting the reticle separate from the knobs to get the reticle zeroed. You'll need to consult the manual or tell us what kind of scope you have.

It's a nikon prostaff bdc

http://www.midwayusa.com/eproductpage.exe/showproduct?saleitemid=944215

[Diabolus]

Ok. Yes, every round fire will cause wear, but how significant or insignificant is this wear in the grand scheme of things?

When are you planning to rebarrel any of your guns? 2000 rounds? 3000 rounds? 4000 rounds? How many times do you swap scopes? Once a week? 3 rounds a week to resight only accounts for roughly 150 rounds annually. How many rounds do you fire annually? Assuming you fire in a 80+8 round match every two weeks for a year with a single rifle, you're already at 2300 rounds. That extra 150 rounds for sighting in isn't going to have much affect as far as accelerated wear. You've already gotten to a point of throat erosion from your actual match use that you'll need a rebarrel soon anyway (depending on your barrel make and quality and your actual accuracy depreciation). Even if you had a bolt rifle chambered in something like 6.5x284 with short throat life and a life expectancy of 1500 or so rounds before accuracy begins to drop off, most likely than not you would have a dedicated scope for the rifle anyway.

But getting back to the boresighting issue, there is no boresighter that is perfect such that it will guarantee that you will have the point of aim = the point of impact. So even then, you're going to need at least 2 rounds to sight in anyway. So you either use 2 rounds to sight in with a boresighter, or 3 rounds without one.

I'm just trying to save you from the headache of putting your faith in a 'tool' that does not work as well as common sense.

Thanks again for the info.