Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Help, ran out of adjustment on optic

You could try swapping the rings around, that has worked hor me a time or two.

Squint!

When rings are on the base, tilting the base will not change a thing as far as scope stress. I have milled bases for long ranges but rings do not change at all. But put a shim in the ring and you can stress the scope. You change alignment from one ring to another. I do not trust the Burris system. Rings must be in line no matter. Now you might get it right but how do you measure? Roll the rear inserts to raise the back and where are the fronts? Best is the base movement. Shimming is always done under the base.

He said bases, as in plural for two piece. Shimming under one of those two pieces is definitely not the same thing as tilting a one piece base.

Try resetting your scope back to mechanical zero.This may get your adjustment back without having to change your mounts.Here are some videos on the subject.I ran into the same problem before too.I reset the scope back to zero and it gave the adjustment back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZ-pF52t4TQ

Really?

Look today with long range rifles. The base will be milled for a 20 MOA change. ONLY the base. Thicker at the rear and never the rings. Now many rifles have different heights at the actions but they made bases to level the scope, never for extra long ranges. Yet you can shim the rear base to shoot far . Not as good as a one piece, One piece is still best. It keeps the scope in line with rings.
You want the scope to be near center with adjustments no matter. To be at extremes is bad on the scope. Also to go too far with elevation will effect windage too. Pads on a tube will move in and out.
A scope is easy to understand so don't bend the tube.

has worked for me several times

Signature rings work great. If there's any easy way to guarantee a mounting job free of stress on the scope tube, that is it. The offset inserts are really helpful when dealing with misaligned D&T on receivers. I use em on one or two rifles.

As I said, won't cure the problem but may allow you to center the scope.

Years ago, I got a Charles Daly 98 that had the rear scope base holes drilled off center. CD said they were within spec despite clearly not being centered and tilting to the right. A scope base would sit cockeyed. The shop that sold it actually felt bad for be and provided a set of Burris rings and inserts. Ultimately I redrilled (milled actually) the holes and re tapped for 8x40 screws. That fixed the problem, no band-aids.

Or, as I did as I don't have a machine shop and still building skills, modify the base. The first modified base was truly modified, into something other than a base.

My motto: Always work on the part cheapest to replace.

Sounds like they got the wrong bases on it. They probably put bases for a modern post 64 action on a pre 64. The rear bridge height on pre 64's is different than modern model 70's. Ran into this when putting modern bases on a pre-64. Some scopes may have enough vertical adjustment to compensate but the misalignment of the rings caused by the unequal base height stresses the scope tube and can bend it or leave nasty ring marks in your tube.

Yes, knives, even wunnderful wunnerful Winnies had manufacturing tolerances that stacked. Like all firearms, Winchesters were made by humans, not God.
Really.

Mechanically, it does not make sense. Only if the inserts can rotate sideways should it work so no matter how they are turned they will align with each other. To force one end over against a fixed other end is stress. I do not have any so I don't know. If they work like a round bushing in a race it is fine. A tilted base can be shimmed on one side to level but can be off center if the holes are off center. If the outsides of the inserts are rounded and fit a rounded ring cut so they can swing--good. If flat, NOT.
I need you to tell me how they are made.

That .0035" is enough of a difference to create your problem. Since you are using 2-pc bases you could likely shim the rear base .003-.004" and correct the problem. Alternatively you could use the Burris rings as suggested by others,

Of note, several years ago, about the time Winchester first introduced the Classic and brought back the CRF action, I purchased one brand spankin' new in 300Wby. Took it home, topped it with Leupold Std bases and rings and went out to shoot. Ran into the same issue that the OP has. Tried different bases, and base ring combos all to no avail. Took the gun back to where I purchased it, showed the gunsmith there the issue and he agreed that something wasn't right. The gun was returned to Winchester to have them look it over. About a month later I got a call to come in and pick my gun up. Turns out the gun I returned, DID have an issue with the bridge height, and Winchester replaced the rifle. Took my ring, bases and scope, mounted everything up, shot it and never had a problem.

Moral of the story is, the issue COULD be with the rifle itself.

You don't mention what kind of scope it is. I had the same issue with a zeiss conquest hd5 with target turrets. I did not realize but the zero stop was causing it. Zeiss sent me the instructions on how to change it and I fixed the issue.

Would be interesting to hear where limabean is at with this.

Thanks guys, I ended up shimming the rear base to get the rifle to shoot where it needed to. I still don't like this setup but it is working for now. I wish I could find some bases that would work without shims but no success yet.

Cool.