Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Recommendations vertical split rings

All depends how they are installed. It is a round tube with round internal lenses. Where the rings join is purely preference

Warnes. Two sets on CZ 527s and one set on Marlin 336 on EGW rail. 👍

Warnes's have worked for me.

Warne rings for the win.

I have crushed a new scope tube with a set of Warne Maxima rings. They are easy to over tighten. A torque wrench is your friend.

I don't think the "vertical pinch ring" style causes issues with all scopes, or even most scopes, but with all the other options out there, I like to eliminate that possibility by using other rings that don't rely on the scope tube flexing to hold tight.

Warne rings are the only rings I will use. They are rugged, have never caused any zero-retention issues and -- if installed properly -- will never, ever leave any marks on a scope tube. A couple years ago, I sold a Conquest scope here on the fire, and it had been in and out of Warne rings a minimum of 13 times. Even so, the tube could have passed for new as there were no easily-discerned indications of it ever being mounted.

I always chuckle when I read the classifieds and see a scope listed with "has marks from Talley rings." Talleys are so highly revered here, so I have to wonder: do people not know how to install a scope, or is there a problem with the design of the rings? The way Warne rings work for me, I have no need or desire to find out for myself.

I likes the Tally's better than Warn...

Regarding vertical split rings, I have several sets of 1" Warnes and I'm sold on them. Just got my first scope with a 30 mm tube last summer and that's also in Warnes. Friend of mine has sets of Warnes on almost every scoped rifle he owns. That's what got me into them. They look good and work good.

Rely on the scope tube flexing? Guess I am not following? They're all a clamp.

wareagle,

Would love to hear about rings that don't depend, at least partially, on some flex of the tube.

Maybe someone could bust out the crayons and 'splain the flexing?

Proper ring alignment, (lap rings or bed scope in them to minimize misalignment) pretty much eliminates scope tube flexing axially, but I suppose that when scope ring caps, split vertically or horizontally, are torqued down (even properly), there must be at least microscopic radial flexing of the scope tube. RJ

Vertically split rings, the way they are executed in most designs (like Warne, ADM, etc) depend on the ring halves flexing a little as you tighten them.
Because of that, most of he pressure on the tube is from two sides along a comparatively small contact area, not from the entire perimeter of the scope tube.
Depending on how much torque is on the screws and on which scope you are using, it can interfere with tracking, sometimes even with POI consistency, but that is less common.
I have not done an extensive study of which scopes can tolerate this kind of asymmetric pressure and which do not. I have some vertically split rings and they do not give me any trouble with SWFA scopes where I mostly use them. March seems to be OK with them. Leupold VX-3 was sensitive to ring location with vertically split rings. Vortex Razor HD LH seemed OK.
In general, I will not use vertically split rings in applications where I dial a lot.
Now, horizontally split rings are not immune to this either, but it is less common for them to be as out of round.
Vertically split rings are pretty much always oval in cross section once tightened.
To avoid this asymmetric pressure you want very stiff ring halves. The easiest way to tell is how quickly it goes from loose to tightened. The best I have seen in this regard are probably mounts and rings from Aadland Engineering (and I have seen the stress modeling he did on the rings). They are well machined and extremely rigid.

ILya

As Warne explained it to me, for the rings to hold tight to the base, the scope tube has to deform a little as the top screws are tightened or else the bottom of the rings would separate, creating a loose fit on the scope base. (I have video showing that happening with an alignment bars in the rings) Those rings aren't a perfect circle, more oval, which puts pressure on the sides of the scope rube rather than spreading out the pressure all around. Other ring designs, with a more circular shape, support the scope all the way around when rings are tightened. Warne's aren't the only ones that do this and not saying they are bad rings, just not an ideal design for some scopes. Again, that's all from Warne.

I'm not arguing that, all I am saying is after talking with Warne about a situation I was having with their rings, their design isn't my favorite and I think it could cause issues with some scopes.

Asymmetrical pressure for the win....

No trouble with Warnes so far, but it can be a bit tricky to get all the pieces together. Still, Talley LWs are hard to beat for normal use, and Burris Signatures with the inserts the top choice, though I'm not wild about the big cut they have in the bottom of the Weaver-type.

Verticals can look very neat and trim. The Talleys on my CZ455 are very attractive IMO.