I'm going to be buying a Matte fixed 6'er here very soon.
I will be sending it in for a reticle change & maybe a knob (have not made up my mind yet on that).

Should I have the parallax adjusted? If so to what distance & why?

Thanks!

We need to know a little more. What will you use the rifle for? Where will you be hunting mainly? How far will most of your shots be taken? What cartridge?

I run mine to 500 with no problem.....

x2, I routinely shoot 3-500 w/o issue. Get the M1 elevation turrett.

Edit - You can order your scope directly from the Leupold custom shop set-up the way you want.


David

What will you use the rifle for? Hunting w/ some play at distance
Where will you be hunting mainly? Washington & Montana (open flats to mountains)
How far will most of your shots be taken? Close as possible to 500 yards max while hunting. Playing: out to 1K
What cartridge? 300 H&H

Here's my experience with the 6x Leupold- I have had both the 6X42 and the smaller version, 6X32 or whatever it is. One resides on my 270 as I write.
Some of the 6x Leupolds I have had have exhibited LOTS of parallax. One with the long range reticle had enough parallax so that by moving your head from one extreme to the other, the target would move half the space between the 200 yard and the 300 yard dot.
I have since then had parallax adjusted in my 6X scopes to 400 yards. (There are a limited number of options- The next shorter range was something like 250 yards).
When I get the scopes back from Leupold they have had less parallax at all ranges out to 500 or 600 yards than before. In other words, no downside, and lots of upside.
A careful cheek weld will eliminate much of the parallax problem. However, from field positions in hunting positions few people can achieve the uniform cheek weld that is possible at the bench. I have also never heard of someone shooting worse because their scope had little or no parallax. I used to typically shoot hundred of rounds through my rifles with the 6X scope at paper and ground squirrels and prairie dogs and grasped at every little advantage I could get to get more precision, and minimizing parallax seemed to be a significant improvement.

Royce

Parallax adjustments from Leupold:
Infinity
50 yards
60 "
75 "
100 "
125 "
150 "
200 "
400 "

I would only get it changed from the factory setting if I was putting it on something like a 22 that would be shot mostly at shorter distances. I've never heard of anybody changing the parallax for centerfire hunting rifles.

Why not change it to be optimum "out there" where it counts?

This question assumes the user will actually be shooting at 300+.

Another option is to order a FX-3 6x42 AO Competition Hunter with LRD reticle and field style turrets from the Custom Shop.

I guess opinions are like azzholes and I gave mine. I'm here to learn. Maybe my opinion will change........but it will still be like an azzhole.

There is a do-it-yoself way to change the parallax on a Leupold. I think it may have been Bruzer that told me how to do it. But I didn't take notes. I do recall we were discussing 6x42's and he had learned to accomplished the feat.

257
How much do you shoot at 300 yards?

My sample of one does not have noticeable parallax out to 500 w/ the factory setting. I can hit with it very well even from field positions, my technique is not spectacular, my cheek weld not always perfect. I believe it more likely that the parallax setting was not set properly on Royce's scope as delivered from the factory.

David

None with a 6x. But I guess the occasion could arise.

Bruzer's posts about it make me wonder why Leupold will only reset to a particular list of values.

Because according to the custom shop rep I spoke to it really makes very little difference when going over the factory setting. The primary benefit is to those wanting to shoot close range. He stated there is a very noticeable difference between the 50yd setting and the factory setting of 150. Which is what make's me think Royce's scope wasn't set properly to spec from the factory.

David

Did you find them or do you just recall that he posted? I guess I'm too lazy to search. May try tonight.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbth.../1/Changing_Parallax_On_a_Non_AO_#UNREAD

Had it saved in favorites...

That's it.....THANKS. I remember I talked to Robert on the phone about this. I think I bought a 6x42 from him and he helped me with a walk-thru.

The only way to improve that scope is slapping an M1 on top.

Whoa! Very interesting!

Royce I tend to see parallax at 300 yards with mine but it seems to have disappeared at 400-600 yards.....can anyone figure this out?

Bob,

Beyond the distance where the scope is set to be parallax free, the parallax seen by your eye tends to get less and less significant the further you go, and gets more significant the closer you get to the object. That is why a scope that is what I assume to be parallax-free at 100 yards shows more parallax at 300 yards than 400-600 yards. It would also show a significant amount of parallax at 10 yards, even more than you see at 300, if you sat down and had a look.

Not directed at you, but I often see people incorrectly assume that parallax gets worse and worse the further from the target you get. In reality, the image converges on the objective lens from whatever distance the object is at and the angle of convergence becomes smaller and smaller the greater the distance to the object, and the amount of parallax grows smaller and smaller as that angle decreases.

One way that you can think of parallax that is often easier to visualize than a riflescope's internals, is your eyes. Your eyes have parallax by nature, since they are seeing the same object from different angles. If you look at an object 6" in front of you, and close your left eye, and then your right eye, the object appears to be in a drastically different position when viewed with each eye. But if you look at an object 100 yards away with each eye in succession, the object's location does not appear to be significantly different when viewed with each eye. This is because the angle of convergence between the object and your eyes is great when it is 6" away, and very small when the object is 100 yards away.

BobinNH
My WAG is that the scope has it's parallax set for 400 or 500 yards. I suspect that not a lot of quality control goes into the parallax settings at the factory because nobody but me and three other whackadoodles pay any attention to it.
It puzzles me that so many people fret about heavy reticles being too imprecise because they cover one minute of angle, but three or four MOAs of parallax doesn't concern them

Fred,

I tend to be just about obsessive about checking parallax, especially in new scopes, and at various ranges. The worst I've seen was an in expensive 5-15x Euro-scope that, oddly enough, didn't have ANY sort of easy parallax adjustment. When set on 15x the parallax was over a foot at 400 yards.

I have to guess that your scope was accidentally set wrong at the factory. Right now I have eight 6x Leupolds, mostly 6x36's but also a couple 6x42's. One is on a 6.5x55 that I loaned to a friend's daughter to hunt with this fall, her first season, and one is at Leupold. Five of the six that are here have NO detectable parallax at 350 yards, the longer distance I normally check at, since that's about the range to the water tower from one of our upstairs windows. The other has about an inch, which I don't worry about. All of these are straight from the factory.

Jordan/Fred/Mule Deer: Glad you guys are around to discuss this stuff and Jordan thanks for that detailed explanation!

I just got back from the range and shot a pair of 7mm mags at 300 yards, both equipped with 6x36 Leupolds. I was thinking of this thread as I wiggled my head around and watched the parallax through both scopes, holding on a 3" orange dot against a black target (contrast). I could watch the dot dance around, mostly vertical,and it was related to cheek weld, i.e. if I got sloppy with my head the dot danced low and if I snugged into the stock the dot was in the right place....I expected all this as I have seen it many times.

Anyway my first shot at 300 yards from the Mashburn hit the orange dot, the second about 2" away,where the rifle and scope has been putting them for the last 5 years and it has been that long since the scope was adjusted. I know it would have put them where they need to go at 400-600 as well since I have run the drill many times.

The rifle and scope are now getting to the point where I trust them. Parallax or not I think I will just leave well enough alone.

I wonder if you did send your scope in to have the parallax adjusted to 400 yards...If the second would hit the orange dot too?

WBill: The second one was so close,it wouldn't have mattered...but maybe!

Oh I know it's close enough....BUT...What if??? Always crops into your head doesn't it? LOL

6x42, matte finish, wide duplex w/ M-1 elev turret for the win. No need to fugg with the parallax.

At 300 yards, who needs a turret?

Besides turrets have nothing to do with parallax.

MD, just out of curiousity, what's the 6x42 at Leupold for?

I wasn't particularly careful about those two sentences. The one on the 6.5x55 and the one at Leupold are 6x36's. The one scope is at Leupold because it didn't seem to be adjusting correctly.

Why the wide duplex?



P

BobinNH
You listening to me about guns and/or scopes is like the Pope asking Bill Clinton for advice about celibacy.
But, back to parallax, I suspect having reduced parallax helps on those field shots when you are hanging upside-down by your toes from a limb on a Ponderosa pine shooting one handed across a canyon while Sasquatch is stealing your lunch, and cheek weld is the last thing on your mind. Happens to me all the time.

Fred

Fred the thing is, I see parallax at the range...but don't remember noticing it when the reticle is hanging on an animal.

Is that because I am concentrating on not falling out of the tree?

I do know it can affect our groups...

Wide duplex sux ballz.

As does Leupold for ignoring what consumers want.

I bought a 8x40 FXII, box marked Duplex, and it had a WIDE duplex.

Really, who decided at Leupold gloss fixed scopes get duplex, and matte get wide?

JB, did you miss the latest video on scope break in?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRRahHX9Zkg

The ones who wanted to make money off of hunters who would return their scopes for a reticle change!