Hoyt (DZR Rat)

 How to sight in a scope on a springer

Hoyt knows that of which he speaks...if I were you...I would listen and learn.

Hi Chris -

Sighting in scopes on spring rifles is challenging - but rewarding once set up correctly.  

I have found that I can't hit the broadside of a barn freehand - so that was certainly out as a method of hold for sighting in. I have found that if you can rest your left hand on a rolled towel - shooting bag - pillow - anything semi-soft - and NOT hold the rifle with a tight grip - you can get repeatable results.  

Russ Best and all the usual airgun gurus on the Yellow Forum have written tons on How-To hold spring rifles - and the advice seems all about the same - Don't hold the rifle too tightly with either hand - Let the rifle recoil as it wants to - you cannot force it - do not yank the trigger - squeeze it slowly - and don't put too much cheek pressure on your rifle either. Sometimes you are concentrating so hard to not grasp the rifle tightly that you forget you are pressing real hard with your cheek.  

Try VERY short ranges at first - like five yards - see if you can get tight 5-shot groups at that distance - practice your hold at that distance until you get repeatable results. You can't even BEGIN to adjust your scope until you get repeatable results. At this point - you don't care where the pellets are in relation to the bulls eye - five inches high and off to the left is just fine - as long as all the pellets go to the same point. Once you have achieved this - you can:

A.) begin to adjust your scope and 

B.) begin to move your target out to 10, 20 30 yards and beyond.  

I cannot stress enough the benefit of starting out with very short ranges - this will help a lot in figuring out what is going on. At longer ranges - small differences make sighting -in too hard - start with short range - master that - and then move out.  

Many lower end scopes - anything that cost less than $200 really - don't have very good adjustments - and in that light it is a good idea to always be consistent in how you turn the cap/knobs. Visualize that there is slack in those adjustments - and you must take it out for any adjustments to make sense - otherwise the slack can throw you off & confuse you. I accomplish this by always going past where I want to go - say go past two clicks - and then BACK down those two clicks so that you are always "arriving" at the new adjustment with the same tension & pressure on the caps. It is like taking the backlash out of a machine dial - or a combination lock - go past the desired number - and back down to it - this maintains the amount of adjustment so that things line up the same every time.  

This is very important for the sighting-in procedure. You will be aiming at the bulls eye - and sending pellets to a different location. That's fine - as long as you are getting most all of the pellets to go the same place - then you can begin to make those adjustments to bring the Point of Impact closer to the bulls eye. As you make the small turret adjustment - you should be rewarded with the sight of you pellets moving closer to the bull. I find it much easier to sight in by using a lot of fresh target paper - if you allow too many holes in your paper it is easy to get confused and make the wrong adjustments. 

 I saw your question on the Crosman Forum - and I saw someone reply that the rear -ocular lens- of your scope should be adjusted until the crosshairs are sharp for YOUR eyes only. If someone else looks through your (adjusted) scope - the crosshairs may not be clear to them - and they will have to adjust it for their eyes. This - rear - ocular lens adjustment has nothing to do with viewing the target as far as set-up is concerned. That is why the poster said to look at a blank white wall - or the blank sky - and simply screw the rear lens in & out until the crosshairs are clear for you. He was correct about that. Once the cross hairs are clear for you - you can forget about that adjustment - it's set (unless it gets moved somehow later).  

Your Crosman 4x32 scope is a decent little unit - and quite useable - but it does lack an Adjustable Objective lens feature - that means your front scope lens does not move or adjust. If you look at a scope with AO (adjustable objective) you will notice it has distance marking on the front lens ring - those scopes have one focusing feature that yours does not - the ability to fine focus for different ranges. Your scope is "fixed" - which means that it is focused at a "fixed" distance - at that set distance that particular scope will exhibit it's best optical clarity and lack of parallax error. Most likely your scope is set to about 50 yards - which is too far for airguns really. You can check this by looking thru your scope at something 50 yards away - and bobbing your head up and down a bit as you look thru the scope - it will probably look steady (the target that is). Now look at something 15 yards away - and bob your head up & down - the target will probably appear to move up & down a bit in the scope view as you move your head.......that's parallax error. The scope is focused much farther out than you are viewing....and it gives a bit of error - still shootable - but does have some blur and some error. 

This is what the AO scopes dial out - they adjust for both far & close ranges. This is also why the poster on the forum mentioned that on some fixed scopes (like the Daisy Powerline $28 3x9x32 sold at WalMart) you can physically turn-move the front lens - and adjust it down to closer ranges. I don't think the Crosman scope is as easy to move - or may not move at all - I can't remember - but on the Daisy you can turn it with your hands usually. Adjusting the scope front lens so that it is CLOSER to the target brings the focus to shorter ranges - that is you are moving the front lens OUT - away from scope - toward target - usually one or two turns does the trick - if it is possible at all. Turning out the front lens on a fixed scope is not adjustment necessary - just a possibility if you feel like messing with it.  

Really - the hardest part of sighting in a scope - is learning to hold your rifle in a manner that it shoots repeatably. In case you are driven to fits with the scope - take it off - shoot with the open sights until you can hold a tight group at close range - re-mount the scope and try again. But really you must learn to shoot the Quest in a consistent manner that works for you. The Quest is really a version of the Chinese B-18 and B-19 rifles - which were copies of the Gamo Hunter series of rifles - all are about the same - powerful & accurate - but all exhibit a fair about of recoil - and all require a decent technique to shoot repeatably. 

Probably the best advice I can give you is.......start at short range and work up. This will make it much easier. When I mount a new scope I still start out at about three yards for the first shots.......I don't move back until I can get on target repeatably. Choice of gun & scope don't matter - you have to start at close range. Springer are by far the hardest to scope though........but the spring pistols are even harder!  Very difficult to hold a spring pistol (like a P-1) REPEATABLY still in order to sight it in.  

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