Defeated by Burris Rings

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mtnGhost

mtnGhost

Member
Dec 15, 2018
3,621
539
Defected from the PNW, United States
Sorry for this rant - but I have to get this off of my chest! As I said to a fellow air gunner, this endeavor has given me a mental hernia :(

I've logged close to 8 hours across three scope mounting sessions with the Burris XTR Signature rings. These are the rings that have the adjustable scope shins for adjust elevation MOA and optical offset alignment. My goal was to add 20-30MOA in additional elevation to my FX Crown.

The first time I had my scope mounted on these rings, I thought everything was nice and straight, but over the course of a few days the shims shifted a bit and there wasn't any quick fix for realignment. I took them off and noodled the prospect of starting back from square 1.

Fast forward to last weekend - I decided to give them another shot. Long story short, while trying to mount them - one of the threads stripped on the mounting bolts. I sent them back and got a replacement set sent out to me. I stayed up late Friday trying to get them mounted, and couldn't get the offset worked out, so I threw on the FX No Limit rings that I had ordered as a Plan B contingency.

I burned most of my afternoon today trying to get the offset worked out once more! I had probably 4 attempts where my boresight aligned perfectly with the reticle, and There was just no way to get the caps tightened down in such a way that the offset would be preserved. We're talking like 7 full MOA to the left (and 7 MOA to the right when I flipped the base mount around). The damned things just would not seat down flat without screwing up the orientation of the shims (and this destroying the reticle alignment).

I threw in the towel and put the FX rings back on my rifle. It took me less than 10 minutes from start to finish, and my scope reticle is perfectly aligned with my bore, and I have a ridiculous amount of MOA available with the rear seated up high. 

Anyone else had similar experiences with these?
 
what insert were you using .005-.010-.020's and have you watch this video



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcRAX5OLtJE



It would seem you would just put the negative .020 in the back bottom ring and the positive .020 on the top raising your scope up giving you your extra elevation

and the standard inserts in the front

but maybe I'm nuts
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I think you have that backwards. I believe you would want the +20 in the bottom and the -20 in the top for the back rings.

I've used multiple sets of these rings over the years and never had any issue with them. Possibly a bad set but I've never seen it.
 
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@bandg is correct. I could get the alignment worked out with 20 in the rear and 10's up front, but the rotation needed for the offset was so great that it would null out the MOA. 

With the first set, I was just using 2 in the rear and 5 up front. I had even gone as far as dropping in the zero shims front and rear and the offset was still there.

The face of the rings has to be the culprit. I tried 4-5 different spots on my rail for mounting (and also flipped them around like I mentioned earlier). I measured the bases on my rail with one of my digital calipers and feeler gauges. Both bases were mounted evenly. 

The sign for throwing in the towel was at the point where I nicked the rail and left a small gouge through the anodized finish with the sharp edges of my Mitutoyo calipers - as long as these FX rings stay put I'll use them. I don't need any MOA for my ATACR though, it has plenty of MILs for anything I could ever shoot with this rifle, and I have 3 different sets of 34mm NF rings for it already.
 
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I haven't tried FX rings but many people like them and if they solved your problem then you're good to go. I've got several sets of SportsMatch rings and they work great. The Burris rings have always been great for me as well but it sounds like you may have received a set that was mis-machined in some way. The weakness of the Burris system is that any use of the shims to correct lateral offset will subtract a percentage of the vertical correction available. I really like how the SportsMatch rings allow independent adjustment of lateral and vertical positioning and then lock.
 
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I have the FX no limit on my FX Impact, and the Burris XTR rings on my W.A.R Flex. The XTR rings are a pain to setup, align and tighten down properly, but once they are secured, they lock in tight and handle the recoil on my 357 cal Flex like a champ. I believe the rings are "paired" and can only be used pair-wise and shouldn't be split up. Each set of "paired" ring inserts have exact offsets and cannot be mixed and match. Also, the top and bottom paired ring halves have different thickness and offset and have to be placed accordingly. if you miss-match any of the ring halves position, it won't tighten down properly and it will not work.
 
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I've never specifically tried mixing sets of inserts but I don't think it would be an issue as long as the sizes matched. I haven't made any particular effort to keep them "paired". If you have a +10 on one half then you must have a -10 paired with it, etc. but I would think that any +10 should pair with any other -10. Could be wrong but seems they would all be the same dimensions per size. Agree that they work well. I've had some on large bore centerfire rifles and they stay where they are put.
 
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Yeah I'm aware. I never went as far as trying to go against the instructions, since that would make the situation even worse (e.g. putting a +20 with a -10 on the same ring). 

If these FX rings hold up, stay in place, and do no damage to my scope I'll keep them on. If they fail for whatever reason, I'll probably run some lower rings on a custom MOA riser (cut down for the mag well).

The turn off with the FX rings are the single bolts, I'd prefer to have two on both the mounts and the hinge adjustment side for redundancy. The top straps are also a little thin for my liking, but the only 30mm scope that I run is this March 3-24x52mm - which is light (23oz), but I'd be nervous with a 39-40oz scope on them lol
 
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Burris is the best of the best. Everything they say on their website is true.

They allow perfect alignment with your optic center. Just follow the instructions.
Click to expand...

I read them top down. The first time I had my scope on them, it only took around 2 hours to get aligned. I'm not going to blow another 6 hours trying a third time, ordered a set of Infinity rings from Eagle Vision, the Burris and FX rings sit lower than I'd like anyhow.

Burris is better than average, but I wouldn't place them in a pedestal.
 
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I believe Burris Signature rings to be excellent. Seems I've heard enough about air guns having alignment issues to think that it may be the gun/rail setup and not the rings themselves. Every set of Burris Signature rings I have has worked exactly as needed but only 1 set is on an air gun. I have 3 other sets on firearms and they are excellent. Maybe you need to try the Sportsmatch fully adjustable rings.
 
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I believe Burris Signature rings to be excellent. Seems I've heard enough about air guns having alignment issues to think that it may be the gun/rail setup and not the rings themselves. Every set of Burris Signature rings I have has worked exactly as needed but only 1 set is on an air gun. I have 3 other sets on firearms and they are excellent. Maybe you need to try the Sportsmatch fully adjustable rings.
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Here's why I'm not thrilled with the quality aspect - I had purchased the Burris rings from Midway. The first set had defective threads on one of the rail mounts and the threads came off just as the screw bottomed out.

Getting my scope aligned with the replacement set has been too challenging. I had to use -20/+20 up front and +20/-20 in the rear in order to have enough shim real estate for getting my scope aligned with some degree of elevation canting gains. The gap between shims have been pretty big, and I couldn't fully control where the shims settled as I snugged the caps down.

There's no alignment problems with my NightForce unimount, nor my NightForce rings (only tested one of two sets since I've had this Crown), and no issues with my March rings. Even the FX rings were fine up until this weekend, but that's a different subject beyond the scope of this thread.
 
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I have two scopes mounted with those. I read the instructions and watched a couple youtube vids. Had no trouble getting mine set up and I am no brainiack.

Did you read and understand the directions. Center distance between mounts affects the amount of MOA with any givedninsert combo
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I'm a veteran engineer, so undoubtedly, yes - I had both read and comprehended the instructions. Did you read my post?
 
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I got a surprise in the mail today. I thought these were stuck in US customs, but they just magically appeared this afternoon!

1565053774_10813017795d48d34e7a3692.55986103_201279FA-AD34-4BD4-A48A-97C774E8E516.jpeg


Quality appears to be excellent I'm going to have to make some time to install these this evening.
 
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