One of the Scott Jedlinski-isms:
"If you're a good shooter, your zero doesn't really matter. If you're a bad shooter, you're zero really doesn't matter."
One of the Scott Jedlinski-isms:
"If you're a good shooter, your zero doesn't really matter. If you're a bad shooter, you're zero really doesn't matter."
I have to say, I am surprised at all of the 15 yard responses. Like Doc I have been running a slide mounted red dot since 2010 and have never seen 15 yards as a thing. I am not saying it is a wrong answer, just that it is new to me.
I initially tried a benched 25 yd zero for both a RMR and a 508t. After chasing my tail a little with both I ended up having a better result with a 15 yd zero and a couple of confirmation shots at 25. I’m just not good enough at 25 (mid-high 80s ona B8) to zero there. My ballistics app shows the 15 yd zero gives me a (acceptable) deviation of .3 in from 10-35 yds whereas the 25 had me off as much as 1.5 in up close. I’m 50% on an 8 in steel at 82 yds with this zero method, so I’m not changing.
If you really wanna get into the weeds, there's also a 13, 18, and 27 yard zero that people have wrote/vlog'd about.Originally Posted by MVS
It's going to be the same thing as rifle zeroing. Everybody has their own theory.
Personally, I subscribe to the motto of "Keep the thing the thing". I teach people so I'm primarily interested in whether or not their bullets are hitting the thing they are trying to hit at any given moment. On handguns when the answer is "No" it's exceedingly rare that the zero on their sights/optic is the reason.
15 probably has a lot of logic to it, but I find that it's about 10 yards where people's ability to shoot a pistol consistently really falls off a cliff. So it makes sense to have them shoot at a distance where they can shoot a useful group even if it is mathematically sub-optimal by some reasoning, because an optimal distance where they can't generate useful data isn't keeping the thing the thing. A zero that's outstanding for some other dude who isn't shooting your gun doesn't help you much. Luckily I don't have to deal with setting policy for an organization so I have the luxury of dealing with clients as individuals.
The temptation with RDS sights on pistols is to get deep in the weeds about the gizmo on top of the gun, but the thing on top of the gun doesn't shoot the gun. It's nothing more than an aiming reference to hopefully give us an accurate prediction of what the muzzle is pointed at. Ballistic trajectories and the like are cool and all, but it occupies the same size slice of the reality pie chart as someone who would celebrate a 500 million dollar lotto check by pounding their testicles flat with a wooden mallet.
Handgun distance can be whatever I say it is (200 yards a couple of weeks ago!), but realistically the typical use of them is at around a car's length. We need to be set up to make precise, rapid hits at that distance and then see what we can do with that setup at longer distances should those statistical outliers manifest.
So I'm a fan of simplicity and reliability. I find that when clients ask me questions they are usually searching for the same things, bounded by what they can do and what they have ready access to.
3/15/2016
Yes.
If I could like this more than once….
I don't have much to add that hasn't already been covered more eloquently by others, but I'm another vote in the 10/25 yard camp. I'll go put a few rounds on paper at 10 just to make sure I'm in the ballpark (and I'll make rough adjustments as needed), but then I spend most—probably too much—of my time at 25 with the gun bagged and benched. Typically, I can hold around a 2-3" group with the aid of a bag, whereas offhand, I'm generally a high-80s to low-90s guy on a B-8.
I tend to shoot three-round groups for rough adjustments at 10 and then five-round groups when fine-tuning, and if I have time, I'll shoot two groups after each adjustment (and before making another), just to ensure it's not me screwing something up. Once I get everything dialed in, I like to shoot a final 10-round group for confirmation. I usually practice with American Eagle 147gr and carry HST 147gr, so I've found that I can get away with doing most of my zeroing using AE and then switching over to HST for some minor final tweaking. There's a discernible POI shift between the two, but it's small enough that I can get to a final zero with just a couple clicks, which is more cost effective than ripping through a bunch of HST.
Today, I didn't have a bench available and I needed to zero a gun, so I shot offhand at 10 and 25... and it was definitely much faster. Reading some of the discussion here combined with today's experience tells me I'm probably spending more time chasing a perfect zero than I need to. For confirmation today, I shot out to 45ish yards and kept everything in the A-zone, so I'm trying to be satisfied with that.
I'd like to hear more about this. I agree that hunching over a bench adds a weird posture to the process, but I don't quite understand what isn't being lined up on the same plane. (I attended Scott's class in 2019 but may have forgotten some of the specifics he covered about zeroing.)
Where are they putting out content weekly or daily?
Are you loyal to the constitution or the “institution”?
Max Michel has a Patreon training program with 300 videos with new ones multiple times per week.
Stoeger and Kim have the Practical Training Group forum and format.
They all teach classes too.
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