Thread: Another lesson under the belt - parallax binding up

Recently got another inch cut off my 260 with a new DPT magnum can fitted. Got it home and finally got around to taking it to the range to re zero etc. Noticed my parallax dial was quite stiff and didn’t seem to have the full range of motion that I remembered. Didn’t think much of it at the time but it sat on my mind.

A few days later I was sitting at home with it still on my mind and me cursing that it might be buggered. Pulled the rifle out and lined up some trees 800m behind the house and had a play, sure enough the parallax wouldn’t focus. I went and got my other rifle with the same scope (Swarovski Z5) and put them side by side. Sure enough my other one moved much more smoothly and had its full range of motion, focusing nicely upon on the trees. Bugger I thought, I’ll have to take it in for repair.. I undo the rings and pull it out and hello, it’s suddenly operating like normal again!?

I start messing around with fitting it back in the rings (Talleys) and as soon as I hit a certain point in torquing up the screws it starts binding the parallax dial. I try swapping the ring tops around but still does the same thing. By this point i’m a wee bit fustrated as it has been in these rings perfectly fine before the latest chop. Anyway, I head into my local (Manawatu H&F) filled with good buggers who give me a hand trying to tidy up the rings to remove any pressure points. Head off to the range to fit it again and do a zero but nope it’s still binding that parallax. I pack it away and check zero my other rifle.

On my way home I drop into the local and they throw me some Optilocks to see if the scope is fine and confirm if it’s definitely the rings. Once home again I try a few more tricks that might work like rotating the rings etc. No joy. I then pull out the Optilocks and for the millionth time re mount the scope - Bingo she torques up nicely and everything is functioning as it should.

Now I am happy because I have resolved the problem but fustrated that I need to fork out a decent sum for some damn Optilocks! I’ve used plenty of Talleys across a few different rifles without issues so this was new. The Optilocks are damn nice though. Always a new lesson to be learnt!

Mate to be brutally honest, the fact that the thin swaro tubes are so sensitive to ring types would be a massive redflag. Talleys are good rings as you've stated and worked with all your optics.

Optilocks are my preferred rings. They grip the scope well without garking the anodizing. You also have some options for correcting base misalignment.

Swarovski have good glass and nice and light but I've had z3 z5 and those big turret X5's and the whole lot broke down on me, lovely glass just quite delicate so ya gotta be mindful of that

Originally Posted by mawzer308

Mate to be brutally honest, the fact that the thin swaro tubes are so sensitive to ring types would be a massive redflag. Talleys are good rings as you've stated and worked with all your optics.

Just the trade off you make in order to have it light aye. The thing I find most annoying was that it was fine before I pulled it apart for the chop. It’s been on and off a few times with previous rifles too. Ahwell. A new set of Talleys would probably fix it aswell but I think i’ll just fork out for the optilocks. Definitely got me keeping a closer eye on my other Z5 that’s in Talleys on my SAUM.

Originally Posted by stagstalker

Just the trade off you make in order to have it light aye. The thing I find most annoying was that it was fine before I pulled it apart for the chop. It’s been on and off a few times with previous rifles too. Ahwell. A new set of Talleys would probably fix it aswell but I think i’ll just fork out for the optilocks. Definitely got me keeping a closer eye on my other Z5 that’s in Talleys on my SAUM.

Spot on with the trad off and they cant be beaten on clarity
Certainly is weird though that it all of a sudden gave you grief, glad it's sorted.

Do you have a picture or the offending set-up and know what the screws were torqued to? Did the gunsmith put the scope on after chopping by any chance - perhaps they overtorqued it?

Just don't fuck around with second tier optics, you know what to buy!

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Originally Posted by andyanimal31

Just don't fuck around with second tier optics, you know what to buy!

Sent from my SM-A226B using Tapatalk

The only brand I haven't had fail on me was Schmidt bender and nightforce and I've tried a heap of brands out now. The leupold I have now is holding up good, 4 years and still going strong getting punished

Maybe dropped at gunsmiths, and ring distorted a fraction , shows when torqued up?


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Ive had it happen. The Element Helix actually has a warning note with the scope not to over torque the rings because of this.

Only need 15 inch pounds on most ring cap screws

Had an early Redfield 35 years ago that worked fine,unless you put rings in certain spot on scope tube.if there where eye relief was good it turned into a 3x7instead of a 3x9.move it along in rings and was fine.

It doesn't take much misalignment to tweak a scope tube out either, that's one of the reasons I really dislike any scope mount setup that needs lapping. I've had one where it needed to be lapped, and subsequently due to an issue with the rifle and needing to strip it back to a bare receiver the ring bases needed to come off the receiver. Once it was reassembled back into it's stock and the bases retorqued the alignment was up the shit and an attempt to relap meant everything went sloppy and suddenly needed to start shimming... Nup, bin models.

Replaced with something decent name of which I can't recall at the moment, no more problem.

If weight isn't an issue and there's no issue with ejection port clearance, I used steel one-piece rails bedded to the receiver and sintered one piece rings. No issue with alignment at all that way - ever.

Rings were fully removed from the rifle before it went away for the chop and just stored at home before I then put them back on again.