Laser Bore Sighter

[HollowPoint]

I recently replaced the scope on one of my rifles and in effort to avoid having to waste alot of ammo sending sighter rounds down range, I bought one of those cheap laser bore sighters off of the flea-bay auction sight.

It's the kind that comes with various expandable rubber arbors so as to allow the bore sighter to fit any bore from .22-.50 caliber.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Red-Laser-Bo...QAAMXQVT9SxNd0

The concept behind the design is a sound one and the laser itself works quite well but the poor tolerance/fit of the rubber arbors makes adjusting the actual laser light to dead center virtually impossible. On my specimen the correct rubber arbor slid down the bore well enough but the laser did not align with the center of the bore of my rifle. The sparse instruction stated that this laser was adjusted at that factory and cautioned against any further adjustments. Kind of humorous if your not the guy who just shelled out the money to buy one.

With the laser bore sighter in place and held approximately 36" from a wall or vertical surface that will reflect that laser light, I could carefully spin that laser light and clearly see that it traced a 2 1/2" circle on the wall. That was at 36" away from the wall. Now imagine trying to center my crosshairs on that laser dot at 25 yards. I'd need a backstop the size of a large bill board just to be able to find that laser dot. That 2 1/2" traced circle I got at 36" would be multiplied enough times so that the laser light wouldn't even find its way onto an average sized bullseye target; even at ten yards.

On a positive note: I'm a chronic tinkerer so I was able to fabricate some tighter tolerance brass arbors and re-adjust the laser light to dead center out to fifty yards. Hopefully that will keep me form wasting alot of bullets just to get my shots on paper when I'm trying to zero my scope.

HollowPoint

[tazman]

Some one makes a laser that is the same as the cartridge in the rifle and sends the beam down the bore. That would seem to be a better, more foolproof idea. I haven't tried one since I can buy a box or so of ammunition for what one of those costs.
I pull the bolt out and look through the barrel, aligning it with a bullseye at 50 yards with the rifle rested on bags. I then adjust the crosshairs to that bullseye and fire a test shot. Normally, I am within a very few inches at 50yards and on target at 100yds within 5 shots or less. Those sight in targets with the printed 1 inch grids are great for that.
A rifle that doesn't have a bolt you can remove presents a different problem. With those I start at 25 yards on posterboard and go from there. This usually only requires a couple more shots.

[dragon813gt]

I have one like the OP describes and have had great results w/ it. I don't use it to site in the rifle. I use it to get on paper. I use it in my basement which is about 30 yards long. Doesn't take many shots to get it set perfectly. It's saved me a lot of wasted ammo and time.

[HollowPoint]

Although it's working fine now; after fiddling with it, I must have just gotten a bad specimen cause I read alot of positive reviews before buying it. Just for the record; I too was just using this bore sighter to "Get On Paper." It's just that, due to it's out-of-alignment laser beam, initially I couldn't even get on paper.

I too have used the method of sighting down the bore but even that method still left me shooting more sighter rounds than I like. I thought about buying one of those cartridge specific laser bore sighters but the ones I was looking at had to be shipped in from the Philippines or Malasia. I didn't want to wait and I didn't want to pay the extra cost of buying the same item from a US based retailer. I'm just cheap that way.

I have some home made cartridge specific laser bore sighters of this type for my .223 caliber, 7.5x55 caliber and for my Enfield cartridges. If it came down to it I could make another for my 6.5x55 chambering. I just thought that this particular style of interchangeable laser bore sighter might save me some time and money.

HollowPoint

[ole 5 hole group]

Read the negative reviews first. I never purchased one but our indoor range had a couple - mainly used by semi-autos such as the "black rifles". They could usually get you on paper at 25 yards providing your target was large enough. Most didn't last very long before crapping out due to some internal problems.

Your LGS will usually bore sight a rifle for you with almost the same results. My grandson just got a 223 bolt action with a 4X12 Nikon that was bore sighted at the LGS - ran the target down to 50 yards and no bullet strike - I sat down and took out the bolt and bore sighted - low, really low, so I just bore sighted and the next shot was about 3" off at 50 yards.

[Scorpion8]

On a positive note: I'm a chronic tinkerer so I was able to fabricate some tighter tolerance brass arbors and re-adjust the laser light to dead center out to fifty yards. Hopefully that will keep me form wasting alot of bullets just to get my shots on paper when I'm trying to zero my scope.

I can't access the exact model from your link (blocked at work) but since they only give you 5 or so different caliber adapters, you have to adjust the screw-in to spread the arbor fingers out to your specific caliber. It should need a slight push to get it into the barrel. If it slides in too easily, then it will wobble inside the barrel. Likewise I use mine just to get "on paper", especially for lever guns where it isn't so easy to remove the bolt and boresight in the tradional look-down-the-barrel method.

[HollowPoint]

I can't access the exact model from your link (blocked at work) but since they only give you 5 or so different caliber adapters, you have to adjust the screw-in to spread the arbor fingers out to your specific caliber. It should need a slight push to get it into the barrel. If it slides in too easily, then it will wobble inside the barrel. Likewise I use mine just to get "on paper", especially for lever guns where it isn't so easy to remove the bolt and boresight in the tradional look-down-the-barrel method.

I know what you mean. Your description is similar to the sparse instructions that come with the unit. I did it according to those instructions but I found that when I screwed the securing screw in to spread the arbor's fingers, it would not spread evenly all the way around. It tended to spread more to one side than the other, causing the tail end of the Bore-Sighter to be out of alignment with the axis of the bore. I,m sure that's why I got that 2 1/2" traced circle on the wall at just 36" away.

No matter now. The problem is fixed. My reason for posting was to let the curious minded know of the potential problems that they might face if they happen to get a bad one like I did. I doubt that all of them come as out of kilter as mine did. I still think the concept is a sound one; it's just that the tolerances are woefully lacking with those rubber arbors; at least on my specimen.

HollowPoint