My father in law replaced the barrel on his Springfield rifle with a new military barrel. His scope is mounted very high so he can use the original safty. When he got it back from the smith he decided he wanted a new scope. So I got the job of installing and sighting it in. At the range today while bore sighting I found that the gun would shoot at least 3 feet high at 100 yds. Looks to be about 9 inches at 25 yds.So to findly get to my question the crosshairs are centered in the scope so I would like to shim the scope base. The front would have to be moved up I think. Does that sound right. If so About how much or is there a different way to solve this problem.

I have used a straight edge (W/scope & rings removed) on the bases & shim the low one up to match. I use hobby shop brass shim stock.
Good luck!!If more than .020 or .030 is needed I would go see my Gunsmith!!

For starters, remember that you always want to move the scope to where the barrel is shooting. So in this case you need to lower the rear of your scope and bring the front end up.

There are three ways to attempt to solve the problem. First, you can use shims, second you could try Burris Signature rings that use offset inserts, and finally, you can remove metal from the bottom of the bases, which is waht a professional Smith would probably do on a milling machine with the proper radius cutter.

You can try it by Taking the rear base off and remove a tiny bit of metal everywhere evenly with a small file and some polishing paper, making sure to keep the original contour of the base.

If you do a good job it will look a lot better than the unisightly gap from a shim.

Great deals on sporterized rifles often mean that the scope mounts are not pointed in the same direction as the bore.

So going to gunshows, I have brought home this problem a few times.

3 feet / 100 yards = 1% correction


If the scope mounts are 6 inches apart on the reciever and need a 1% correction:
1% of 6 inches = .060"

But we want the scope to be in the middle of it's adjustment range when we are done, so if the scope would not sight in, and it was screwed down all the way, then we may need .090" of correction under the front mount.


For two piece Weaver mounts, I use very narrow shims of tape layers or sheet metal layers to get the scope the right hieght. I mix some thick epoxy and put it between the mount and reciever with the screws loose. Then a scope and mounts is used to fixture the mounts in the same direction until the epoxy is hard. Then the screws are tightened.

For one piece mounts I would just put sheet metal layers under the front and tighten.