Scope mounting

wow sweet looking rifle i have the same model in 30 cal dark charcoal 8 months old ,,,and waiting on the same one you got there but in 25 cal,,,, i ordered 4 months ago,,,, i like the red.... my boy picked it out ....never thought to try and be that low.... i have FX no limits on my 30 cal do you have any problem fitting the mag ?or a side shot ,,? what rings are you using thanks for the pics HYNZIE

"rivers"What is it with so many air gunners mounting their scopes so high up from the rifle barrel? Yes, I'm coming from the firearm side and my own RAW .30 (see pic) has a Vortex scope with all of about 1/8th-inch clearance to the barrel, as close to sharing the same alignment as possible. But physics and optics don't change from one platform to another. How is mounting a scope on an air rifle with a gap you can put your hand in going to deliver the accuracy over a range of distances, like 30 - 100 yards?

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The prevalence of high scopes is likely an artifact of airgun Field Target.

Most FT rules don't allow laser range finders to be used but they do allow unlimited scope magnification. Big objectives scopes with high magnification are used as parallax/focus range finders. The ability to range find well using that method falls off quickly with distance, but it can work well out to 50-55 yard when using a big enough scope. Those big scopes need higher mounts. There is also another consideration - a high percentage of field targets (especially at world matches) are in the 30-55 yard range, with 55 yards being the maximum. The "loopy" 12 fpe limit in many FT divisions makes ranging critical at those distances. Shooters often try to optimize their setups to be more tolerant of ranging errors in that 30-55 yard range. A high scope can push the point blank range out past 30 yards, even at 12fpe, improving the ranging error tolerance.

High scopes can help in FT but at the expense of your closer zero. If you are only shooting in the 30-100yard range (no close shots), a high scope won't hurt you. If a lot of your shooting is in the 10-25 yard range, a scope mounted as low as possible is better, and then use a range finder for the far targets. Especially if you are shooting out to 100 yards, as focus range finding is not really effective in the 60-100yd range.

That's a nice riffle. Your right the bubble level system for installing the scope is paramount. The anti-cant device is worth its weight in golod as far as I am concerned. Some times people install those tall adjustable mounts for extreme long distance. There are some adjustable mounts to raise the rear and lower the front, but that is for some serious distance. Ted has a few vids on youtube 

"High scopes can help in FT but at the expense of your closer zero"
Yep, especially for the hunter class where max allowed scope power setting is 16x (used to be 12x), plus "holdover aiming".

I'm currently using a scope with 50mm objective which makes it necessary to mount the scope higher than a while back when 40mm objectives were the norm for me. While the pellet trajectory for a scope with higher mounting does cause the "trajectory flat spot" to shift further down the lane, it also means that the pellet is rising more per yard from muzzle to line of sight at the closer targets.

Personally I would prefer having the "trajectory flat spot" at closer distances, but my scopes with larger objectives force the "trajectory flat spot" into the distances where a hft scope doesn't rangefind very accurately, but it is what it is. My HW95 with 5-15x50 Hawke Panorama..........
 

Anywhoo.......different shooters prefer different "trajectory flat spot distances" and I personally like the "flat spot" at the closer distances where the scope rangefing is rather accurate instead of "way out there" where the scope rangefind at 16x max isn't very accurate.

LOL.....for me using holdover aiming at 15x on most of the current "not so springer friendly lane set ups", some of the longer shots are simply "lottery shots". Even if the trajectory of my HW95 with higher mounted scope has is skewed the "flat spot" a bit down the lane, shots of 40 yards or more are still "lottery shots" for me!