Ballistic Randomness

Where is the center of the group on the right? Somewhere between target center and about and inch high and right I suppose. The rifle is actually perfectly sighted on the center, but you would have to fire more shots to be sure.

When you zero your rifle you shoot a group and guess where the center of the group is. If you are off by an inch at 100 yards, you are off by more than 3" at 300 yards. So if you want to hit with your first shot at 300 yards, you are going to have to fire 7 or 8 cold shots for your zero. So bring a good book :).

Simple Windage

Earlier we added nail polish marks for scope elevation, is there is simple way to deal with wind?. Yes.
Paint the wind deflection for a 10mph wind at 200 yards on your windage turret cover. As the distance doubles wind deflection quadruples. Let's say you paint "6" on your wind turret as your 200 yard windage. At 400 yards the windage is 4 times that, 24" (Multiply by 4 at 400). At 100 yards the windage is a quarter of that, 1.5".

100 yards	200 Yards	400 Yards
X/4	X	X*4
1.5"	6"	24"

It works in meters too. If you check out a ballistics table, you will see that it is very close.

Cat Box O'Truth

Ballistics for Hunting

Hunting with a rife has quietly changed in the past couple of years. You can get a laser rangefinder for a hundred dollars, and a smartphone for "free".
There was a time when, out of ignorance, people would come up with rules of thumb for zeroing. Wind was ignored.
Nowadays you can measure range exactly, look up the ballistics table on a smartphone or luggage tag, and make the correct adjustment to your elevation turret.
If you are still guesstimating, why?