At one time, many years ago, I dabbled in small bore rifle shooting along with my favorite sport of high power rifle. I wasn’t a particularly good small bore shooter, but I did manage to win the National Guard’s Chief of the Guard Bureau annual State matches four out of five times I competed. The high light of my small bore rifle shooting carrier was winning the Nevada State Championship in 1983. Seems like an eternity ago, but I still have the trophy if anyone would like to see it. My rifle was a bull barreled Winchester Model 52C and I topped it off with a 12 power Unertl 2 Inch Programmer. It was a test of stamina to hold and shoot that bull barreled rifle with it’s big Unertl! But, shoot it would and the Unertl was absolutely the best choice of optics at the time.
The Unertl Optical Company (Las Vegas, NV) is well known in shooting circles as a manufacturer of quality target rifle scopes of the old style. You know, those long tubes with the external adjustments that look delicate…. they aren’t! Unertl has always made products that I like to call “bullet proof” for their quality and durability. Unertl made the scopes for the United States Marines. That’s a good indication that something must be right about them. The USMC first used the 8X Unertl on the M1903 Sniper Rifle and later a great 10X Unertl was the choice for the M40A1 and later models. They are even used on the 50 BMG Barrett and that takes a tuff scope!
Unertl is now expanding into new product lines as well as having plans to produce many of the older model scopes. They are even manufacturing a very nice .45ACP 1911 style automatic pistol. I do shoot pistols on occasion, but I’m really a died in the wool rifle shooter. My favorite rifle is the M14. I’m always on the lookout for new products, parts, and accessories for this rifle. Unertl has filled the bill by providing me with two prototype scope mounts made specifically for the M1A/M14.
The basic design is that of the proven Brookfield Precision Tool M25 mount with several improved features. The most notable is a large cut away area above the rifles bolt which is designed to prevent ejected brass from bouncing off the mount and back into the breach, jamming the action. This will eliminate a very common problem that many have when shooting scope mounted M1A/M14 rifles.
The rail is the MIL-STD-1913 Picatinny design which will take any good tactical or Weaver style rings. It is a three point mount with a cam devise on the receiver screw, a rear dove tail, and front top bearing dog screw. The nice thing about this set up is it won’t shoot loose! This attachment system also allows the mount to be tweaked into proper alignment on the receiver, if necessary.
The two mounts have different lengths and rail arrangements. These are so new that no name or model designation has been given them. I’ll just call them the short mount and long mount for now. The short mount is your basic optical scope set up. It’s rail is about six inches long with four forward and four rear slots to position the rings. The rear portion extends back about 3/4 inch over the rear sight cover and gives a good amount of longitudinal adjustment. It should work well with scopes up to about 10 power. The mounts allow fairly low scope mounting and can be used with low rings on scopes up to 50 MM. They also allow the use of iron sights with the scope removed from the mount.
The long mount has a seven inch rail with two slots on the rear portion and eight in the front. It extends two inches forward of the receiver and will work well with EOTech and other red dot optics that require forward mounting. It is also designed to accommodate the larger higher powered scopes many use.
For testing I used a Weaver T16 target scope. It’s 16 inch length pretty well demanded that I use the long Unertl mount for this installation (it fit the short mount as well after repositioning the rings). The choice of rings was decided by the intended use of the mount and scope. In this case, tactical rings were the only way to go. I ordered a set of Tactical Precision Systems, Inc. (Woodburn, OR) rings from Brownell’s. I wanted to use the steel rings offered by TPS, but we mistakenly ordered the aluminum rings instead. That was a surprise when I opened the package, but it saved a few dollars. As it turned out, the aluminum tactical rings worked out quite well.
Installing the mount was easy enough even without instructions. The mounts didn’t come with any being pre-production prototypes. I slid the dovetail piece into the clip guide dovetail and installed the screw loosely. Next came the cam and receiver screw. I snugged the screw and lightly tapped the cam lever with a plastic mallet to insure the cam was fully engaged and then tightened the receiver screw and dovetail screw. Next came the dog screw that bears on the top of the receiver barrel ring. All that’s required here is to turn it until it lightly bears on the receiver, then tightening the set screw to keep it in place. This makes an extremely stable three point mount.
The rings were next and I mounted the base portions to the mount, leaving one notch open on each end of the Picatinny rail. These are 30 MM rings and my Weaver T16 only has a one inch tube. Brownell’s just happens to offer a nice set of durlin adaptors which filled the gap just right. After checking the alignment, the scope dropped right in and I installed the caps. It turned out that the medium rings were more than high enough for this scope. I could have used low rings, but they were not offered from Brownell’s. A check with the TPS company confirmed that low rings are available in both aluminum and steel.
It was Tuesday when I finally got to the range in White City, OR for the test. The wind was quartering from the right rear at about 10 to 12 MPH. It was a bit cloudy which brought rain about an hour after I finished testing.
I started at 50 yards to make sure I was on target. It took four shots to zero the scope. I must be getting a little rusty…. After that, the target was moved to 100 yards and the first shot was a little high and left. A careful inspection of the scope showed it was mounted a little left of the barrel center line. Checking later, I found it was .024” off center. Not bad, but enough to throw the shot off about 1 ½” at 100 yards. After a couple of adjustments, I had it shooting right on.
The next step was to remove the scope from the mount and reinstall it to verify that it would return to zero. That’s when something really strange happened….
My first shot was low about four inches. To confirm it, I shot another without adjustment and, like magic, that shot was right on. Now I’m confused. I shot a few more shots and then went though the same exercise again, removing the scope and remounting…. with the same results. Don’t ask me, I don’t have any idea why that first shot is going low. Overall, I’d say these mounts are going to be great. They are equal in quality to Smith and Sadlak, and have the advantage of a large clearance cut out that eliminates brass impact on the mount. No brass hit the scope either. I am giving these mounts a thumbs up!
After I returned to the shop, I installed the mounts on a different LRB Arms rifle and found the center line offset is common to both Smith and LRB receivers. I notified Unertl and I’m sure they will be correcting this and making other changes that I have suggested. One problem area included the valley for iron sight use. I found it needs to be deepened. It took about eight clicks of elevation to get the full view through the iron sights. Unertl indicated that once the corrections are made and all dimensions are finalized, it will only take a month or so to get them into production. The price will be competitive with other similar mounts.
(An update on Unertl Scope Mounts. To date, June 2007, Unertle mounts for the M14 rifle have seen very limited production. Deliveries are very slow and I have several on back order. They are running two months plus behind at this time. The cost of both models is $275 plus S&H. So far, only the long mount has been produced. Please be patient if you deside to purchase one of these excellent mounts.)
Another word about TPS rings. This company makes a lot of different products and they manufacture OEM products for other companies. Their prices are reasonable and quality is high. Check them out….
Note: As of may 2007 Unertl has only produced a few of the long mounts and no short mounts. They are slow getting into production and may take some time to get.
