Blown away by Bushnell customer support

G

grox6

CGN Regular
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I'm signed up for a long range precision rifle competition and to be honest I'm in over my head. I've never shot past 200yards and this event will be out to 600meters. While I had hoped to have a few weekends to start tuning my equipment and trying to get my "head in the game", I had more pressing things to deal with and left everything to the last minute. I expect to come in last place but I'm approaching this competition as a learning experience and a chance to have some fun throwing lead at 600m.

Anyway, I'll be using the best rifle and scope I have but I now realize my scope isn't as well suited to this event as I'd like: I'll be using a Bushnell Elite 6500 4.5-30 with their "DOA 600" reticle. As I started reading through the details on my scope, I realized that the hold over marks are calibrated for yards. At the 600yard reticle line, I'll be short by 56yards when aiming at 600meters and given how fast that bullet will be dropping by then the target could easily be outside the sight picture. I won't have much range time to waste on figuring out the clicks to dial into the scope to compensate for that kind of drop. Shane over at Reliable recommended I call Bushnell's USA support number and ask them to give me the clicks needed to adjust for meters vs yards at the various reticle hold over lines. It didn't occur to me that this would be something the manufacturer would give me, especially on short notice. (I realize that anyone with enough experience and/or knowledge could probably work out the clicks on their own, I'm new to long range shooting and getting help is always nice.)

So, I called up Bushnell and was blown away with their support. I called them a couple of hours ago and one of their guys took my info and started putting together a chart for me tuned for my 24" barrel, my chosen ammo(FGGM 168gr .308), and he even emailed me back asking for the coordinate of the range so that he could include the predicted weather conditions for tomorrow and Saturday! Just a couple of minutes ago I received the chart he put together.

I still don't expect to do very well in this competition, but at least my dust clouds should be a lot closer to the paper than they would have been without this info from Bushnell:)

Thanks Bushnell!
 
Wow, you must of gotten connected to a fellow gun nut on the other end of the phone to do all that for you.

Good luck shootin'.
 
Don't be so frett'in.
Take a bunch oh deep breaths and go enjoy yerself.
Gain from each s'periance and bring it to the next.
Pretty qwick yew'll git tired oh pawlish'n them shinies.
 
W/R said:
Wow, you must of gotten connected to a fellow gun nut on the other end of the phone to do all that for you.

Good luck shootin'.
Click to expand...

Yup, the fellow definitely came across as really knowing his stuff and he was very pleasant/helpful about it. I didn't have to explain myself more than once; he was already ahead of me with what I was looking for.
 
kamlooky said:
Don't be so frett'in.
Take a bunch oh deep breaths and go enjoy yerself.
Gain from each s'periance and bring it to the next.
Pretty qwick yew'll git tired oh pawlish'n them shinies.
Click to expand...

Well, that's the kind of approach I'm hoping to maintain:) I'm going to be missing half of the stages as I can't make the last day, so I'm just going to try to soak up as much as I can so that next year it'll be a smoother ride...
 
Great luck and is how all of us would like to be treated. I bought a couple dozen decoys from Final Approach, a Bushnell co. They turned out to be less than satisfactory. Bushnell was very slow to send replacement parts and rather unconcerned with the problems. I now avoid FA products, but glad to hear they support there scopes.
 
Instead of looking for close dust clouds ...
How about Tight Groups !
No drinking coffee and stay off the #### sites tonight and bet while you might not place in the Top 10,
You will certainly not place last ;)
Again Tight Groups and have fun.
Rob
 
I bought a Bushnell 3x9 at a gun show and it turned out to not work worth beans. Sent it to Bushnell and told them I was willing to pay to have it fixed even as i knew it didn't have a warranty on it anymore. They sent back a scope and a bill COD for $35 bucks I have no idea if it is even the same scope but it's like brand new what ever it is.
 
I have had great luck with Bushnell warranties. Even when a lens was broken by an ejecting piece of brass, they replaced it for free.

You will find shooting back to 600 to be fun. the wind is the issue, not the elevation.

BTW, 600m is "mid-range", not "long range". LR starts at 800 m.

Here is how you shoot known distances. The "come up" for each distance is well known. I will give it to you, and explain how to use it. Put a piece of masking tape on your rifle, and write this table on it. Leave room for corrections to record what you actually needed.

100 - Zero
200 - 2
300 - 4.5
400 - 4
500 - 4.5
600 - 5.5

The numbers are minutes. Lets assume your rifle is zeroed for 100, and the shoot starts at 300. You have to come up a 2 minutes for 200 and 4.5 minutes for 300. That is 6.5 minutes, or 26 clicks if it is a quarter minute sight. You will get at least two sighting shots. They will show you where you hit, and they will be on paper.

I would shoot them both with the same sight setting, note the average elevation change I have to make, based on those two shots. (I would make a wind adjustment, after the two sighters, too.) If there is some wind, it would not be unusual to have to make a one minute wind change, too. Let's say your sighters were a bit low, and you had to come up 2 more minutes (6 inches). So the correct come up was 8.5 minutes, not 6.5. Write that new number on the masking tape.

I would suggest that a newbie shoot the rest of the 300 meter shoot by aiming off slightly , as dictated by where the shots are hitting.

When you move back to 400, come up another 4 minutes (16 clicks) as dictated by the table. If they move from 300 to 500, that is a 8.5 minute change, so come up 34 clicks. Because the rifle already had the correct 300m elevation on it, the come up will get you real close at 400 or 500. Fire the two sighters, and make an adjustment, and note the correct come up on the tape.

At the end of the day, your masking tape should show the actual come ups for your rifle/ammo/scope. record these numbers and take the tape off. If you leave it on it will bake on.

Report back on how it went.
 
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I have one of their scopes with a built in range finder and I lost the special rail adapter for mounting it. They sent me a new one for free after I called them. Very happy with the two customer support experiences I've had with them. But, the numbers for tuning my scope didn't help me too much in today's competition. My skills and experience just weren't up to the task of getting a good score. I didn't come in dead last for the day, but I was definitely in the basement.

Raton57 said:
I bought a Bushnell 3x9 at a gun show and it turned out to not work worth beans. Sent it to Bushnell and told them I was willing to pay to have it fixed even as i knew it didn't have a warranty on it anymore. They sent back a scope and a bill COD for $35 bucks I have no idea if it is even the same scope but it's like brand new what ever it is.
Click to expand...
 
I really, really, really wish I had read your post before yesterday's walk back/tune up day. I was very well zero'd at 100m. I had a 1/2 inch group nicely centered on the bullseye at that distance. Kept it at ~1/2 MOA at 200m but by 300m I opened up to 1MOA with a flyer. Then, everything started to fall apart after 300m and with the wind kicking up and my lack of experience I started to fall apart. Then, with the competition today, adding in moving targets and shoot/no-shoot stages, I had a hell of a lot of fun but landed not too far from the bottom of the scoring.

Anyway, I know what I need to focus on to improve. And, I'm not going to blame the tools: While other equipment may have made things a bit easier, my gear was more than up to the task and the only thing missing was experience and skill;-) Fortunately, that will come with time...

Anyway, I'm looking forward to doing more of this stuff as it really was a lot of fun. And, given how poorly I performed today it shouldn't be hard to get some big improvements the next time around...

Ganderite said:
I have had great luck with Bushnell warranties. Even when a lens was broken by an ejecting piece of brass, they replaced it for free.

You will find shooting back to 600 to be fun. the wind is the issue, not the elevation.

BTW, 600m is "mid-range", not "long range". LR starts at 800 m.

Here is how you shoot known distances. The "come up" for each distance is well known. I will give it to you, and explain how to use it. Put a piece of masking tape on your rifle, and write this table on it. Leave room for corrections to record what you actually needed.

100 - Zero
200 - 2
300 - 4.5
400 - 4
500 - 4.5
600 - 5.5

The numbers are minutes. Lets assume your rifle is zeroed for 100, and the shoot starts at 300. You have to come up a 2 minutes for 200 and 4.5 minutes for 300. That is 6.5 minutes, or 26 clicks if it is a quarter minute sight. You will get at least two sighting shots. They will show you where you hit, and they will be on paper.

I would shoot them both with the same sight setting, note the average elevation change I have to make, based on those two shots. (I would make a wind adjustment, after the two sighters, too.) If there is some wind, it would not be unusual to have to make a one minute wind change, too. Let's say your sighters were a bit low, and you had to come up 2 more minutes (6 inches). So the correct come up was 8.5 minutes, not 6.5. Write that new number on the masking tape.

I would suggest that a newbie shoot the rest of the 300 meter shoot by aiming off slightly , as dictated by where the shots are hitting.

When you move back to 400, come up another 4 minutes (16 clicks) as dictated by the table. If they move from 300 to 500, that is a 8.5 minute change, so come up 34 clicks. Because the rifle already had the correct 300m elevation on it, the come up will get you real close at 400 or 500. Fire the two sighters, and make an adjustment, and note the correct come up on the tape.

At the end of the day, your masking tape should show the actual come ups for your rifle/ammo/scope. record these numbers and take the tape off. If you leave it on it will bake on.

Report back on how it went.
Click to expand...
 
grox6 said:
I really, really, really wish I had read your post before yesterday's walk back/tune up day. I was very well zero'd at 100m. I had a 1/2 inch group nicely centered on the bullseye at that distance. Kept it at ~1/2 MOA at 200m but by 300m I opened up to 1MOA with a flyer. Then, everything started to fall apart after 300m and with the wind kicking up and my lack of experience I started to fall apart. Then, with the competition today, adding in moving targets and shoot/no-shoot stages, I had a hell of a lot of fun but landed not too far from the bottom of the scoring.

Anyway, I know what I need to focus on to improve. And, I'm not going to blame the tools: While other equipment may have made things a bit easier, my gear was more than up to the task and the only thing missing was experience and skill;-) Fortunately, that will come with time...

Anyway, I'm looking forward to doing more of this stuff as it really was a lot of fun. And, given how poorly I performed today it shouldn't be hard to get some big improvements the next time around...
Click to expand...

Challenging yourself in a big way usually brings the biggest gains, and shows more courage then those who have enough skill to easily win. I expect you'll be impressing yourself in the next competition.
 
I returned a scope to Bushnell over a year ago through my dealer for warranty work, when I tried to follow up 2 months go they were very nice on the phone but had to speak with the store I bought it at (and returned it through). After speaking with the store who provided a tracking number the store owner was told that there was nothing they could do. Thankfully the owner of the store (Triggers and Bows) is going to provide me a new scope at their expense. It won't be a Bushnell
 
It sounds like you got the right guy on the phone to help you like that, sometimes being shown the right direction is all you need to get competitive. Keep practicing, I'm sure youll figure it out soon.
 
Raton57 said:
I bought a Bushnell 3x9 at a gun show and it turned out to not work worth beans. Sent it to Bushnell and told them I was willing to pay to have it fixed even as i knew it didn't have a warranty on it anymore. They sent back a scope and a bill COD for $35 bucks I have no idea if it is even the same scope but it's like brand new what ever it is.
Click to expand...
That was good service I have (2) so good to know..
 
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