QR Rings On A DG Rifle: Necessary or Hype?

Ok, at the risk of committing heresy is it really necessary to have QR rings on a DG rifle? I followed the herd and have a set of Alaska Arms for my 375H&H. In retrospect I don't think I'd do it again. In fact I might even replace them with a set of Tally fixed rings. If my scope fails I can simply take the scope of even if it has fixed rings. Granted, I'll need a hex wrench but that's pretty easy to find. About the only legitimate reason I hear is if you have to go after a wounded animal in close cover. In that circumstance is a low power scope (1-2X) really that big a detriment? I know I can shoot a low power scope with both eyes open. I guess given the right circumstances having the ability to quickly remove a scope could be a good thing but is it enough of a concern that QR rings are a must have item?

I'd love to hear some personal anecdotes about the pros/cons of QR rings especially if having a set made a significant difference in the outcome of a real life event.

Thanks in advance.

I hunted a leopard on my first trip to Africa. On the third evening (yes @johnnyblues - the third evening ) I shot my leopard with my favorite .338. The shot was taken a 9 pm, and as I came out of recoil, the cat was gone. My PH (Nick Nolte - who I think is the best leopard man in Africa) and I slipped out of the blind and side-stepped to the bait as the land cruiser pulled up. There was a bit of blood, and the cat had taken off down a dry stream bed that was perhaps six-feet wide, with banks three-feet high, and covered at forehead height with overhanging acacia. It was a pitch black tunnel in the middle of an equally dark night. Nick and I set up shoulder to shoulder with his chief tracker holding his arm out between our shoulders with a spotlight. My PH was carrying his trusty .470 K gun with open sights and bright front bead. I was carrying my .338 with telescopic sight in its fixed mount. As we began to creep down the ditch, I quickly realized I would be better off carrying the rifle as a club. Fortunately, 40 meters and thirty minutes later we rounded a bend and found him quite dead. I have never stepped onto the continent subsequently without my scopes mounted in quality detachable mounts.

I live about 20 min from the Talley Manufacturing facility and have had the pleasure to meet the current owner. He mounted the mounts for me on my 375 H and H. I have not had the need to remove the scope in a hunting situation, but I can tell you that I strongly recommend Red Leg's thoughts! As a side note, it also allows two rifles to fit in a double rifle pelican case with a little more wiggle room! I have removed the scope and replaced it on the bench between shots and it holds a zero!

Red Leg said:

I hunted a leopard on my first trip to Africa. On the third evening (yes @johnnyblues - the third evening ) I shot my leopard with my favorite .338. The shot was taken a 9 pm, and as I came out of recoil, the cat was gone. My PH (Nick Nolte - who I think is the best leopard man in Africa) and I slipped out of the blind and side-stepped to the bait as the land cruiser pulled up. There was a bit of blood, and the cat had taken off down a dry stream bed that was perhaps six-feet wide, with banks three-feet high, and covered at forehead height with overhanging acacia. It was a pitch black tunnel in the middle of an equally dark night. Nick and I set up shoulder to shoulder with his chief tracker holding his arm out between our shoulders with a spotlight. My PH was carrying his trusty .470 K gun with open sights and bright front bead. I was carrying my .338 with telescopic sight in its fixed mount. As we began to creep down the ditch, I quickly realized I would be better off carrying the rifle as a club. Fortunately, 40 meters and thirty minutes later we rounded a bend and found him quite dead. I have never stepped onto the continent subsequently without my scopes mounted in quality detachable mounts.

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Probably one of the best leopard write-ups on AH...wow!

Question: you have extensive experience with iron sights. What about the hunter who doesn't have that experience - wouldn't a scope dialed down to 1x (or 1.7x in some cases), maybe illuminated, be more appropriate for that hunter?

I like the idea of QD rings just for a backup plan. As you mentioned you could carry an Allen wrench but that doesn’t seem very handy. If you don’t like them I understand but I love mine.

Pheroze said:

Probably one of the best leopard write-ups on AH...wow!

Question: you have extensive experience with iron sights. What about the hunter who doesn't have that experience - wouldn't a scope dialed down to 1x (or 1.7x in some cases), maybe illuminated, be more appropriate for that hunter?

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It would not for me. The shot in that situation is close and almost instinctive - the same would be true of an inbound buffalo at spitting range. In that situation the scope would be a hindrance to that instinctive acquisition. But that is just me.

I too live very close to the Talley facility and feel their quick detach mounts are very good. I can remove the scope from my 375 without any change in POI.

They also sell a peep sight that fits their bases. I like mine.

I grew up using iron sights so it is much more instinctual for me. My father removed the sights from one gun to improve my point shooting ability. Close up you should be able to shoot as if a shotgun. A scope hinders this for me.

I believe it not hype at all, I think there is sound reasoning behind most anything learned through blood spilled on the ground or through the lessons learned as hindsight by professionals on the ground. I personally mount my DG rifle scopes in QD rings by either Alaska Arms, Talley or Warne. I have never found them lacking in anyway to a fixed mount.
I’m certain if you decide to go fixed, someone will be happy to snap up your AA rings rings here on AH.
Cheers,
Cody

My DG experience is limited to 1 buffalo...

But.. that said, I don’t believe that QDs are “hype” at all... my 375 and 416 both sport Warne QDs.. and that will not be changing..

Thankfully everything went well with my buff... but had it not, I would have been very uncomfortable closing in an uncertain situation and uncertain circumstances with anything slower than open sights or a red dot..

And I’m not willing to give away the flexibility and advantages offered by a low power variable optic

Personally I cannot see iron sights well enough to use them accurately. This said, I do often practice with iron sights mainly for point blank where, as mentioned, instinctive shotgun point and shoot.
I primarily use my Warne QRs to change from 1-6x DG scope to 2-12x PG scope. It also gives me a backup scope just in case a bad bump in the bakkie damages or misalign my primary scope. This has happened, not in Africa, but here in the US.

What ever you have faith in should work for you, but Mr Murphy and his law sometimes shows up in the worst places.

At real close range I don’t even see the sights, just the barrel. A scope definitely hinders that. You would be amazed how many deer are killed in Illinois every year with vent rib shotguns and rifled slugs

A set of Talley SCREW detachable rings are no more likely to grab and snag things than any other ring set that I have seen. The screw detachable rings require a torx wrench but, so would the fixed rings if you wanted shed the scope for any of the reasons mentioned.

Another legitimate reason I believe for them is the ability to remove the scope when packing, either in a foam case where space is limited, or you can remove the scope and pack it separately in another case or even in a carry on.

I have QD’s on all rifles that I take to Africa. I have had two situations where I removed the scope for follow up work. I also view the irons as legitimate backup for the scope should it go bad. I practice with both iron sights and scope before each trip.

Pheroze said:

Question: you have extensive experience with iron sights. What about the hunter who doesn't have that experience - wouldn't a scope dialed down to 1x (or 1.7x in some cases), maybe illuminated, be more appropriate for that hunter?

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Based on experience in the military and practical shooting fields, at very short range even at 1x (no magnification) a scope is slower, even with both eyes open, than a set of iron sights, and iron sights themselves are slower than just looking down the barrel. Reflex or holographic sights are faster than scopes or tube-type red dots, because their field of view is "almost" unencumbered, but your brain still needs to guide the front sight or red dot on the target, which is slower, until you have a whole lot of practice doing it, than your muscle memory pointing and shooting. If you want to verify for yourself what I just wrote, take a Remington 870 with a shotgun barrel and a slug barrel with rifle sights on it, and go trap or skeet shooting, alternating both barrels. This is a very enlightening experience...

This reminds me of the user manual for the .32 Seecamp that has been for decades the gold standard, loaded with Winchester .32 Silvertip, of LEO (law enforcement officers) last-defense backup-gun. These tiny pistols have no sight. None. Zero. Not even a groove. Their first generation user's manual had a sentence along the lines: if you need to ask about sights, this is not the gun you need. Their current user's manual states: "The Seecamp is designed strictly for self-defense ... Crimes usually happen under bad lighting conditions at short range ... If you can't hit the target pointing and shooting, be sure to have a good lawyer lined up to explain why your life was threatened at a distance where you needed sights."


.32 Seecamp and its wallet holster, the ultimate LEO backup gun, and civilian deep-conceal carry gun. Strictly a short range defensive affair. No sights needed. As the leather shows, this has been my back-pocket daily companion for many, many years, from three piece suits to beach shorts. The user's manual states: "The Seecamp is designed strictly for self-defense ... Crimes usually happen under bad lighting conditions at short range ... If you can't hit the target pointing and shooting, be sure to have a good lawyer lined up to explain why your life was threatened at a distance where you needed sights."

Regardless of which sights are considered, a hunter has no business following up wounded DG, especially cats at bayonet range, unless hundreds (more like thousands actually!) of shots were fired under pressure at close range in practice. Otherwise, said hunter is but an additional liability to the PH. Shooting in a couple of friendly local USPSA (United States Practical Shooting Association) rifle or shotgun events will likely open your eyes as to how much NOT ready you are to follow up a wounded buff or cat. I had done a fair amount of "kill house" live fire training in the military in my younger years but I was amazed and humbled to see how much proficiency I had lost over the years...

Here are some easy and also very enlightening exercises to do alone or with a couple of safari buddies:

Try it, it is great fun and great practice

Chances are that regardless of whatever optical sight you have on the barrel, you are faster without it - hence the need for quick detachable mounts - unless you truly burn thousands of rounds with a reflex or holographic sight, in which case, you will be marginally faster but mostly more accurate with it. This is why SOCOM (Special Operations Command) purchases EOTech holographic sights and trainloads of practice ammo...

Then, of course, the conversation can shift onto whose job it is to stop charging animals, how often charges happen etc. etc.

Steel at 5 yards? What about splashback?

I would suggest "Pigeons on a Stick".
Clay targets on your wooden target sticks, held up by rubber bands.

We did this for a close range FAL stage, then giggled as most placed their rounds low.

shootist~ said:

Steel at 5 yards? What about splashback?

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I hang the steel plates from chains, so they swing when hit and direct the bullets fragments downward into the ground. I have had no issue with splashback, but maybe I have just been lucky (?)
The .257, .300 and .340 Wby drill the steel but anyway these are not stopper calibers, so I do not use them in these practices, and the .375 H&H, ..416 Rigby and .470 NE do not drill but swing the plates almost horizontal on impact. I have assumed (?) that it is safe. I may be wrong... Any specific experience on that shootist~?
Also, I do a lot of volume practice with .22 lr. It is just as good to practice proper shooting form, proper sights acquisition, and proper trigger control, and it is virtually free. As long as I shoot a couple full power rounds at the end of the sessions after a couple hundreds .22 it seems to work quite well for me.
I got tired of replacing the clay pigeons, milk jugs, etc. or even resetting the hinged steel, so I like hanging the steel...

I have a Rem 700 375 H&H with the QRW mounts. Only took them of once when we followed my wounded buff in dimming light, one last quick shot and he was down. I do not think it mattered having the scope off. He was almost dead on his feet and 50 yds away, could have hit with scope, Leopold 2x7. Leopard was followed with scope on as we could see him laying 50 ft past his kill. My question is? Why not have the detachable option? I can think of no negative reason to not have them on a DG weapon. Would be a real pain having a scope go, making weapon useless, at least with irons you can still hunt. I do suggest using the irons and practicing before the hunt.

MB

One Day... said:

I hang the steel plates from chains, so they swing when hit and direct the bullets fragments downward into the ground. I have had no issue with splashback, but maybe I have just been lucky (?)
The .257, .300 and .340 Wby drill the steel but anyway these are not stopper calibers, so I do not use them in these practices, and the .375 H&H, ..416 Rigby and .470 NE do not drill but swing the plates almost horizontal on impact. I have assumed (?) that it is safe. I may be wrong... Any specific experience on that shootist~?
Also, I do a lot of volume practice with .22 lr. It is just as good to practice proper shooting form, proper sights acquisition, and proper trigger control, and it is virtually free. As long as I shoot a couple full power rounds at the end of the sessions after a couple hundreds .22 it seems to work quite well for me.
I got tired of replacing the clay pigeons, milk jugs, etc. or even resetting the hinged steel, so I like hanging the steel...

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USPSA/IPSC rules mandate 10 yards minimum on steel, but that's for pistol. In Texas Tactical, a similar gun game we did pistol as close as 7 yards, but tried to use good steel with no dimples.

I've personally never used centerfire rifle on steel targets closer than 20 yds. I would suspect suspending steel from chains could mitigate splashback to some degree. Possibly a lot, I just don't know.

For static or semi static targets, the splashback radiates out at about 20 degrees, based on what I was taught. This puts someone standing off to the side of the shooter at somewhat more risk.