Poll: Preference: MIL or MOA?

[VanceInWA]

Just for the sake of curiosity, which do you prefer in a rifle scope reticle, MIL (milliradian) or MOA (minute of angle)? I'll add a single-choice poll with this thread so people can see how it shakes out with the NWFA membership, the three choices being MIL, MOA, or Either One/No Preference.

For reference, a Minute in MOA is 1/60 of a degree. Since there are 360 degrees in a circle, there are 21,600 minutes (60 X 360 = 21,600). In practical terms, one minute of angle roughly equals one inch at 100 yards, or 10 inches at 1000 yards (more exactly, 1.047" and 10.47" respectively). MILs* are another unit of measurement for a circle, but based on the metric system. One radian is equal to 57.3 degrees of a circle. Do the math and you'll see that makes a full 360-degree circle equal to 6.2827 radians. As most of you are probably aware, as a prefix "milli-" means one-thousandth, so a milliradian is one-thousandth of radian, or 57.3 degrees divided by 1000, which is close to half of a degree for each milliradian (.0573 to be exact). Practically speaking, this means one MIL at 100 yards is roughly 3.6" inches, or more appropriately in metric terms, 10 centimeters at 100 meters.
*Sometimes you'll hear "MRAD" used instead of MIL, but the two terms are completely interchangeable. MRAD is just another way of shortening the word milliradian.

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[Andy54Hawken]

I like an old fashion post and cross hair....what is commonly called a "German reticle " or a " European reticle".
Andy

 

[VanceInWA]

I like an old fashion post and cross hair....like what is commonly called a "German reticle " or a " European reticle".
Andy

I like that, Andy. This poll is just about preference between MOA and MIL reticles, but there should be another poll (follow up?) that would allow selection from the full gamit such as, for example, MIL/MOA, BDC, German, Dot, Duplex, Crosshair, etc., and even just plain old iron sights.

 

[Member 53328]

Mil. Simply because that's what I used in the USMC and it's what I am familiar with. Both work though.

 

[solv3nt]

I like that, Andy. This poll is just about preference between MOA and MIL reticles, but there should be another poll (follow up?) that would allow selection from the full gamit such as, for example, MIL/MOA, BDC, German, Dot, Duplex, Crosshair, etc., and even just plain old iron sights.

Andy has a MIL scope with MOA turrets on his Hawken rifle.

 

[No_Regerts]

I know MIL is supposed to be intuitive, but I think in MOA. Besides, it's more 'Merca!

 

[dangerranger60]

I go with MOA only because that's what I grew up with. If I had learned MIL first I probably would stick with that. DR

 

[USMC-03]

Mil-dot ranging, MOA adjustments. I'm a mixture of military training and competitive rifleman - oddly works.

 

[Frank RW]

open sights. real men don't need scopes.

 

[Member 53328]

open sights. real men don't need scopes.

How far does a real man shoot? I qualified at 500 meters with iron sights in boot camp. Shooting further than that (and closer) I'll gladly sacrifice my manhood for a scope. Hahaha.

 

[USMC-03]

How far does a real man shoot? I qualified at 500 meters with iron sights in boot camp. Shooting further than that (and closer) I'll gladly sacrifice my manhood for a scope. Hahaha.

Qualified at 500 meters with iron sights and shot long range match out to 1,000 yards with irons. But, that's known distance on a bullseye target.

Unknown distances with targets that aren't intending to be shot at is entirely different and my no longer young eyes can use all the help I can provide.

 

[Xmark1]

open sights. real men don't need scopes.

Wait till you're a senior citizen. Glass mandatory!

 

[Xmark1]

I recently bought my 13th optic.
Got a smoking deal off Focus Camera on a Vortex Venom 5X25X56 FFP.
Ordered MOA, received MRAD.
Waited almost five weeks for an exchange to MOA. It was worth it.
MOA is very intuitive for me.
As far as reticule goes. A simple duplex works fine. Too busy the reticle I don't like. I dope my turrets for shots past my 100 yard zero. Many of my scopes have MOA reticules and I don't really mind them - it gives me the option to dope or use hold over via the reticule.
BDC reticules are against my religion.
I do prefer SFP.

 

[Andy54Hawken]

Andy has a MIL scope with MOA turrets on his Hawken rifle.

Made of brass and signed by Sam Colt....
( Yeah...that's the ticket....Best Tommy Flanagan voice )
Andy

Edit to add :
If forced to choose between to two listed reticles....I'd choose MIL , just cause that is what I used at times while in the Army.
Still prefer a post and cross hair on my rifles now.....or iron sights.

 

[daved20319]

I voted MOA. I think in inches, feet, and yards, so MOA works best for me. I have a couple of MOA scopes right now, a Bushnell Engage with 1 MOA reticle, and a Sightron S-TAC with a 2 MOA reticle with 1/4 MOA center dot. That Sightron is probably the best reticle I've ever tried for me, not too busy, and the center really helps. The Bushy is too busy for me, but not a bad scope otherwise. Both have the same "con", very fine glass etched reticles, which tend to disappear against a dark background. Oh, and SFP only, I tried a FFP scope and hated it, felt like a solution in search of a problem .

Recently got a very nice Burris MTAC as part of a trade deal, but it's MIL, which was giving me fits until I quit trying to treat it like it was MOA . Perfectly useable, but the math is just a lot easier with MOA for me. In my case, I had no prior training with either system, and up until recently, the extra dots or hashes were just aiming points, I never bothered to learn either system. Getting interested in long range shooting changed that, and like I said, the math is easier with MOA. Later.

Dave

 

[erslll]

I voted MOA because that is what the people I shoot with use. Math really doesn't have much to do with it. You adjust by what you observe. If I am spotting hits (whether for myself or someone else), I/they adjust by the observed measurement. If I miss by 3 MOA, I adjust by 3 MOA in the correct direction. If the person I am shooting with has a MIL scope, then I have to do some math. I don't like that.

If your argument is imperial is better than metric or metric is better than imperial......

 

[Mono1]

MOA, but yeah, totally respect the guys who use MIL.

 

[Pepe-lepew]

MOA is my preference. Most ranges use increments of 100 yards. Most targets use inches for dimensions. Rifle competitions I attend, everyone uses MOA. If I thought and used the metric system it may be a different preference.

 

[JuglansRegia]

The last scope l bought was mrad because it was $50 cheaper and in stock but l am familiar with the metric system so it shouldn't be a problem for my kind of shooting l am not worried about it

 

[VanceInWA]

What piqued my interest is that scout sniper school switched from MOA to MIL a few years back. I heard a retired trainer from that school talking about how difficult that change was for him, at first anyway, but once he got it figured out it was "so much easier."