I've posted about the reticle from the Arisaka Type 99 that I've adapted for the SFOD mod before. Yesterday, I found out about the Arisaka Type 97, the 99's predecessor.
A Forgotten Weapons video, or maybe one from
9-Hole Reviews, or something.
Got me looking for images of the reticle. I found a few, and
one especially good one, and you guys might know by now that I'm a sucker for a BDC.
I had to try it out.
So I got a .jpg of the reticle into Irfanview, counted pixels, plugged those values into a google docs spreadsheet, converting the pixel counts to milliradians, then converting those mrads into pixel counts for a .tga.
The first draft of the reticle was for 3x magnification, 'cause the scope on the Type 97 is 2.5x, and, okay, 3x mag. in Novalogic games makes things 355% larger, but 2x makes things 230% larger, and NL magnification functions exclusively with whole numbers. I made my choice.
It turned out pretty good, but I couldn't enjoy the smallness of the 3x reticle, so I made a 6x version:
Now we're talking.
I usually do such experiments on the Dragunov, but the M40 is a bolt-action with a five round magazine, and that seemed a better fit. Part of the experiment is a new ammo.def entry for 6.5x50mm with a 139gr round at a 730m velocity. Then grueling trial and error with drag values 'til all the drops lined up. The reticle is centered on the 300m hash, I locked the elevation to 300m, and with the prone/sighted error at 0.013, producing 1.5 moa groups, this rifle is headshot precise out to 500m, and easy torso hits out to 1000m.
Now 0.445 drag may seem a bit much, but understand: I adapted the reticle from a through-scope photo with math, I found the velocity on Wikipedia, and that amount of drag at that velocity under laboratory conditions (0 error, 0 recoil) puts the fired round, the 20x20cm target, and the bullet drop pixel on the reticle targa in
exciting alignment every 100m out to 1000m. Usually, a new BDC targa I've made requires some level of elevation hash tweaking, but not this time.
It's got me in a good mood. Happy Valentine's.
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Note also that, much like the
TA648 reticle, the vertical on the Type 97 reticle is canted right a few degrees to compensate for the left-of-bore scope mount, if what that one guy on the internet said was correct, and honestly, when has it ever happened that that one guy on the internet was less than
completely factual?
OscarMike247 has told me about the 'camera-off-bore' mechanic in JO, and it's used on the tanks for sure, maybe other emplacements, and it could be possible to work it into this situation for an authentic TA648 and Type 97 canted vertical experience, but those are experiments for another day.
'Cause I suspect the line of sight and the boresight remain parallel in this mechanic, but offset, and what this trick might possibly actually require to successfully simulate scope offset or spin drift is locking LOS and boresight at a specific zero distance and
twisting one a few MOA to the one side or the other.
I'm intrigued, yet hesitant, 'cause the possibilities are infinite, yet a lifetime is not only limited, it's infamously short, and if nothing else, this
entire thread is testament to my underdeveloped time management skills.
* sigh *
I shall Keep Calm and Draw Reticles.
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I just finished a few missions with the M40A1 in its Arisaka 97 cosplay. The reticle is unintuitive, the bullet is a bit slow and a bit light, and it's only a bit fun.
A five round magazine goes, like... if the reticle doesn't confuse you, the first hit is not always a kill beyond 300m, then there's a little panic when the target turns on you, so the second shot might go wild, but if the second hit doesn't kill — and a second hit does seem too often to appear survivable beyond 500m — then [DEITY OF YOUR PREFERENCE] save you if you forgot to reload before engaging, or the target has backup, 'cause things are gonna get exciting.
But, y'know, something about using a suboptimal sniper rifle makes that 700m headshot so much more satisfying.
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Mostly 'cause I can:
