I have a 20" Henry Frontier .22lr with a Simmons 3-9x mounted on the Weaver rail on top of the receiver, and it seems to suffer from wandering zero. Pretty much every time I take it out and shoot it, groups land in a different place. Most recent example is that I zeroed it in at 50 yards, put it in a rifle bag, took it out at an event four days later, and at 36 yards it was about 3-4 MOA high and right. The rifle itself is quite accurate and will shoot quarter-sized groups at 50 off a rest with CCI SV.
My suspicion is that the problem is in the mounting to the receiver. The dovetail isn't actually part of the reciever, it's part of a sheet metal cover that goes over the pot metal reciever frame and is attached with 4 screws on the sides. If you take it off to clean the gun, zero is completely lost, but I suspect it wanders and flexes even when screwed in place. This u-shaped cover "floats" on these four screws.
Anyone know if there are other ways to mount a scope on this platform that will retain zero better, or if I should just scrap the scope completely and put it on something more suitable for accuracy work? I've had a lot of frustrating misses on squirrels with this rifle and I think the wandering zero is the main reason.
My suspicion is that the problem is in the mounting to the receiver. The dovetail isn't actually part of the reciever, it's part of a sheet metal cover that goes over the pot metal reciever frame and is attached with 4 screws on the sides. If you take it off to clean the gun, zero is completely lost, but I suspect it wanders and flexes even when screwed in place. This u-shaped cover "floats" on these four screws.
Anyone know if there are other ways to mount a scope on this platform that will retain zero better, or if I should just scrap the scope completely and put it on something more suitable for accuracy work? I've had a lot of frustrating misses on squirrels with this rifle and I think the wandering zero is the main reason.