Ever since Burris offshored their Signature Zee ring manufacture to Red China (that was really a disappointment), I'd been looking for a good, and reasonably affordable, riflescope ring that's made in USA, or at least not an adversary, which Red China definitely is. My search took me to EGW's Web site a year ago, and I found these "Keystone" series rings, which are made in USA (hello, Dolly!). Called EGW and discussed the intent, which is long-ish range shooting, up to 1,000 yards, with a Leupold Mark 4, 4.5x14x50 riflescope. The guy at EGW customer service recommended their Heavy Duty Tactical series to wring out the last bit of precision. But he also indicated that the Keystones certainly would work if I'm not doing competition-level shooting.

So, I gave the 1" Keystone rings a try with a Redfield Revolution TAC-MOA 3-9x40, just to try them out. That was followed by a 30mm set for the Leupold Mark 4 4.5x14x50. Both riflescopes were mounted on a Winchester 70 (post-64 action) chambered in .30-06, with a 24" barrel and an EGW 20 MOA, Picatinny scope base. In either the 1" or 30mm versions, the cost is $69.99 for the pair. If you also buy a scope base with them, both get a 10% discount.

For the money, I think these Keystone rings are hard to beat. In both cases, they hold every bit as well as the Burris Signature Zee rings. They're very solidly built. They stay put when you torque them down to spec. THEY'RE MADE IN USA...ENTIRELY. EGW's Tech Support is located here in the USA as well. The one thing that you don't get vs. the Signature Zee's is the ability to use elevation shims if you want to shoot somewhat farther distances, as I do. Some loadings of, say, .308 Winchester do help from using both when you're reaching out there (e. g. Federal Gold Match out of a 22" barrel).

Fortunately, that's not really necessary in my case, as my Superformance .30-06 load (178-grain) is fast enough (nearly 2900 ft/sec) to be fine with a 20 MOA scope base alone. The same is true with .308 Win, BTW, if you're getting, say, 2700 ft/sec out of the muzzle with a 168gr bullet; it'll reach out there as well with just the elevated base. I would assume that the 6.5mm Creedmoor, given the rather impressive longer-distance ballistics numbers I've been seeing on the Intertubes, also would be just fine at such distances with this setup.

I've got to give it to EGW on this one. They made a solid, affordable, quality scope ring here.