I'm interested to hear your experience with the
Red dot? Pros and cons?
Bush hunting and target identification
Effective range?
Have you gone back to a scope
Types of rifles you run them on.
General experience.
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I'm interested to hear your experience with the
Red dot? Pros and cons?
Bush hunting and target identification
Effective range?
Have you gone back to a scope
Types of rifles you run them on.
General experience.
most common mistake is people rank up the brightness at dusk and dawn, your pupil contacts and the target is harder to see.
good on short range, fast moving targets but useless on shotguns unless you are shooting slugs.
Ran one on an ar, effective to 250 m on animal size targets without the doubler, can shoot both eyes open, ideal for snap shooting and moving targets. Have it on a 10/22 now and it does bunnies and possums just fine.
Bought an Aimpoint years ago when they were the best part of $1000, still got it but broken, best unit ever on a .375 Win lever gun for stags in heavy bush...shot a sika stag two hours after chopper landed with it...shot many since. You can hold dot on animal with your peripheral vision while searching straight ahead...had this happen once when younger stag approached me from the side while I was looking for another stag straight ahead, put the dot on him and kept looking ahead, as soon as he spotted me I decked him. Moving from clearing to bush, light to dark and back again one needs to continually keep rotating intensity of dot. On a pump shotgun shooting possums, nothing is as quick to drop them from a perch.
i had a leupold cqb on my ar, its a dot, crosshair, circle reticle. gave the best of all worlds. no longer have a use for it :(
or etched illuminated reticle so no power and you still have sights
Limited experience. I have one that I had on an AR found I didn't like it in the Bush. Was hunting goats and if animal was mostly obscured at a distance was hard to find an aim point for a clean shot. Always wanted to try it with a magnifier. Was not right often enough for me to keep using. Now have 2 x 7 scope and like that better. Would like to try it on a shotgun. Holosun brand
They suck if you have asitgmatism. The dot becomes a smear.
tried them and I want/need more magnification
very happy with VXRs
They're pretty useless on anything other than a semi.
You get parallax issues on the traditional style stocks you normally use on a hunting rifle.
Occluded Eye Gunsights (OEG) work well on any firearm but require both eyes open. They don't suffer parallax issues. https://www.armsonusa.com/armsonoeg.html
I have had the Eotech and Magnifier, Aimpoint micro, Bushnell TRS25, Burris fastfire iii and a few others.
For me personally they are great for ~ 150m and under stuff on anything (200m+ if you are confident), great on shotguns for up close if that is your thing and even a semi .22 for rabbit/vermin control. I only have the aimpoint now which is on my Kriss .22, it will probably end up on some pistol calibre lever gun when I get one.
To be honest though I think with semi's being gone it is hard to justify a red dot when you can get something like VX-R or VX5/6HD firedot in 1 to 6 power (or one of the various other brands) . The 5/6HD are particularly good as they offer a true one power and you end up something which is almost as fast as a red dot at 1x and also have up to 6 power on tap when you need it. Some of the other brands go up to 8x.
I think SOCOM are replacing their mainstream ACOG fixed 4x/RMR red dot "combos" on their M4's with NF 1-8 scopes now as they are so versatile...
Ive got a trs25 on a rossi puma 44. Not used it in anger yet but sighted in at 25yards, 2 inch high. My plan is to use it on goats in creeks and bush.
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Great out to 200 meters.
Holosun is my preferred brand.
Have used / used on pistols, bolt action rifles, semi centre fire and rimfire rifles and semi shot guns.
Fast and accurate.
Modern units, batteries last for 10s of thousands of hours and turn on automatically as soon as you move them.
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I’ve been using a Aimpoint for over a decade its got the best battery life and can handle hard abuse. Really good for stalking fast runners in the bush and in big thick dark native forest where a standard non illuminated reticle would be near impossible to use in dawn and dusk with rain or mountain mist. A 2MOA is good for anything under 150m-200m depending on calibre. Only used them on bolt action 223,308 and a 300 blackout. Depending on the type of hunting I’m doing for a trip and the weather I’ll swap the Aimpoint for a longer range scope with quick release mounts.
If you are left eye dominant me they are a doddle.
No batteries, but also no lenses to assist in the dark.
Used it on a 22. Pulled off a couple of silly shots with it
Got it on the rossi 357 la. Forgot what a pita theybare to sight in on a rifle lol.
Had it factory returned with a tritium insert 3 years back
Yep, tritium helps in the dark. Still no batteries, but they glow enough... for the first 6 or 7 years, at least!
I always found if you could see the target you could see the dot.
I did the most shooting with it on a shotgun for rabbits with a miners cap lamp clamped on the top of that as a poor man's big lazer. The dot got around sometimes very poor gun fit spotlighting and if the rabbit was in the the middle of the light you could squeeze off a shot and do pretty well.
Did some good shots duck shooting also BUT I still found it worked best of you shot fast as it was designed for. If you started to aim, it wasnt as good.
On a shotgun you shouldn't really need it but as posted it helped massively with poor gun fit
@Bobba they are discontinued but there are still a few for sale. I actually asked Leupold about two weeks ago about this and they said some new Leupold scopes are coming out that "may" replace them but they wouldn't elaborate.
I suspect there is a new line coming out possibly that replaces what the VX-R was.
Im using a vortex reddot on my 4570, looks like a teardrop on the piss with my astigmatism but does the trick on fast shooting in tight bush
I’ve two memorable experiences using red dot scopes.
One was a el cheapo Tasco that I got off a mate. Took ages to set up on my .22. Finally when sorted I went out for a spotlight. Lined up on the first rabbit.,,all I could see was the dot n no rabbit.
Second one was when I was a member of the pistol section of the Waitomo Small Arms Society a few years ago. On a Sunday we set up some plates to run a three gun shoot.
At the time I was using club guns and borrowing rifles/shotguns. I had bought along some pkts of 7.62X39 along.
One of the members was using a SKK with a red dot on it and 30 shot banana magazine. Asked if I could use it and use my own ammo This was pre Aromonana so perfectly legal.
Load up mag, rifle at ready(this was a timed match)( targets were 2 A3 sized plates of steel at 75 metres) get the command to commence fire..so I do.
Approximately 8 minutes 34.74 seconds and 56 rounds later I finish put my five rounds on target....( yes I had to stop and reload the magazine).
The owner of the SKK comes over as he couldn’t figure out why my hit/miss ratio was so shit..... “oh you didn’t turn it on.....”
Haven’t used one since....[emoji38][emoji38]
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I've used a sig red dot on my 303 for a couple of years. its been inconsistent. Ive found it great on rabbits out to about 70m, but struggled on goats at longer ranges.
I find them fun but the key part is not to over think it
@GSP HUNTER , At the moment I’m using a 300 blackout mostly using subsonics with a 60m zero for both Aimpoint red dot and the dial up scope for precision longer range shots.
When I had a 308 I’d taken deer out to 200m with the red dot.
I’ve only just up graded to the smaller Micro from a Comp M4. The quick release levers are the way to go and return to zero every time.
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...98f73210_h.jpg
I used this rifle and the Comp M4 for the this roar before the lockdown.
https://www.nzhuntingandshooting.co....wn-roar-59305/
I have an Aimpoint Micro H2 and used it on a .308 scout rifle where it performed brilliantly for the ranges that I was shooting at due to the scrub (max 100m) Now I've got it on a takedown 10/22 and that makes for a really compact setup.
I would suggest getting one that has a 2 MOA dot, rather then the 3 - 4 sized ones out there, with the brightness cranked up a 2 MOA dot can be pretty big.
I'd say i'm happy with my purchase, but the obvious limitations do annoy me.
@Bol Tackshin posted it on the forum before but here it is in the 357. Had the sight and rifle for over 25 years and only got them together last year.
Attachment 139588
https://vortexoptics.com/riflescopes..._reticle=18079
This is what I would like for my next rifle build best of both worlds a red dot x1 power for close stalking and x10 power top end in MIL FFP. The only thing I don't like is low battery life as I like to leave it on all the time in red dot mode and it hasn't got parallax adjustment.
It's hard to find a optic that covers everything.
Pros:
Fast, light, parralax free.
Cons:
Lack of precision, no magnification, can give trouble with even mild astigmatism. Light transmission is an issue on cheaper ones
I liked it on my ar and think they make sense in a wee bush cannon but personally I think a small fixed 2.5 or a 1-4 is more versatile. I run a 1.75 - 6 on my bush gun now and find that perfect. The mag really helps determine which piece of the deer you are looking at.
Would own one on a bail gun or whatever again for sure
I own two Aimpoint Micros a T1 and an H2. Have used them a lot. A lot! I also have a Bushnell TRS25 on a kids gun. Best sight for kids starting out. Currently have the H2 on a x39 and the T1 on a 10/22. Have shot a lot deer and pigs out to 150m with x39 with one on. 2MOA the only way to go. Have used them heaps pig hunting. Best bail sight ever. Rabbits out to 80m pretty straight forward with one too. Trick is to only have just enough illumination. I am like Tikka. I use a small scope with QD mounts on my x39 and swap with the micro. I couldnt get hold of the QD mount and actually found just screwing the standard Micro base side screw on and off returned it to zero every time and really consistently. Just do it up tight to sight in initially and do same when putting it back on. In short I love red dots but only good quality and compact ones. They are the best thing for snap shooting and adequate for standard shooting. Biggest issue is low light at distance or where background makes target fuzzy. You need to be very careful as you should anyway. No target ID as with scope. They are the best fun little sight you will ever play around with. I got a Vortex Strike eagle 1-8 to play around with. Strange reticle but works and can be illuminated or not. Red dot is quicker. Vortex is very heavy. Prefer red dot. Anyone want a Strike eagle?