My AR came with a red dot, works great...but it did NOT come with any co-witnessing flip-up BUIS and I want to add them for obvious reasons. Front pic rail is the top of the gas block, so metal front sight is a must. Would love the KAC micros, but I can't spend $500 on BUIS. Leaning toward Midwest Industries (local to me is a plus)...but some I respect say the Magpul Pro should be in the mix. Troy makes good ones for that AK round front post guard look. Also heard the Bobro Lowrider should be in the mix. Anyone have comments? I'd prefer to keep it under $300...all the "reviews" online seem to be paid advertisements.
BUIS comments requested
- Thread starter Jfal
- Start date
Any of the ones that you selected really should be just fine. I have first-hand experience with the Magpul Pro and MI, and have enough friends with the Troy. None have ever been problematic in terms of class/training use. Most folks just go with whatever fits the form-factor or spacial requirement that they're looking for.
Given the Bobro name, I would imagine that they're not going to be complete shite, either.
In all honesty, if you're able to try a pair of second-hand take-offs of the polymer Magpuls , I'd say that they're worth a shot. My reason? Unless you really prefer to shoot with irons for some reason or another (e.g. that it helps reduce the effects of astigmatism) or really foresee the possibility of needing them (i.e. this is your "apocalypse gun"), what I've been advising friends is to really get out to the range and see just how far you can get before you need to really deploy your BUIS. This itself is based on the fact that Joe Weyer and his cadre at Alliance Police Training facility have actually never seen students take the time/effort to deploy their BUIS when their RDS has gone down (they also cite that the chances of this happening is itself a rarity, that in the hundreds of unique students they see roll through their facility on a yearly basis, this occurrence can be counted on both hands, with fingers-to-spare), and almost all being able to meet typical CQB-distance standards.
If you're running a modern, rugged visible laser, on a good rail, this itself can count as a viable backup sighting system.
Given the Bobro name, I would imagine that they're not going to be complete shite, either.
In all honesty, if you're able to try a pair of second-hand take-offs of the polymer Magpuls , I'd say that they're worth a shot. My reason? Unless you really prefer to shoot with irons for some reason or another (e.g. that it helps reduce the effects of astigmatism) or really foresee the possibility of needing them (i.e. this is your "apocalypse gun"), what I've been advising friends is to really get out to the range and see just how far you can get before you need to really deploy your BUIS. This itself is based on the fact that Joe Weyer and his cadre at Alliance Police Training facility have actually never seen students take the time/effort to deploy their BUIS when their RDS has gone down (they also cite that the chances of this happening is itself a rarity, that in the hundreds of unique students they see roll through their facility on a yearly basis, this occurrence can be counted on both hands, with fingers-to-spare), and almost all being able to meet typical CQB-distance standards.
If you're running a modern, rugged visible laser, on a good rail, this itself can count as a viable backup sighting system.
TEXASforLIFE
Ronin
1st what height is your red dot at? Are you JUST 1/3co-wit or full? I prefer DiamondHead due to the shape even though I have do have Troy, various Magpul and some other stands. All range from poly to metal. Some I've change the front post out with a duel adjustable cross -hair reticle for a 2nd range. I chose more times over the DiamondHead for easier windage adjustments by visually knowing/seeing where the post is in relation to the diamond shape staying constant.
HayesGreener
Hellcat
I have these on my SIG 516. I do not use them much but they are solid and precise.
Here are some options for mounting to consider. My question would be, what do you want to accomplish with your BUIS, backup, CQB, or both?
My rifle is set up with an ACOG 4x on the top Picatinny rail with quick disconnect, the rear BUIS popup sight is mounted behind the ACOG and the front sight is in front of the ACOG. I would need to remove the ACOG in the event of a failure of the ACOG and that is unlikely, so the BUIS are just there for peace of mind. I have a small red dot mounted at a 45 degree angle next to the ACOG for CQB (I say 25 yards or less). This is how some Special Warfare units set up their M4's so they have three sighting OPTIONS. The 45 degree sight is easy to use-just rotate the rifle to bring the sight in line.
If you are not mounting a secondary optic, one option is to mount your BUIS at the 45 degree angle from your optic in the event of optic failure and to provide a CQB capability. Once you have them zeroed fold them down and forget until you need them. An advantage if side mounted BUIS is that you can zero and practice with them without removing your optic.
Another option is to learn to use your front BUIS in conjunction with the optic, but that assumes you still have an optic, which is the concept of the BUIS in the first place. I have also seen sights mounted atop an optic, but in my opinion complicates any kind of zero. However you choose, redundancy in sighting options on a defensive rifle are good.
Sig Sauer Iron Sight Set, Flip Up, M1913 Rail - SITE-SET-1913-FLIP
Sig Sauer Iron Sight Set, Flip Up, M1913 Rail - SITE-SET-1913-FLIP
www.amazon.com
Here are some options for mounting to consider. My question would be, what do you want to accomplish with your BUIS, backup, CQB, or both?
My rifle is set up with an ACOG 4x on the top Picatinny rail with quick disconnect, the rear BUIS popup sight is mounted behind the ACOG and the front sight is in front of the ACOG. I would need to remove the ACOG in the event of a failure of the ACOG and that is unlikely, so the BUIS are just there for peace of mind. I have a small red dot mounted at a 45 degree angle next to the ACOG for CQB (I say 25 yards or less). This is how some Special Warfare units set up their M4's so they have three sighting OPTIONS. The 45 degree sight is easy to use-just rotate the rifle to bring the sight in line.
If you are not mounting a secondary optic, one option is to mount your BUIS at the 45 degree angle from your optic in the event of optic failure and to provide a CQB capability. Once you have them zeroed fold them down and forget until you need them. An advantage if side mounted BUIS is that you can zero and practice with them without removing your optic.
Another option is to learn to use your front BUIS in conjunction with the optic, but that assumes you still have an optic, which is the concept of the BUIS in the first place. I have also seen sights mounted atop an optic, but in my opinion complicates any kind of zero. However you choose, redundancy in sighting options on a defensive rifle are good.
Blackfeather
Custom
I have used Troy BUIS for years, they are rock solid.
HansGruber
Ronin
I’ve got Troy, Magpul, MaTech on various rifles….they all work.
But, I also tried using my optic (Aimpoint Comp M4) as a big ghost ring, with the dot turned off…and I found I can get solid body hits out to 200yards with it (given, this also used a fixed front sight on my 6920).
So…while I’m not going to take them off, I also don’t think they’re nearly as important as I used to.
But, I also tried using my optic (Aimpoint Comp M4) as a big ghost ring, with the dot turned off…and I found I can get solid body hits out to 200yards with it (given, this also used a fixed front sight on my 6920).
So…while I’m not going to take them off, I also don’t think they’re nearly as important as I used to.
I want to co-witness, and astigmatism allows me to use the red dot out to between 50 and 100 yards, then the starburst covers the entire target, thus I would use the BUIS beyond 50 yards...probably have them up any time shooting. Read from you guys about certain dot optics that are better for astigmatics, but I'm not going to spend $500-1000 on a new optic any more than I want to spend $500 on BUIS. The rifle is a range plinker only...although I keep of enough ammo for end-of-times scenarios...I figure spending the $$ on the ammo is better than nothing. Appreciate the comments.
I am toying with the offset BUIS concept. Thought co-witness was the way to go, but offset is making more sense as I think it through (and maintain the field of view with an unobstructed dot)...
I think TSI mentioned the plastic Magpuls, but my front pic rail is the gas block and gets SMOKING, plastic-melting hot...200-300 rounds over a session.
I am toying with the offset BUIS concept. Thought co-witness was the way to go, but offset is making more sense as I think it through (and maintain the field of view with an unobstructed dot)...
I think TSI mentioned the plastic Magpuls, but my front pic rail is the gas block and gets SMOKING, plastic-melting hot...200-300 rounds over a session.
TEXASforLIFE
Ronin
I think the offset is just a fad like over grip for the right handed shooters. It's called"Tacticool"! If it works for you then who am I to say anything!
Anytime I hear the word "tactical" I immediately throw up a little. Never tried offset. My dot does not fold down (I have it Loctite-secured otherwise it shakes loose after 1 or 2 mags, even after cranking as tight as I can crank), astigmatism limits a dot for me, as does my inability to spend $1k on an optic for a plinker.
Tex, my dot is mounted full height on a riser. It's as cheap a dot as they come...Crimson Trace (came on the rifle). Smith calls it a CTS103, but Crimson Trace calls it a CTS-25. $80. 4.0 MOA (blech), but my eyes don't let me use a dot beyond 50 yards anyway, hence my desire for BUIS. Again, this a recreational platform for plinking. Any serious firearm usage around the home is covered by sidearms...
I was hoping someone would try to convince me that $500 for KAC micros is worth it over $150-200 for most other options.
Bassbob
Emissary
Something seriously not right about that brother. You shouldn't have to loc-tite it ( I know, everyone says blue Loc-tite, but I had more than one engineer tell me that if you torque it properly and it doesn't stay put without Loc-tite, the screws are garbage). Furthermore, with no Loc-tite and just tightening it down " By feel" I broke 3 T-10 bits trying to remove a Romeo 5 off a rail a few weeks ago. I had to drill it out. I admit, a few of my Romeos are currently Blue Loc-tited down to the rails of some ARs and a shotgun. I am afraid to try to remove them frankly.
Anyway, I recommend not using Loc-tite on red dots. Get better screws and a torque driver.
Mag-dump!!!
OK, no, seriously.
<snip>
With the offset BUIS, guys like Chuck Pressburg of Presscheck Consulting has found that a not-insignificant portion of his students using such setups are unable to shoot to marksmanship standards cold-and-on-demand, due to the offset of the irons. If you are looking at going this route, spend some time getting familiar with how your offset affects external ballistics, particularly from compromised positions.
In terms of astigmatism....this is gonna be a long one, so pull some coffee and settle-in (or just read it in bed, as I'm likely to put you to sleep
).In addition to being full Coke-bottle nerd at -5.50 in both eyes, I have astigmatism in both eyes, too, -1.25 / -1.00 CYL, OD (R)/ OS (L - dominant eye, but my dominance can be overcome by "forcing" the right eye through an optic or aperture), both at -180-deg. axis.
A few years ago, while attending the first AR class that allowed me to actually go beyond the 100 yard line, as we started pushing yardage, the dot in my Aimpoint T1 (4 MOA, which doesn't help, but I'll get to the reason why I chose the larger dot to start with, later), I start seeing a growing "comma" that quickly began to grown to "starburst" as my eyes were and more more strained. At the 165 yard line, we moved to engage a 6-inch A-zone (from a progression of a full-torso to a 12-inch gong), I could no longer find the proper hold due to the growing smear I saw of what should have been a clearer dot, and I quickly started to fail to connect with the steel, losing it after just the first two shots (which both connected). And what's more, even as I had verbalized to the instructor that this problem was occurring, it actually worsened as we transitioned back to the larger targets, which I surprisingly also was no longer connecting with as we rolled back through them after my misses on the 6-incher.
The reason for the diminishing performance?
As my then-boss and professional mentor (we're talking about a full-fledged, tenured, Professor of Ophthalmology, Medicine, and Pharmacology, as well as a Veteran's Administration Career Scientist - and an outdoorsman to-boot) assessed, it was just a matter of my eyes having "gotten tired" - what I'd been able to hold and compensate for gradually eroded as the day wore on and as I asked more and more of my eyes for longer and longer periods.
My solution - after hashing it out with my instructor for the class (Andrew Blubaugh of Apex Shooting and Tactics, who, when he was active in the Marines served in FAST, and later taught at Rifles Only after discharge) - was to go the route of a LPVO. I later vetted this for myself in several close-quarters and low-light training classes, and it's now the route that I've been going. But at the same time, I also explored a bit as to what I can do to make RDS work for me, both with the understanding that the same T1 is still resident on my home-defense AR - for some very good reasons - as well as with future-proofing in-mind, in that I will likely have to transition to pistol-mounted RDS sometime within the next decade, too.
For me, for virtually any scenario I can possibly envision in terms of home-defense, the vision/optics limitations I experienced in class will most likely never come into play. The likelihood that I'll need to take the gun to the 50 yard line (for which I am perfectly proficient with the pistol) is nearly nil, to speak nothing of the 100, given that I live in what is a rather densely populated "near-inner-circle" commuter suburb. The bomb-proof nature of the the T1, its amazing battery life, and its low weight (it sits on a similarly flyweight Larue QD mount) really makes it an ideal partner for my defensive AR as it also allows my teenage daughter to wield the weapon. And even without corrective eyewear to compensate for my awful nearsightedness, that 4 MOA orb remains super easy to pick up (as I'd hinted above, this is primarily the reason why I decided to go with it instead of the 2MOA).
I simply understand and deal with my physical/vision limitations as just that, a true limitation on what I can - and should - do.
And towards this -
Proper technique helps a lot.
With modern RDS techniques, the reason why we us it is because it makes us fast to get on-target. To a certain extent, that reticle/dot does not even need to appear centered in the aperture of the sight for us to get a hit, and that gives a tremendous advantage to its user. However, in order to achieve this speed with the certainty of hitting, we must physically look at the TARGET (instead of the reticle). This (correct) technique is target-focus, and in-practice this also will help those of us with astigmatism to resolve a better "dot" - as we are visually "blowing through" that projected reticle, with both eyes open, seeing the TARGET clearly, with the "dot" projected over it.
This works both with long-gun and the handgun-mounted RDS.
It really wasn't until I started shooting RDS handguns that I started to realize just how much properly target-focusing can help overcome the blurriness and aberrations that my astigmatism caused, and this really translated over to my use of RDS on long-guns as well.
Towards the latter, upon my questioning in class (c.2017, APD Basic Carbine), John "Chappy" Chapman - one of the "BCM Gunfighters" and a true SME in the lights/lasers/optics sector of the industry (his expertise has been sought by the lines of Steiner and B.E. Meyers) flat-out said that a good shooter, even with significant astigmatism, should be able to successfully engage center-mass targets out to the 300 yard line with typical 1 to 4 MOA red-dot sights, without the need for magnification. This bit of encouragement by him really got me back into working with my RDS guns.
^ And that's without "cheating" - i.e. dropping your eyes behind the BUIS, whose rear aperture will, through optical principle, help even those of us with significant astigmatism to resole a much sharper "dot."
So, towards that last....
You noted, @Jfal , that you'll likely just keep the BUIS deployed while shooting.
If this is the case, then why not just use a set of fixed BUIS?
I understand that you don't like visual clutter, but, particularly with the use of a lower-1/3 cowitness setup, even with a fixed BUIS setup, the irons really won't intrude that much:
^ With proper use of "target focus," allowing your eyes to "blow through" the optic (and hence also the irons) - which might require a bit of extra practice/acclimation on your end
- you may truly not find the irons all that intrusive: and this "always there" setup will also allow you to instantly sharpen the resolution of that projected "dot," by dropping your eyes through the irons. Both my HD and my hobby ARs are set up as fixed, lower 1/3:
^ DDM4V5LW, c.2012 - my home-defense AR. DD fixed front and rear.
^ My hobby gun, an Aero complete Midlength AC-15 which I bought to tear-down and put back together for a local armorer class. That's a C-More Tactical from back in the day, which is a flat-top mount reflex sight with an incorporated A3 rear drum. The gun is a middy, with a FSB (shrouded by the Magpul SL handguard).
The DD was the AR that I started really taking classes with, and by the middle of the first day of the second 2-day class I attended with that gun, when we were shooting from within the 100, I honestly wasn't even seeing the outlines of the irons any more.
You know that trick where you keep both eyes open and stare off at an object that's all the way at the other end of the house, and then you stick your thumb up into your line-of-sight and it looks like you're looking "through" your thumb?
It's just like that.
I really don't know if this long post helped any (besides sending you off into a good night's sleep
), but I'm hoping that by relaying my difficulties and experiences, it'll help you in some small way. Thanks Bassbob, but everyone I know who shoots with optics Loctite's the screws (always blue, never green or red), including guys with a LOT of trigger time (my CCW class instructor, several cops working at gun shops I chat with, friends). I've read and seen everywhere that optics shake loose on pic rails. Hunters with scopes and plinkers like me alike...one might argue that torquing a screw/bolt enough to break it means somethings not right. I learned of this after my groups at 50 yards went from about an inch to about a foot during a magazine or two. I used to sell Loctite professionally...it won't damage anything and is very easy to apply and clean up.
Great content TSI, you are just prolonging my decision! No outdoor range I go to allows faster rate of fire than 1 shot/second...so mag dumps take a while!
Great content TSI, you are just prolonging my decision! No outdoor range I go to allows faster rate of fire than 1 shot/second...so mag dumps take a while!
Bassbob
Emissary
Just my opinion bro, formed by conversations with some Boeing engineers and gunsmiths. I can tell you that I recently acquired a Beretta 1301 and I removed and re-installed the 4” pic rail that holds my optic. I torqued it and used no Loc-tite. Then I proceeding to run about 500 heavy slugs through it. Rechecked torque. Hasn’t moved. I also have a Romeo on a KSG25 with no Loc-tite and probably 1500 rounds through it. Again, no movement.
It’s not really my intention to change anyone’s mind understand. Really I just think your specific issue has more to do with using a cheap optic than it does Loc-tite.
HayesGreener
Hellcat
The hardness of metal and thread design also plays a role. Manufacturer recommended torque values are impprtant
My writing-spree made me brain-dead last night - I totally missed the ongoing conversation about your hardware coming loose, @Jfal .
As with @Bassbob and @HayesGreener , I also believe that the hardware does matter. It could be that for some reason, yours simply wasn't heat-treated properly or has some kind of surface finish on the mating surfaces that's causing an issue, and that's causing the hardware to back out over time/vibrations.
Properly torqued - as with the critical bolts and other fasteners on your vehicle - they should not loosen so readily, especially from just a .223/5.56.
That said, I also do Loc-Tite the stuff I know I'm not going to be moving much, if at all, and I Vibra-Tite the stuff I know I will likely move/swap. Regardless of whether I use chemical enhancements, I always witness-mark all fasteners.
As with @Bassbob and @HayesGreener , I also believe that the hardware does matter. It could be that for some reason, yours simply wasn't heat-treated properly or has some kind of surface finish on the mating surfaces that's causing an issue, and that's causing the hardware to back out over time/vibrations.
Properly torqued - as with the critical bolts and other fasteners on your vehicle - they should not loosen so readily, especially from just a .223/5.56.
That said, I also do Loc-Tite the stuff I know I'm not going to be moving much, if at all, and I Vibra-Tite the stuff I know I will likely move/swap. Regardless of whether I use chemical enhancements, I always witness-mark all fasteners.
Bassbob
Emissary
That’s exactly what those engineers were saying. Thread pitch, wet or dry torque, quality of steel screws, etc.
By the way, probably everyone knows but never use Loc-tite on aluminum.