Lasers and shotguns

I’ve only recently got into shotguns and the one thing I noticed is that there isn’t a lot of discussion about using red or green lasers in any application. My ARs have DBAL units on them but I don’t typically see any laser application of any sort on a shotgun. I think the T1/T2 is perfect for many applications but I’m colorblind and have a hard time picking up the red dot quickly on certain backgrounds. While not the same thing, I would think a green laser would be a great addition to a home defense/tactical shotgun. Interested in what you guys think as the shotgun world is fairly new to me.

To me, it seems more and more are equipping and treating shotguns more like an AR. They have their own, distinct manual of arms and advantages/disadvantages but IMO if it's valid for you on an AR, it's valid on a shotgun. Especially with your vision differences.

Mostly gone are the days of a bead sight and 3 foot pattern of buckshot thinking.

I wasnt sure if there was an applicable reason not to utilize a laser. You pegged my thinking though. The platform is certainly different but the scenarios where conflict based use takes place certainly do overlap. I don’t think an IR Illuminator with visible laser is necessarily applicable like in an AR for instance, but some sort of ligh/laser combo I think could only be beneficial. I’m curious why there isn’t more discussion on it.

Forearm laser units have been around at least since the 1990s. Mossberg had a factory M500 with a laser.


If you are red - green colorblind does a green laser or green RDS dot show up any better for you than red ?

Lasers are slower for trained shooters. Mission drives the gear train so what would the applications for a shotgun mounted laser vs RDS or conventional sights ?

Untrained shooters - since you actually need to aim shotguns at social distances
Gas mask use
Unconventional postitions though the recoil of the shotgun makes this more complicated than on a pistol or AR.
NV goggle use

On pump guns, maintaining zero with a Forearm mounted laser may be an issue.

Tagged this I'm confident 'ol DB will chime in here sooner or later.

The shade of green makes more of a difference for me. My base optics atop my ARs are ACOGS with green rets. I’m able to see them far better than the red. The green laser is something I can easily pick up as well... again more so than red. I’m not suggesting that a laser should replace an optic or standard sight anymore than it would on a handgun or AR but I was wondering if there was a reason that they weren’t popular with the shotgun crowd.

There's probably not a good option to withstand the recoil

I mentioned in another thread that someone mounted a laser on a pistol grip only breaching shotgun at work back in the day. Indoors, it worked a lot better than the bead sight.

The laser was cheap, and probably did not hold much of a “zero” as we would normally think of it. But at 10 meters or less, which is all it was ever expected to cover, it was good enough, and again, better than the bead.


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I'd personally love to get some autogated WP NODS helmet mount and run an IR laser on my M4 SBS. Short of that, I don't see the point.