Red dot update - June 2019

[TCB]

For now I would personally lean towards an Acro with a monthly battery change and a good BUIS

In fact as soon as I can convince GLOCK to sell MOS slides separately I will do exactly that.

Yup, I’ve personally had to power wash my pistol clean (I was covered head to toe in a lot of mud) after working a group I’m a very muddy field and another time IN the Rio Grande when the water was low and the mud was deep. I did some drills the other day with the front lense of the ACRO totally occluded and had no problems making good hits at 25 yards and with it totally off my BUIS were very useable. A quick wipe to the rear lense to be able to see the dot is fairly easy with a finger or even your tongue if your hands / gloves are super muddy and I’m going to do some more experimenting with both lenses occluded and try out the Sage Dynamics guy’s trick of putting a witness line on the top of the optic as a windage reference. Once we get enough data on the battery life of the ACRO on its different settings a maintenance schedule should be fairly easy to work up. And again...can’t wait for the #nextgenPMO to come out, but I believe it’s close enough to start seriously training and employing them.

[Gio]

I'm sure he would have made Advanced with irons because an MRDS doesn't make a bad shooter good. Similarly, I don't believe the MRDS makes a good shooter bad at under 15-yards. Hence the reason I used @karmapolice's recent accomplishment as an example.

IMO, if you can improve your shooting >15-yards (some say >10-yards), and have no or negligible degradation of performance inside that distance real consideration should be given to utilizing that tool.

Gio, I'd be interested in seeing more of your data if you continue your agency's evaluation process and are able to share it.

I don't know your particular situation, but it would be cool if you could get two identical weapon platforms for your data collection and compare a closed emitter MRDS to an open one. I say this because I've heard there may be an advantage with the closed system (ACRO) in regards to dot acquisition over non-enclosed competitors.

I've heard a lot of variance (which is okay) on the time investment with dry-fire required to become proficient with dot acquisition prior to attempting a side-by-side with irons. I'm interested what your dry-fire regimen looked like with your MRDS prior to your data collection and if you are continuing how it differs from your iron sights dry-fire regimen.

What is your take on the time needed (approximately) before an individual can really do a good A/B comparison on their personal performance?

I have access to a dpp and an rmr at the moment and will get an SRO in the near future. I’m working on getting an acro sent to me as well for testing. My agency does very detailed and scientific testing of the actual optics themselves, but I’ve been asked to informally provide input on performance as an end user/shooter.

For me it took less than one dry fire session to transition to an RDS and be able to hit identical times on basic weapon handling drill. Im sure it helped I had a solid index already developed, and I can see how shooters without that index could have trouble finding the dot. To me though, the transition was not a problem at all. I think to do a good comparison your 7 yard drill times need to be identical. If you can draw to an A zone in .9 with irons but it takes 1.2 with an rds, you probably won’t be able to conduct a meaningful performance evaluation yet.

Don’t get me wrong, I am the first to want to squeeze every tiny performance advantage out of my duty setup. My issue with rds in general though is I don’t think it provides a real advantage in 99% of gun fights based on statistics and actual gun fighting/shooting reviews, which makes the potential risk of failure worth it. There are of course outliers, and I can point to a handful of real world shootings at >25 yds with a pistol where an rds could have made a difference. I’m hopeful we’re knocking on the door of that kind of optic reliability, but I am also disappointed in all the negative reports of these new 2019 optics.

With regard to nvg’s and optics, my experience has been that an IR laser is a much more user friendly aiming method with nvg’s than anything else. With the new TLR1 VIR release, I would go that route on a pistol for dedicated nvg use.

[BigT]

So My Shield RMS is getting replaced under warranty

The lens is cracking where it meets the frame.

870 rounds in.

[JodyH]

Trijicon RMR dual illuminated still working perfectly match after match after match on my wife's PPQ Q5.
The Dual illuminated RMR on my 19X has been 100% despite quite a bit of deliberate abuse.
Third dual illuminated RMR on my Glock-a-RONI has again been 100%.

Trijicon SRO serial #1148 was dead on arrival, even after trying multiple new batteries it refused to come on. Sent it back to Trijicon two weeks ago, it's currently scheduled to be back in my grubby little paws tomorrow.

I still consider pistol mounted dot sights to be toys at this stage in their development.

[LOKNLOD]

Trijicon RMR dual illuminated still working perfectly match after match after match on my wife's PPQ Q5.
The Dual illuminated RMR on my 19X has been 100% despite quite a bit of deliberate abuse.
Third dual illuminated RMR on my Glock-a-RONI has again been 100%.

Trijicon SRO serial #1148 was dead on arrival, even after trying multiple new batteries it refused to come on. Sent it back to Trijicon two weeks ago, it's currently scheduled to be back in my grubby little paws tomorrow.

I still consider pistol mounted dot sights to be toys at this stage in their development.

Which size/shape/color dot are your dual-illums?

[Jeff22]

"realize you don’t need to bring the dot into the scoring zone, and hold it steady — you just need to release the shot with the dot somewhere in the scoring zone."

I have about 3200 rnds through an RMR06 series 3 on a Glock 34, including a one day class at the Vortex Academy and a two day class with Modern Samurai Project.

I think RDS sights offer a huge advantage in shadowy lighting conditions to those of us with old eyes.

The RDS are authorized as options at both departments I work at. A mix of Trijicon RMRs and various Vortex RDS. It will be interesting to see how this works out over time. None of those people shoot as much as I do.

I'm an instructor and most of the people I instruct have Glocks with iron sights. For that reason I have not switched for duty use.

One of my USPSA shooting buddies just put a Trijicon SRO on one of his guns. It'll be interesting to see how that works out for him over time.

[Bart Carter]

...Everyone I know with any manner of Vortex has had them fail with any sort of real use....

Well, I have shot in excess of 20,000 rounds with my Vortex Venoms. Over 10K with one. I just replaced my 1st one that I physically damaged by putting my pistol through a narrow portal and it got hit upon recoil. The Vortex warranty can't be beaten. They didn't care that it was my fault, they sent me a brand new one within a couple of days.

I average 1 or two matches every weekend. I have yet to see a Vortex go down. I have friends with Vortexes and don't know of any that have failed. I was surprised to see a Vortex on a Tactical Performance Center's instructor last time I was there.

It is impossible to know real failure rates. The manufacturers sure won't tell us. Even if they did, you don't know the kind of use the optics have. I know of no optic that has had a zero failure rate.

Just another viewpoint, YMMV.

[JodyH]

Which size/shape/color dot are your dual-illums?

9moa green dot.
Best color for the typical background in my area (desert southwest).
The dual illuminated dot doesn't have the "bloom" that a red dot has and the 9moa isn't nearly as big as it sounds in actual use.
I've found that my 2.5moa SRO red dot appears much larger than it is and the RMR dual illum green dot appears much smaller and I find no difference in them under actual use outside of extreme accuracy tests (say 1" dots at 10Y) and even then I have to manually dim my 2.5moa to see any advantage.
My primary use is for USPSA carry optics and it'd have to be one hell of a small target for a max brightness (bright direct sunlight) 9moa to obscure and the washout issues the dual illuminated are prone to in low light is a non factor at the range.

btw: Trijicon replaced my dead on arrival SRO with a brand new one (serial number 1000 higher) and I spent an hour this morning zeroing and playing with it.

Right now i'm in a holding pattern of just playing with dot sights on pistols.
Maybe in another generation or two of refinement the SRO/ACRO/HE508T will be where I'm good with switching over to them completely.

[OldRunner/CSAT Neighbor]

9moa green dot.
Best color for the typical background in my area (desert southwest).
The dual illuminated dot doesn't have the "bloom" that a red dot has and the 9moa isn't nearly as big as it sounds in actual use.
I've found that my 2.5moa SRO red dot appears much larger than it is and the RMR dual illum green dot appears much smaller and I find no difference in them under actual use outside of extreme accuracy tests (say 1" dots at 10Y) and even then I have to manually dim my 2.5moa to see any advantage.
My primary use is for USPSA carry optics and it'd have to be one hell of a small target for a max brightness (bright direct sunlight) 9moa to obscure and the washout issues the dual illuminated are prone to in low light is a non factor at the range.

btw: Trijicon replaced my dead on arrival SRO with a brand new one (serial number 1000 higher) and I spent an hour this morning zeroing and playing with it.

Right now i'm in a holding pattern of just playing with dot sights on pistols.
Maybe in another generation or two of refinement the SRO/ACRO/HE508T will be where I'm good with switching over to them completely.

Jody thx for the MOA info. etc. & keep us updated on the SRO as I used my 2.5 moa SRO in a USPSA match Sun. for the 1st time w/ zero issues & *something* def. improved my shooting vs. my previously used Vortex Venom.

[Clark Jackson]

I've been saying it for years, but RDS are just not ready for prime time duty use yet.

Lots of high speed, low drag, low coefficient of friction units (DoD special operations and LE SWAT) are literally forcing the adoption of RDS because they are addicted to the flat range accuracy they get from an RDS, but it's a fad not unlike those same units all adopting 1911 pistols in the late 90's-early 2000's with all the drawbacks of those as mass issue duty weapons. When you think about the intended use of a duty pistol for these units as a backup/insurance policy, it makes no sense to add a significant mode of failure to it.

I think as a concealed carry or plain clothes option for shooters (especially enthusiasts who will keep up with battery changes and checking zero on occasion) with aging eye sight, an RMR is viable and low enough risk of failure if you have separate training and carry guns that you can get away with it. For a mass issue, "let's give this to 36 SWAT operators and only issue them one pistol/optic," it's a bad idea waiting for a disastrous consequence. For reference, I was one of the "enthusiasts" trying to get my team of non-enthusiast operators to change their recoil spring and firing pin spring once a year on their 1911's, and doing that was like pulling teeth.

+1. Good post.

I absolutely agree that mass issuance is "a bad idea waiting for a disastrous consequence." Well said. Given current technology the applicability for self-defense use favors concealed carry enthusiasts.

Current optic/mounting solution pricing pushes most non-enthusiasts out of the conversation. I think this is a good thing. However, that free-market rudder is useless when a mass issuance is introduced.

I don't have a ton of time on a PMRDS, but I do have a few thousand rounds on a DPP and much less on a few other big brands. Despite the ruggedness, I am not a fan of the RMR2. The window size, parallax issues, and disappearing dot with polarized sunglasses = no bueno for me. I'm sure I could practice my way out of disliking the RMR2... if I had to, but I don't so I won't.

I am a fan of the DPP window and battery compartment. I'm not a fan of auto-sleep or a design that allows water to pool over the emitter.

For me, the PMRDS is an advantage for shooting on the move, shooting from unconventional/awkward positions, and for shooting faster/more accurately at distances beyond 7-yards. When shooting closer (7-yards and in) I like the PMRDS for high-percentage shots, but the off-set can make low-percentage shots less fun.

The PMRDS may do a lot of things well, but it absolutely will not magically transform a bad shooter into a good shooter. I think there is a fair amount of people who want a mass issuance because of the perception PMRDS use turns lead into gold, and/or because the PMRDS provides the user a bat-signal for verification of sub-culture legitness.

As an aside @Gio, I would add one more fad item your list:
1) 1911
2) PMRDS
3) Crye Multicam everything.

The same collective mindset that pushes for premature adoption of technology similarly advocates for LE use of multicam uniforms. Outside of highly specific circumstances where operationally necessary this it is just another example of 4TM. The same is true for emergent technologies like PMRDS.