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Are Iron Sights Outdated?

Old_Me said:
i know...huh..??

get a pacemaker, go back, in like 10 years for a lube, rotation and new battery.
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:ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
Just did that but I got 12 years. Agree with don't trust your life to a battery but in this case, there isn't many options. ;)
I know I'm not the only one here old enough to remember when the same question was being asked about laser red dots. Maybe I missed it but don't recall them taking over the world. I think I would like to play with optics, but I'm too cheap and too much of a believer in "if it works don't fix it". What I have works and has done so for years. The bottom line is. To each his own, whatever works for you, whatever lifts your skirt, hike your own trail, my way works for me YMMV, etc.
 
Grayfox said:
They change batteries almost daily. Plus they don't have to pay for them either.


I'm retired. 😁


Yup. (y)

Batteries have a very annoying habit of going dead at the worst possible time. Murphy was an optimist.
I do have a couple of electronic sights on target pistols. But not on my carry guns. I have an EoTech on my Socom 16. But its on a quick release mount. If it goes dead, flip a lever and it comes right off.

Tough crowd here. Oh well, this old fox has a pretty thick hide. ;)
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On the subject of batteries and red dots/electronic optics.

Point #1
I have Romeo 5s, 510Cs, 512Cs, CT lasers, Vortex RDMS, Viridian lasers. I carry spare batteries in the grips of rifles and in all my gear related bags and I change batteries once a year. I shoot a lot, I carry a lot and I am not particularly nice to any of my stuff. In all this time I have never once had a battery in any aiming device go dead or any aiming device malfunction for any reason whatsoever.

Point # 2
I personally know two people, one of whom is a semi-retired "Operator", who have had game stopping issues with their Eotech holo sights. And to GF's point about them changing batteries every day, that's because the battery life on Eotech's ( which is what most of them are using) is shite. Every person I know with Eotech holos changes batteries often. Because if they don't it's not gonna work. The "Operator" I know straight up told me if he was to deploy again he would take a Holosun before he would take an Eotech.

Point #3
Holographic sights and presumably prism sights eat batteries faster than reflex sights. And reflex sights or any sights with extensive, complicated reticles are going to eat more batteries. I am really interested in and frankly on the fence right now about the Holosun 507C with the Vulcan ( Primary Arms ACSS) reticle. I'm putting a dot on a VP9 and I've narrowed it down to 3 choices. Either a Holosun 507 doughnut of death, Holosun 507 vulcan or a Trijicon RMR. And I am also trying to decide if I want to try a green dot for the first time. And on a related note, I was on the range drilling for 7 hours Friday with multiple platforms, shotguns, ARs, pistols and multiple optics. Which I mention just to say I had some time behind that Primary Arms Prism sight mounted on a suppressed Larue 5.56. The PA holo sight has a chevron/mil drop type reticle which I forget the name of. And it had a low end magnifier in front of it. And I was extremely impressed.
 
bc22wm said:
:ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
Just did that but I got 12 years. Agree with don't trust your life to a battery but in this case, there isn't many options. ;)
I know I'm not the only one here old enough to remember when the same question was being asked about laser red dots. Maybe I missed it but don't recall them taking over the world. I think I would like to play with optics, but I'm too cheap and too much of a believer in "if it works don't fix it". What I have works and has done so for years. The bottom line is. To each his own, whatever works for you, whatever lifts your skirt, hike your own trail, my way works for me YMMV, etc.
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my buddy took his brothers AR to the open range. brother installed an optic.

brother nor my buddy either knew or could get optic zero'd in, but yet, buddy wanted me to shoot it.

i had better luck if i closed my eyes, wore dark sunglasses and bobbed my head like Stevie Wonder....

gave it back to him, shot my 1911's with iron sights.
 
Old_Me said:
my buddy took his brothers AR to the open range. brother installed an optic.

brother nor my buddy either knew or could get optic zero'd in, but yet, buddy wanted me to shoot it.

i had better luck if i closed my eyes, wore dark sunglasses and bobbed my head like Stevie Wonder....

gave it back to him, shot my 1911's with iron sights.
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Almost all remotely decent optics are going to come already really close if not dead on for windage. Elevation is a couple clicks. Maybe. The last few I bought were within 1" @ 50 yards straight out of the box.

It's not an optic problem, it's a "Failure to understand the basic principle of zero'ing an optic" problem.

On a related note, my best friend just got a free Romeo 5 from his retired state trooper father because the old man says it's broken because he can't get it to move enough to be zero'ed. I almost guarantee 5 or 6 minutes at the range and I will have it dead nuts.

For the record, instructions how to zero a red dot, which is different than sighting in a scope, are readily available on the internet via Google.
 
Bassbob said:
Almost all remotely decent optics are going to come already really close if not dead on for windage. Elevation is a couple clicks. Maybe. The last few I bought were within 1" @ 50 yards straight out of the box.

It's not an optic problem, it's a "Failure to understand the basic principle of zero'ing an optic" problem.

On a related note, my best friend just got a free Romeo 5 from his retired state trooper father because the old man says it's broken because he can't get it to move enough to be zero'ed. I almost guarantee 5 or 6 minutes at the range and I will have it dead nuts.

For the record, instructions how to zero a red dot, which is different than sighting in a scope, are readily available on the internet via Google.
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yeah, the brother wasn't too savvy on that red dot, neither was my buddy, and i don't have them either, so i didn't know.

once out there in the open field, was not the time to fart around with it.
 
SimonRL said:
I don’t have a problem with iron sights or red dot, but I need readers to see iron sights and I don’t think I’m going to have time to put my readers on before I draw my gun, so most of my guns - including carry guns - have red dots on them. Not worried about batteries, my point shooting out to 15 yds is pretty spot on. My FNs have big old suppressor height sights with a super visible front dot that I can see without glasses. And they cowitness with a DPP. They’re almost as good a a red dot. Best of both worlds.
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What is a DPP? I have eyesight issues as well, lol.
 
mikep said:
It is a tough crowd. Whatever you do, don’t bad mouth a hi point.
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😳😳😳😳
 
So ... just like in racing cars ... competition improves the breed ? USPSA shooters and even some IDPA shooters draw, sight on the target and fire, more times in a month than most gun owners will in a lifetime. How many times have we seen a shooter stop in mid stage, wobble the gun around, maybe shake it, look at the dot sight again, and fire off a couple of rounds to who knows where, because they "lost the dot" ? I tried the things for a year or so, then took them off and went back to an ADJUSTABLE flat black rear and a fiber optic front. That said ... would I put the thing on my carry gun ? Not if they were ice skating in hell.
 
ppcgm said:
So ... just like in racing cars ... competition improves the breed ? USPSA shooters and even some IDPA shooters draw, sight on the target and fire, more times in a month than most gun owners will in a lifetime. How many times have we seen a shooter stop in mid stage, wobble the gun around, maybe shake it, look at the dot sight again, and fire off a couple of rounds to who knows where, because they "lost the dot" ? I tried the things for a year or so, then took them off and went back to an ADJUSTABLE flat black rear and a fiber optic front. That said ... would I put the thing on my carry gun ? Not if they were ice skating in hell.
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A lot of dot set ups will retain the irons as well for back up, so sorry you couldn't adapt to dual
 
ppcgm said:
So ... just like in racing cars ... competition improves the breed ? USPSA shooters and even some IDPA shooters draw, sight on the target and fire, more times in a month than most gun owners will in a lifetime. How many times have we seen a shooter stop in mid stage, wobble the gun around, maybe shake it, look at the dot sight again, and fire off a couple of rounds to who knows where, because they "lost the dot" ? I tried the things for a year or so, then took them off and went back to an ADJUSTABLE flat black rear and a fiber optic front. That said ... would I put the thing on my carry gun ? Not if they were ice skating in hell.
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I don’t shoot competitively and I draw from appendix, and make good hits on targets in well under 2 seconds with dots many times a week.

To me it’s like every single aspect of shooting period. It’s only an advantage if you train. A lot.
 
True, training is everything. When the SHTF, you will do what you practiced.

At 75, I don't do the "big matches" anymore. 12-14 years ago we would go to either the USPSA single stack nationals at PASA park in Barry, Illinois, or the IDPA nationals when it was in driving distance. Over that span of several years, I would go through an average of 5,000 rounds a month in matches and practice and was not one of the fastest. My draw to ACCURATE first shot was 1.4 seconds or more. If I tried to speed that up, I would miss the first shot from the draw. These days ... I don't know ... it's been too long since I was on the range four days a week. But I was never able to consistently bring the red dot into my line of sight and onto the first target within that 1.4 seconds. I have friends who are blazing fast with a dot and who marvel at my speed with iron sights, even now, even as slow as I am now. So ... same thing ... practice with what you are going to carry. Practice until you're sick of practicing. Then it will be habit and you can rely on it.
 
While optics do fail (ask me how I know after reviewing photo below), so do iron sights. I’ve had the front sight come off a Dan Wesson Guardian and one on a Glock 43 come loose, both while in use. I still trust both. I’ve had guns occasionally not function properly, sometimes magazines, sometimes ammo sensitive, sometimes operator error. I still trust the guns once I figure out failure point.

Personally, I have optics on all my carry guns except a G43 (because I don’t want to pay to get slide milled). Every one is a Holosun SCS (Solar). Every one is easily charged with a solar watch charging light without removing optic from gun.

In the exceptionally rare chance I need to employ one of those SD guns, I’ll take the odds that the exceptionally rare occasion an optic fails will NOT be at that exact same moment in time.

To the post concerning zero, when that G43 front sight came loose, it certainly lost “zero”. Even then my hits were on the silhouette at 10 yds. They would hit closer I’m sure. I wouldn’t be using a pistol for SD much past 10 yds (30 feet) as I’m not active LEO. Losing zero on an optic is most likely 1-2 inches in a direction…still take the odds the rounds would still land on the threat. If you shoot your SD guns often enough, you’ll know. I’ve yet to have an optic lose zero or come loose. I torque to manufacture specs and sparingly use blue loctite, even though some manufacturers state not to use it.

I’m sure there were times in history where folks were told never trust that new fangled pistol, it’s not a reliable revolver; no pistol without a hammer is reliable; any barrel under 4.5 inches isn’t reliable for self defense; unless you’re using .45 ammo for SD, you’ll never stop a threat, etc. (I’m sure some still believe those and that’s their prerogative).

Personally, I trust optics implicitly and believe that they are through their growing pains. Now they continue to make them better.

But, this can happen…stock G32 shooting .357 Sig, which gun designed for. Manufacturer replaced under warranty. I replaced with a Holosun SCS-MOS and never looked back (or had another issue).


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I do love my Holosuns, that fat green doughnut of death is my jam! I run optics on everything and do not carry anything without optics anymore... also, nearly everything is co-witness, so although I have not had a dot fail yet, if it does my irons are in front of my face. I am not concerned with battery life as I will just change batteries yearly on the ones that have batteries. Lots of them are going to the micro solar battery system which I love and which has worked perfectly for me. For me personally, it is optics 100%
 
I am not big on them. I took Dave Spaulding’s Class simply because it doesn’t matter what I feel for myself Red Dots are here to stay and as an instructor in the private sector I need to know how to teach because people are showing up with them. I am also attempting to host a Red Dot Instructor class with Erik Gelhaus sometime next year

I just find it funny how a lot of folks have to just try to sell you what they believe is the best thing ever because of a lot of theory and conjecture more than practical experience.

Use them or don’t but some of us are fine with Irons

Another attempt at some humor on the subject!
 

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