Sight Mounts
Recent Developments In Reflex Sights
Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the last ten years, you can’t have missed the increasing trend among the world’s militaries and security forces to put combat optics sights on rifles. The USMC, once regarded as entrenched in the use of iron sights, now issues Trijicon ACOG variants for all its shoulder weapons, up to and including the M240. The US Army now issues everyone with a red dot sight – currently the Aimpoint CompM4s (M68CCO) and is providing everyone issued with an M16A4 rifle with a TA31RCO-M150 ACOG.The US Army instead went for an Elcan 3.4×28 rubber armored optic with a 1200 meter reticle on its M249s and M240s, designating this the M145.
The development of the sights used by the US military has been almost entirely a private initiative of companies based in the USA, Canada and Sweden. The civil market drove much of the development of these scopes, armed citizenry being a huge force for progress in this sector. This trend will continue to drive weapon sight development for the forseeable future.
Aimpoint, never a company to rest on their laurels, have brought out a new range of ultra compact and light Micro red dot sights with 4 MOA red dots. The Micro T-1 4 MOA red dot sight is only 2.4 inches long and weighs in at only 3.7 ounces with its thumb nut Picatinny rail mount and battery. That is not a lot more than some back up iron sights and the unit is small enough to serve on 9mm pistols. A vast range of mounts are available for different applications. These sights boast astonishing battery lives of approximately five years of continuous operation. In conjunction with flip-to-side or detachable magnifiers like the Eotech G23 magnifier it makes an highly compact and versatile package covering engagements out to perhaps four hundred meters. Beyond these ranges the 4 MOA dot will tend to obscure too much of the target.
Not to be left behind, Eotech have vastly reduced the size of their unique holographic weapon sights resulting in the new XPS and EXPS ranges. The new sights can get 600 hours of operation out of a single CR123 lithium battery. The use of lasers uses more battery power than an Aimpoint, but the result is a totally parallax free reticle that can be used anywhere in the rear sight window, even if the rest of the window is obscured or even shattered. The Eotech avoids the large dot problem by using a 1 MOA dot for fine aiming at longer distances centered in a 65 MOA circle for rapid target acquisition and centering close up. The XPS-2 XPS-3 and EXPS-3 series are inevitably bulkier and heavier than the Aimpoint Micros at 3.5 inches long and 8 to 11 ounces and are perhaps less robust, although a new, tethered screw cap with an O-ring makes battery housings spontaneously detaching a thing of the past. The XPS-3 and EXPS-3 models are NV compatible and the EXPS-3 series moves its buttons to the side to allow very close mounting of night vision devices. A quick release mount unique to the EXPS series puts the sight 7mm higher for easier co-witnessing of iron sights and compatibility with a greater range of NV units.
Comp M3 Red Dot Sight w/ Cantilever Mount (Airsoft-Club.com)