what to do about red dot sight and front sight pos
I just bought a Windham Weaponary flat top AR15 with a front iron sight and fold down Diamondhead rear sight . I also bought a Burris Fastfire 3 reflex sight. The reflex sight sits to low and the red dot hits the iron sight. What is the best solution for this problem? If I need a riser, how tall and what length and brand? What other remedies are there? Thanks for your help.
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very simple, get one inch rised blocks. they mount on any standard rail, and work really great. i use them on a few of my guns. you can get them at cdnn, cheaper than dirt, or e-happy. 0 -
Thanks for your info. 0 -
If the red dot appears right at the TOP of the front post, that's OK, and if so, I'd leave things as-is.
If you think about it, if you're looking through the sights, the red dot *should* appear right at the top of the front post, because if it doesn't, then either the iron sights are off, the red dot is off, or BOTH are off! (This, by the way, is a good "quick and dirty" check to make sure the red dot and/or irons are sighted in. . .if they don't "co-witness", something has been knocked out of alignment).
If you can't get the red dot to zero, or it will zero, but the dot is way off the center of its window, then yeah, you may need risers.
On risers, they're all basically just machined blocks of aluminum; I don't think you're going to see much of a functional difference between different brands from any reputable manufacturer. You have a Windham gun, I'm pretty sure Windham makes risers if you like.
These come in 1/2" 3/4" and 1" heights. You may have to try more than one to find the one that suits your particular setup and anatomy the best. Still, at under $20 each for the short risers, I don't think this should be too onerous.
See-through risers are available if you find the riser itself blocks your view through the iron sights and you still want to use them.
Edit: On riser length, I think the only requirement is that its at least as long as your sight. You certainly can put a full length riser on there if you like, but these cost a bit more and I'm not sure there is much advantage to doing this if you aren't interested in putting other things in line (like a magnifier), or playing with different sights or sight positions.
As another option, you might consider having the gas block on your rifle replaced with a lower profile one, and then you could put on a folding front sight too. It shouldn't cost all too much to have a gunsmith do this for you. I've got this arrangement on my own gun, and personally, I think this type of setup is a good one for most shooters who intend to rely primarily on their optical sight with the irons just for emergency backup.
Edit, responding to below
quote:Riomouse:
One thing on "co-witnessing" with dots and irons: don't use them like a front/rear sight set up, use the DOT to aim. It doesn't seem right, but do it. We have a lot of issues with guys trying to line up dots and front sights, they're spending more time on trying to line them up then paying attention to what's going on around them threat-wise.
Absolutely.
Just to clarify what I wrote above, the only time you try to line up the dot and iron sights is when you ZERO them. After that, you just use the dot and pretend the iron sights don't exist. The only time you use the irons is if the dot goes down. Note that depending on where your head is, even if they are properly sighted in together, the dot and front post may not necessarily line up perfectly if you're not looking through the rear sight. That's OK.
This, by the way, is the biggest reason I prefer a folding front sight setup. The folded front sight simply doesn't obstruct your view of the target and distract you, and it can't catch/snag anything, unless/until you choose to deploy it (which, by the way, takes about 2 seconds).
Frankly, I don't even know why in this day and age, manufacturers put a fixed front sight on flat top style guns. This is some kind of historical relic, when iron sights were the standard. That's simply not true anymore. Almost by definition if you're buying a flat top type gun, you're putting some type of optic on there. If you want to use iron sights too, you're inevitably going to have to choose a rear sight to install too, so you might as well match a set together instead of relying on what the manufacturer chose. You can always mount a non-folding (or even folding) ramp style front sight if you like that "triangle" profile.0 -
One thing on "co-witnessing" with dots and irons: don't use them like a front/rear sight set up, use the DOT to aim. It doesn't seem right, but do it. We have a lot of issues with guys trying to line up dots and front sights, they're spending more time on trying to line them up then paying attention to what's going on around them threat-wise.
They're called BUIS for a reason; "Back Up Iron Sights"..for when your dot takes a dive and no more workee.
How does the Diamondhead rear work with the standard front winged post? The ads show them working as a DH front and rear set, so just wondering how the DH rear does solo?0 -
Thanks again guys. Good information. 0
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