Dot sight

[cohiba]

Good afternoon guys.

I recently bought a BSA PMRS multi reticle sight. I love it, and i am having tons of fun with it. I shoot in my backyard alot at night (i illuminated my target box) and have noticed that even on the low setting, the red dot is still too bright. It gives it a blurry larger dot, assuming from reflection or something like that, but not nearly as clear as it does during the day.

Any reccomendations for a dot sight (open sight) that works well at night? i also have a UTG 30mm dot sight that does the same thing, but worse actually.

Anyone ever use a bushnell trophy first strike? Specs seem kinda cool

thanks

[quickster47 †]

Not sure what your vision is but the problem could be related to that.

If your dot does not appear to be perfectly round, the distortion is probably caused by the way that your eye perceives the dot, rather than by some mechanical defect.  Due to differences in the lenses in different individuals' eyes, round objects that subtend areas near 3 minutes of angle may appear distorted in a variety of ways depending on the individual and other environmental influences.  Inexpensive red dot sights sometimes have manufacturing defects that can cause the dot to be an odd shape.

A simple test that can be easily performed will allow you to determine the cause of the apparent distortion:
Turn the sight on and look through as you normally would.  (This test is easiest when the sight is not mounted on a firearm, but can be performed with the sight mounted as well.  Just make sure that the firearm is unloaded and pointed in a safe direction.)

While continuing to look through the sight, roll the sight on its optical axis.

If the dot's irregularities seem to revolve around the center of the dot like the spokes of a wheel, there is a mechanical defect causing the distortion.

If the dot does not roll with the sight, the distortion is caused in the way your eye perceives the dot.  This is not to say that you don't have good vision.  You can see clearly and still see a distortion in objects this small. 

This effect is less pronounced in sights with larger dots.  More people will see the dot in a sight with a 10 minute-of-angle dot as being perfectly round than will be able to see a 3 MOA dot as round.

Carl

[Brent]

I never thought about that as a way to test this... but it makes perfect sense. 

I have seen some 5MOA $80 to $109 reddots that actually did not really have a round dot in them. More a sorta squiggly small 5MOA hash like. One the other hand, the cheap $10 Daisy I bought to goof around with does... although it is probably more of a 7 or 8 MOA.
My SP1 though, which was slightly less expensive than these others were I looked at... has a nice round dot.

[cohiba]

What i am noticing is more like a "glow" at night. During the day no worries at all, but at night its too bright. I will try the test when i get home and see how it goes.

thanks

still some good reccomendations would be nice..................specifically looking at night usage.

[Brent]

Does it not have adjustable brightness settings? I looked it up, but on 3 websites they never mentioned if it did or did not. If I use a 2 setting (out of 11)... the dot just shows up. At 11... it is flaring out noticeably.

[cohiba]

It has 1-7 for adjustment settings. Daytime 7 is perfect, nighttime i use 1

[Brent]

Huh... well hopefully someone with a 11 setting reflex reddot can let you know how theirs is working at night. I have never seen them go above 11 settings... but that is not to say some don't have more, have just never seen one that does.