As a beginner marksman, sighting your gun can be a stressful experience. You’ve seen videos on YouTube and read about how to sight in your gun online, but what if you don’t have access to a range?
Maybe it’s raining or snowing outside. Or maybe you’re just too busy watching Netflix instead of shooting live ammo. In any case, there’s good news. It is possible to see in your red dot without ever firing so that when it comes to target practice, you’ll be ready on the first try.
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What Is a Red Dot Sight?
A red dot is an optical firearm sight that uses a non-magnifying reflector sight with an illuminated reticle. This allows for a clear, unobstructed field of view and rapid target acquisition at close range. Red dot sights are often used with magnifying scopes when greater magnification is desired than the red dot alone can provide.
Red dots have been around since the 1970s when they took off during the Vietnam War when they were used by American soldiers who needed to shoot at close distances quickly without being able to use their entire arms as support.
The term “red dot” comes from how these sights’ reticles look through them. They’re not actually red dots, per se. Rather, they illuminate into white or black rings around a central point representing where your bullet will go when you fire it from your gun.
Red dot sighting ensures you hit your target and not someone else. Suppose you are hunting a moving animal. If your red dot sight is inaccurate, you might hit something else unintentionally. In fact, there are chances that you hit a person. If you think that this will not happen, think again. According to Pew Research, there were around 535 unintentional gun deaths in 2020 in the US.
Attach the Red Dot
Attaching your red dot to the rail is fairly straightforward. There are some things to keep in mind, however.
- Attach it to the same place every time. You want to be able to quickly return your eye to that spot on your target when you’re sighting in.
- Attach it securely, so it doesn’t move around when you’re shooting or running with your rifle, especially if there’s a chance of impact from a stray bullet or whatever else. This can be done by using a blue thread locker on all four threads and tightening them equally until they won’t move anymore, but make sure not to overtighten.
Use Boresight
Boresighting is a tool that allows you to see where the bullet will hit at 100 yards. If your red dot is not aligned with your barrel, it will be off by an amount based on how far left/right or up/down it is in relation to the barrel. Use a boresight to ensure the red dot is aligned with the barrel.
Zeroing the boresight is similar to zeroing your rifle, except there’s no impact on accuracy since it’s just being used as a reference point for windage and elevation adjustments on your optic. You should learn to zero a red dot to ensure accuracy. This can be handy while shooting at moving targets, especially while hunting.
It’s easy. All you need to do is choose a target and distance, choose the point of aim and start shooting, and adjust the red dot to make it accurate. Knowing how to zero a red dot will help avoid missed shots. Additionally, you will also save on bullets.
Check the Windage and Elevation Adjustments
Let’s start by ensuring that your windage and elevation adjustments are correct.
- With the gun unloaded, check that the red dot is centered on the target. If it is off-center, adjust it with a small screwdriver until the crosshair is aligned with where you want to hit.
- Now move back ten yards and aim at a target again, but this time without using any sights. Just use your red dot alone.
- Keeping as steady as possible and keeping both eyes open, aim downrange at whatever bullseye or another object you want to shoot at while making sure that everything looks like it’s lined up perfectly between the top of your gun barrel and where you’re looking through your red dot sight.
Adjust the Red Dot as Needed
To adjust the red dot to be on target, it’s important to know where it should be. First, you’ll need to check your current settings.
To do this:
- Adjust the windage and elevation adjustments so they are as close as possible to being dead center of the bullseye at 25 yards.
- Shoot from a distance of 25 yards using only one round of ammunition. If you’re unsure how far back 25 yards is, try our handy dandy shot timer.
Now take note of whether or not your bullet hit where it was supposed to hit. If so, congratulations. You’re almost done! That part was easy enough. One last step is ensuring everything stays exactly how we set them up.
Sighting Red Dot With Shooting Vs. Without Shooting
Shooting is the best way to test your red dot. Shooting will help you determine if the red dot is zeroed in, accurate and reliable. Zeroing a red dot requires that you know where your shots are going on target, meaning that you need to see where the bullet is impacting relative to the target.
When sighting in with live fire, this becomes easier since it forces you to focus on what matters, the impact of your round at various distances, and not just how far away they appear from your aiming point. This can lead to more precise adjustments during sighting and confidence when shooting at unknown distances later on because you know what a specific adjustment will do for your group size or point of impact change based on where it lands relative to other groups fired with different settings.
Conclusion
Red dot sighting is something every gun user should be aware of. You must also try to have all the relevant tools, including the bore sighter, microdots, mini reflux, etc. In fact, the demand for these products is increasing with every passing year. The global red dot sight market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 4.9% between 2022 and 2030. With 36.1%, the microdots are expected to garner the highest growth.
Hopefully, this article has helped you to sight in your red dot without shooting. It is a simple process that can be done with minimal tools and materials, which makes it easy for anyone to do.