Earlier this year I started looking for a new optical sight for my FS2000. The rifle originally was topped with an Aimpoint CompM4S (which I had originally purchased for a larger rifle), which was an excellent sight, but I found that, even though it’s only about ¾ of a pound or so, it detracted from the “handiness” of the FS2000—I like to keep my short rifles as light and handy as possible.
I looked around for what was available—there was not a whole lot that would fit the bill of being lightweight and rugged enough to last. Of course, the default choice for small rugged optical sights is the Aimpoint Micro. There’s no question the Micros are excellent sights with a stellar reputation—I owned one that I had on my 10.5” AR—but I wanted to try something different.
I had heard about Trijicon’s RMR line of sights (RMR standing for “Ruggedized Miniature Reflex”) but had seen them mounted mostly on pistols. I found out that there are actually three models—a “Dual illuminated” one lit with fibre optic and tritium, an auto-adjustable LED version that adjusts to varying light conditions, and a model with a manually adjustable LED. The dual-illuminated version does not have a reticle smaller than 7 MOA—too big for my needs—and I’d read that the auto-adjustable version sometimes didn’t always adjust to the user’s preference so I went for the Adjustable model with a 3.25 MOA dot—the RM06. I was a little apprehensive, though—would the sight be too small to use as a primary optic? Would it mount too low? Would the 3.25 MOA dot be too big for precise work? Read on for the answers to these questions!
Mount Selection
My FS2000 has a rail for mounting optical sights but it’s positioned a little higher above the stock than an AR’s rail. This has made mount selection a little difficult—mounts made for lower 1/3 co-witness on an AR I found too high, but mounting directly on the rail is too low. My CompM4S had a mount with a removable spacer that fit perfectly for me.
The RMR is a small sight, and looking at the factory mount I was sure it would be too low for me—I’d read of another FS200 owner who used the factory mount and found it was an absolute co-witness with the backup iron sights. It worked OK for him, but I find the backup irons really low for me—uncomfortably so—so I looked for another solution. I came across the “American Defense” line of mounts. I saw that they make a Quick Detachable mount that adds maybe 1cm or so of mounting height to what the factory picatinny mount would have. Surprisingly I found the exact one I was after one at The Shooting Edge.
First Impressions and Observations
I ordered one from P&D Enterprises—you can order the sights with a variety of mounts or without a mount at all, which is what I ordered. When the sight arrived I was really surprised at how small it really was!
It’s also heavier than it looks, due to I think the thick glass and rugged construction. It’s still only 33 g (or 1.17 oz) though so it’s very lightweight. It is almost unnoticeable on the rifle
The only thing I noticed when looking through the sight was that it looked a little “lens-y”. Compared with an Aimpoint or Eotech, where there was no distortion at all, looking through the RMR’s window was a little like looking through a very low power lens, but only slightly so. There’s a bit of a bluish tint as well.
The reticle is a nice round, sharp dot. I’ve got a slight astigmatism in my right eye, and have found that Eotechs and Aimpoints have a “sparkly” look to them. My CompM4S had a nice round 2 MOA dot, but my right eye saw two “flares” almost as big as the dots at the 11 o’clock at 7 o’clock points (of course my left (non-aiming) eye saw nothing but a nice round dot!). For whatever reason the RMR’s reticle is much better for me in terms of being clearly defined.
Here’s the field of view through a 4 MOA Aimpoint Micro for comparison.
Here’s how it looks on the mount:
You can see the “+” and “-“ brightness adjustment buttons on either side of the window—there are eight levels of brightness (including two night vision modes that unless my life takes an unexpected turn I will not likely not use). I find that for daytime use setting 3 or 4 work fine for me. The windage adjustment is also on the right side—there’s a similar elevation adjustment on the top, both with 1 MOA clicks.
Here’s how it looks on the rifle:
I experimented with various mounting positions along the rail. I found that closer to the front blocked the front sight “wings”. I use the wings in the lower part of my sighting window for a visual reference to ensure I’m not canting the rifle, and closer to the rear the field of view was blocked more than I liked. Having it midway along allows for quick acquisition and easy access to the brightness controls.
Range Report
I finally had a chance to try it out at the range yesterday, at the Nova Scotia Rifle Association’s Bull Meadow range in Rawdon, NS. Conditions were less than ideal, with the temperature of 6° C and 40km/h winds.
Here’s the cheekweld—a smidge lower than before but not objectionable.
I tried first at 25m to get on the paper—the first shots were about 6” low. My first impression was that the sight was mounted just a bit low—but a few quick snap shots got me quickly into the habit of getting just a little tighter on the cheekweld that I had needed to be with the Aimpoint (or the ACOG I had on my first FS2000). The dot was easy to pick up, allaying any concerns I had about the 22mm X 16mm sight window being too small. Here’s how the dot and target looked at 25m (I found it tricky to get a good picture of the dot—to the eye it’s a nice clear bright red dot, but it looks like washed out pink in the pictures. Anyway—this gives the idea of the relative size of the dot on the target:
Next, up. I tried kneeling at 50m. Again, the dot was easy to obtain, and the precise dot shape allowed for easy accurate shot placement.
Here’s the 50m view. I notice in the picture that you can see a little distortion around the edge of the sight window—I didn’t notice this at all when shooting:
.
Next up I tried prone shooting 100m, to see if the larger dot would present any issue with more precise shooting. I tried 10 rounds prone at a bullseye target and here’s the result (ammo was 62 grain American Eagle):
The group size is a smidge less than 3”…not bad for a ten round group with this rifle. I probably could have improved the group a bit with a few more attempts but I think this demonstrates that even a 3.25 MOA dot doesn’t really hinder accurate shooting. Actually, the dot fit right within the size of the 9-ring, making it easy to centre in the black aiming mark.
Here’s the 100m view using the same target as earlier for comparison.
Conclusion
The sight’s best points are its light weight, great field of view, and well-defined dot. I also like the ability to adjust this model’s dot’s brightness to whatever level I need depending on the conditions. I found that the slight lens-like distortion of the sight window glass was not noticeable at all. I liked how the dot was both easy to acquire for quick shooting, but small and precise enough to allow for accurately aimed shooting at longer distances. I like this sight—it looks to be a very good alternative to the Micro line of sights.
I looked around for what was available—there was not a whole lot that would fit the bill of being lightweight and rugged enough to last. Of course, the default choice for small rugged optical sights is the Aimpoint Micro. There’s no question the Micros are excellent sights with a stellar reputation—I owned one that I had on my 10.5” AR—but I wanted to try something different.
I had heard about Trijicon’s RMR line of sights (RMR standing for “Ruggedized Miniature Reflex”) but had seen them mounted mostly on pistols. I found out that there are actually three models—a “Dual illuminated” one lit with fibre optic and tritium, an auto-adjustable LED version that adjusts to varying light conditions, and a model with a manually adjustable LED. The dual-illuminated version does not have a reticle smaller than 7 MOA—too big for my needs—and I’d read that the auto-adjustable version sometimes didn’t always adjust to the user’s preference so I went for the Adjustable model with a 3.25 MOA dot—the RM06. I was a little apprehensive, though—would the sight be too small to use as a primary optic? Would it mount too low? Would the 3.25 MOA dot be too big for precise work? Read on for the answers to these questions!
Mount Selection
My FS2000 has a rail for mounting optical sights but it’s positioned a little higher above the stock than an AR’s rail. This has made mount selection a little difficult—mounts made for lower 1/3 co-witness on an AR I found too high, but mounting directly on the rail is too low. My CompM4S had a mount with a removable spacer that fit perfectly for me.
The RMR is a small sight, and looking at the factory mount I was sure it would be too low for me—I’d read of another FS200 owner who used the factory mount and found it was an absolute co-witness with the backup iron sights. It worked OK for him, but I find the backup irons really low for me—uncomfortably so—so I looked for another solution. I came across the “American Defense” line of mounts. I saw that they make a Quick Detachable mount that adds maybe 1cm or so of mounting height to what the factory picatinny mount would have. Surprisingly I found the exact one I was after one at The Shooting Edge.
First Impressions and Observations
I ordered one from P&D Enterprises—you can order the sights with a variety of mounts or without a mount at all, which is what I ordered. When the sight arrived I was really surprised at how small it really was!
It’s also heavier than it looks, due to I think the thick glass and rugged construction. It’s still only 33 g (or 1.17 oz) though so it’s very lightweight. It is almost unnoticeable on the rifle
The only thing I noticed when looking through the sight was that it looked a little “lens-y”. Compared with an Aimpoint or Eotech, where there was no distortion at all, looking through the RMR’s window was a little like looking through a very low power lens, but only slightly so. There’s a bit of a bluish tint as well.
The reticle is a nice round, sharp dot. I’ve got a slight astigmatism in my right eye, and have found that Eotechs and Aimpoints have a “sparkly” look to them. My CompM4S had a nice round 2 MOA dot, but my right eye saw two “flares” almost as big as the dots at the 11 o’clock at 7 o’clock points (of course my left (non-aiming) eye saw nothing but a nice round dot!). For whatever reason the RMR’s reticle is much better for me in terms of being clearly defined.
Here’s the field of view through a 4 MOA Aimpoint Micro for comparison.
Here’s how it looks on the mount:
You can see the “+” and “-“ brightness adjustment buttons on either side of the window—there are eight levels of brightness (including two night vision modes that unless my life takes an unexpected turn I will not likely not use). I find that for daytime use setting 3 or 4 work fine for me. The windage adjustment is also on the right side—there’s a similar elevation adjustment on the top, both with 1 MOA clicks.
Here’s how it looks on the rifle:
I experimented with various mounting positions along the rail. I found that closer to the front blocked the front sight “wings”. I use the wings in the lower part of my sighting window for a visual reference to ensure I’m not canting the rifle, and closer to the rear the field of view was blocked more than I liked. Having it midway along allows for quick acquisition and easy access to the brightness controls.
Range Report
I finally had a chance to try it out at the range yesterday, at the Nova Scotia Rifle Association’s Bull Meadow range in Rawdon, NS. Conditions were less than ideal, with the temperature of 6° C and 40km/h winds.
Here’s the cheekweld—a smidge lower than before but not objectionable.
I tried first at 25m to get on the paper—the first shots were about 6” low. My first impression was that the sight was mounted just a bit low—but a few quick snap shots got me quickly into the habit of getting just a little tighter on the cheekweld that I had needed to be with the Aimpoint (or the ACOG I had on my first FS2000). The dot was easy to pick up, allaying any concerns I had about the 22mm X 16mm sight window being too small. Here’s how the dot and target looked at 25m (I found it tricky to get a good picture of the dot—to the eye it’s a nice clear bright red dot, but it looks like washed out pink in the pictures. Anyway—this gives the idea of the relative size of the dot on the target:
Next, up. I tried kneeling at 50m. Again, the dot was easy to obtain, and the precise dot shape allowed for easy accurate shot placement.
Here’s the 50m view. I notice in the picture that you can see a little distortion around the edge of the sight window—I didn’t notice this at all when shooting:
Next up I tried prone shooting 100m, to see if the larger dot would present any issue with more precise shooting. I tried 10 rounds prone at a bullseye target and here’s the result (ammo was 62 grain American Eagle):
The group size is a smidge less than 3”…not bad for a ten round group with this rifle. I probably could have improved the group a bit with a few more attempts but I think this demonstrates that even a 3.25 MOA dot doesn’t really hinder accurate shooting. Actually, the dot fit right within the size of the 9-ring, making it easy to centre in the black aiming mark.
Here’s the 100m view using the same target as earlier for comparison.
Conclusion
The sight’s best points are its light weight, great field of view, and well-defined dot. I also like the ability to adjust this model’s dot’s brightness to whatever level I need depending on the conditions. I found that the slight lens-like distortion of the sight window glass was not noticeable at all. I liked how the dot was both easy to acquire for quick shooting, but small and precise enough to allow for accurately aimed shooting at longer distances. I like this sight—it looks to be a very good alternative to the Micro line of sights.
