Two red dot sights on the blink...

[RostokMcSpoons]

I've got two sights that are playing up at the moment.  One's dirt-cheap but the other is worth a few quid and definitely worth rescuing...

 

Clone T1: red dot flickers with any movement of the sight.  Dodgy connection to the battery.  I've ensured the battery cover is screwed down tight, the connections are clean, changed battery etc.

 

Kobra 'real steel': tapping the sight reduces the brightness - it's triggering the button circuitry as it reduces in the same steps as pressing the 'down' button*.  Unfortunately it's sensitive enough to have this happen through recoil.  

 

Is there anywhere I can send these to have them fixed, or is one going in the bin and the other relegated to wall hanger duties?

 

 

 

Edit: * further testing revealed that's not true, it's more like an equivalent of 3 or 4 steps in brightness, a couple of knocks is enough to take it from max to 'barely visible'

Edited April 5, 2023 by RostokMcSpoons

[Duff Beer]

I realise it doesn’t answer your question directly, but if you’re looking for recommendations for a decent sight as a replacement you can do far worse than a Holosun 403B.  I’ve got one on the MP7 and it’s had about 3000 rounds through it without skipping a beat.

 

It’s been used in 35° heat and -5° cold without issue, and it’s been clattered off walls in CQB.  I’d definitely recommend a front lens protector though as having it shot out is an expensive day!  

Being a proper optic there’s no parallax so if you’ve got something capable of accuracy and consistency the shot will land where you put the dot regardless of whether you can have the perfect cheek weld or not.  Between that and the MP7 I was able to consistently shoot helmets and hands peeking round doors at 15m (perfect for CQB ranges), but also through slim gaps and tight angles. 
 

I saw one in the classifieds recently for about £150 which is okay, but they’re £180 new so the warranty might be worth the extra?

[SSPKali]

Sounds like loose contacts inside the unit. I guess it should be possible to open it up and re-solder / fix but I have no idea what sort of level of skill that would require! Plus the sights are usually filled with Nitrogen to prevent fogging when moving from cold/hot environments - going to be a pain to refill that with out a BoC account and a 90L bottle of Nitrogen 🤣 

[RostokMcSpoons]

Thanks chaps, appreciate the input

I've already had my eye on a Vortex T1 style sight - given they have lifetime 'any reason' warranties then I don't have to buy a protector (but I probably would, just to save the inconvenience).  "Red Dot Engineering" on eBay have provided me with protectors for all my sights - except these two - at £10 a pop, and they're really good.

 

I don't think there's any nitrogen in the Kobra, unless it's behind the lens where the laser is, and as for the cheapo sight - if it fogs... 🤷‍♂️
My soldering skills are ummm "limited" shall we say  but maybe I'll be brave and open it up to see if there's something obvious and easy to fix, so I can present it to someone to sort for me.
Usually I'd think of going to a watch repairer for 'fine engineering', but who does precision soldering 'in the real world'?  
 

 

[SSPKali]

I have two Vortex T1 sights (forget the model name!) and the Red Dot Eng protectors - both great bits of kit.

 

TBH if the sight is broken you can't really make it any worse, right? 😆

[Jamsandwich]

I found this video on Youtube when my dot sight started doing the same thing (barely works at all now!), but it's only useful if you can access that part of the sight.  Mine has an AA compartment with no access that I can figure out.

 

Maybe calls for a little possibly-destructive playing about I guess as I'm getting new sights anyway.  The dodgy one is from Nuprol (yes I know now, that's why I started a thread looking for buying advice).

 

 

[RostokMcSpoons]

Thanks @Jamsandwich - I tried it, and really thought for a moment it had worked.   Sadly - nope, not really.    Good shout though!

[Jamsandwich]

Ah well, worth a shot

[Duff Beer]

6 hours ago, RostokMcSpoons said:

I've already had my eye on a Vortex T1 style sight - given they have lifetime 'any reason' warranties then I don't have to buy a protector (but I probably would, just to save the inconvenience).  "Red Dot Engineering" on eBay have provided me with protectors for all my sights - except these two - at £10 a pop, and they're really good.

 

Good shout, I looked at the Vortex as well.  The only reason I went for the 403B over Vortex was the shake to wake because I’m a lazy so-and-so, but both are very good.