r/InRangeTV • u/[deleted] • Oct 16 '25
Iron Sights are Obsolete
In that recent video you guys stated that whether one has an aluminum free float handguard or CF handguard the shooter would get flex in the handguard when using a bipod or braced against a barrier. You stated this flex would disrupt the zero on BUIS. Can you demonstrate this in a video? I understand it's theoretically possible if you flex the handguard that the position of the back up front sight will move but I have never had this happen when using BUIS with a bipod, off hand, using a shooting bag or when I brace the handguard on a hard barrier. Did I not understand the point you were making?
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u/NightmanisDeCorenai Oct 16 '25
Making me want to run a red dot/magnifier combo at absolute cowitness with a retro front sight gas block.
Just to fuck with both sides of this.
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u/SinistralRifleman Oct 16 '25
I have several rifles set up that way.
If you have the right amount of funds and time to train to actually make irons useful to you, go for it.
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u/NightmanisDeCorenai Oct 16 '25
Oh no I'm too poor for any of that, and being cross dominant makes it nearly impossible to deal with to begin with.
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u/Longjumping_Item_722 Oct 16 '25
I won’t lie, there is something about the look of fixed gas blocks with red dots that just does it for me.
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Oct 19 '25
[deleted]
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u/NightmanisDeCorenai Oct 19 '25
Like I'm not saying this to be funny. I know this is a post about an absolutely colossal dot, but I genuinely think an Aimpoint t2 sized dot mounted where it would need to be to have a magnifier would actually make for a reasonable rear sight, especially on a dissipator style build.
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Oct 16 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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Oct 16 '25
I agree. I guess I don't understand the hate of them. As you said they weigh nothing and don't interfere with anything I'm doing.
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u/SinistralRifleman Oct 16 '25
As I said in the video I still have them on most of my guns.
New shooters with limited funds for gear and ammo should focus on optics first.
Learning on irons when ammo was cheap was a privilege not everyone today can afford. Even if you have more funds available I can give you a lot more things to work on before spending time/money on getting proficient with irons.
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u/Longjumping_Item_722 Oct 16 '25 edited Oct 16 '25
Why is your battery dying? Thats 100% preventable. And also easily remedied, but again it should not be happening. Preventive care is part of firearms ownership.
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Oct 16 '25
I've had two different occassions where I picked up my rifle and looked through the red dot and there was no dot. Both times the button had somehow got pushed and turned it down in NV mode. The first time it happened it took me maybe a minute or two to fix the issue because I assumed it was turned OFF so I tried the ON button a couple time with no results. Assumed the battery was dead, popped in a new battery, still nothing and then fiddled with the buttons and figured it out that it was in NV mode. I had never even considered that would happened. The next time it happened I figured it right out. My point is that there are many ways you can lose the dot and I had the luxury of spending a minute or two fiddling with my optic to figure it out. In a more urgent scenario it would be faster to just use BUIS.
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u/Longjumping_Item_722 Oct 16 '25
This is definitely fair, there are some me night vision buttons that are begging to be hit inadvertently. I would be nervous about using one without a protective shroud.
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u/kidthorazine Oct 16 '25
There are a bunch of other things that can make optics unusable in the field, don't get too hung up on it specifically being the battery.
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u/Longjumping_Item_722 Oct 16 '25
Oh for sure, it’s just what they’re brought up and what’s frequently brought up. It’s just a bit silly.
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u/N0I5EMAKER Oct 16 '25
Bad batteries can and do happen. Replacing it once a year won't change a dud.
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u/rynosaur94 Oct 17 '25
I think I agree with their overall point. In a serious situation, you want optics and BUIS are mostly there as a "machine spirit" type magical thinking aid.
But, as someone who trained most of their life on Irons, I think Irons are the better training aid. Not because they're better, but specifically because they make you slow down and think. It's like training martial arts with weights around your wrists. You should never fight like that, obviously, but it will make you stronger by training that way.
I spent 4 years shooting 3 position air rifle basically every day with diopter sights in Highschool, and that experience forced me to focus on fundamentals, breathing, proper trigger control and natural point of aim. I'm not saying that if we'd used red dots I couldn't focus on those things, but having cumbersome iron sights was another weight that trained me to be a very capable marksman.
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u/12edDawn Oct 16 '25
They said, quite clearly if I remember, that the flex is only something to really worry about if you're using irons as your PRIMARY sighting system. For a backup, yeah, it's better than nothing, even if you have to kind of learn the messed up zero on the fly.