Gear Review Sightmark Ultra Shot Reflex Sight

Amazon.com : Sightmark Ultra Shot Reflex Sight : Paintball Sights : Sports & Outdoors

My step son turned me onto the above sight several months back. A number of his fellow LEO's have purchased them and around here they are known as "The Poor man's EOtech".
I ordered the first 2 and mounted then on a pair of m4 kits that I built up for a friend.
Out of the box the unit feels well built. Has a bit of heft, just feels good. After installing the battery I mounted the unit to the upper using the supplied allen wrench that is also used to adjust the windage and elevation.

Turning the unit on you have a choice of five intensity settings, and four reticle choices. Reticle color is RED. Indoors I did notice a bit of distortion when used on the higher settings. Outdoors it wasn't nearly as noticeable. I found that I liked the sight best on the #2 or#3 setting, and at these settings the sight picture was sharp on all of the different reticle settings. It has a good FOV and presents to the eye very well. Both of the weapons these were mounted on are flat tops with no backup sights so they were mounted directly to the receiver. They can be used with spacers to co witness with back up sight systems.
Adjusting the sight is easy, but can be a bit frustrating for someone not used to the sighting in process,mainly because there isn't any 'clicks'. You do not know how far you've moved your setting until you fire the weapon after the adjustment. This wasn't a big deal for me, but I can see how it might be for some folks. I have now installed 12 of these sights on different AR type platforms and the most rounds fired to sight one in was 12, with the least being 6.The average being 9.(I use 3 shot groups per)

I have had very good luck with return zero after removing and reattaching the sight. A couple of them were off approx. 1" from the original zero. These sights appear to hold their zero well after a thousand rounds fired semi auto, and roughly 600 on full auto/3 shot burst. They are not billed as waterproof, but I have taken one out during a downpour and fired 100 rounds with no issues. The sight comes with instructions, battery,soft cloth for cleaning and a neoprene type cover. Sightmark also offers a 3x multiplier that will mate up with this sight for those who may want one although myself I've never been a fan of any multiplier.

Based on my experience thus far I highly recommend this sight, especially for those budget minded folks. Is it an EOtech? Nope, and one shouldn't expect it to be for 80 bucks. But for 80 bucks I challenge you to find a better reflex sight.

Amazon.com: Sightmark Ultra Shot Z-Series Reflex Sight: Sports & Outdoors

The above is basically the same sight as the first except it has a quick release mount and the reticles are GREEN.

 

Battery life on yours above is only 25 - 100 hours (too short and too iffy as to when it will fail for me). Their top of the line at $198 is rated for 1000 hours. jus sayin'
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This one. Scroll down for specs on all models to compare. Amazon.com : Sightmark Ultra Shot M-Spec Reflex Sight : Sports & Outdoors

 

I've installed and zeroed four of them on my ARs. I have an Eotech 512 On my favorite AR which is no better for the price difference IMO. They both do the job. I plan on buying three more. Mine have night vision modes as well.

 

The questions I have about any optic are, is it of going to war or home defense quality, or good enough for the serious hunt, or just for gun games where all you can loose is a few points? All are valid categories but not all are interchangeable. So in which does this optic fit in your opinion? The manufacturer claims all three.

 

If it can be zeroed at 100 yards, removed and replaced, dropped and bumped and still come back on target, I don't know what else there is except battery life and availablity. A thousand hour battery, no battery required or standard AAA battery would be better. The battery type was an issue for me, so I just purchased a lot of them. I also have rechargable LIR2032 I can use.

 

While having worked in semi active combat zones, I have never taken a weapon/optic to war so I can't honestly say on that account. I don't believe the optic to be overly fragile, nor can I truly attest to it's ruggedness having never gone out of my way to abuse it. I'm not one of those folks that like to throw my weapon systems into creeks, off cliffs, drag them behind my truck down a county road just to prove how bad ass they are/were. I take care of my stuff, and in return I expect it to take care of me.

Home Defense:
Does having one mounted to the 10" selective fire entry gun kept beside my bed count?

Not sure what you mean by a serious hunt.
As this family of sights are primarily geared towards Battle Rifle/Assault Rifle type weapons and their civilian counterparts. That being said, I would never take the aforementioned weapons on a "serious" hunt.

Gun Games:
Would not hesitate to use this sight in an IPSC /IDPA type match if that is what you are referring to.

Hope this helps.

 

Let's not forget, too, that they have yet to suffer a class action lawsuit, like EOTech has, with their sights.