Curious as to who, what, and why…
Do you run fixed or folding? Front up, both up, neither up?
Lower 1/3, 50/50, or whatever you feel best fits your face? If shooting from unconventional positions does your preference change?
Folding, both down. Why? Because I’ll never use them except to zero and to practice for the time when I will need them… Which is probably never. But they’re there just in case.
I run the standard fixed fsp with flip up rears on all my guns. These days I usually don’t shoot irons other than at long distances I will flip up the rear and use it as a smaller apature to look at the dot on my rds. ( makes the dot smaller since I have a slight astigmatism).
+1 what he said
The Marine Corps. switched away from BUIS because the ACOG is so darn reliable that it wasn’t cost effective to provide the troops with BUIS.
As for he everyday guy like you and me, it couldn’t hurt to have some BUIS.
Prior to 08, you were issued a carrying handle to act as your back up sights. A4s acquired since than came with a BUIS instead of a carrying handle. Starting around 10-11, we starting buying thousands of KAC 600 BUIS to equip every rifle, carbine and IAR
Fixed front, flipy rear.
My rifle with the T-1 has the standard FSB, and a flipped up Troy rear sight. I always keep it flipped up. Why I do not get a fixed rear, is if I decide to put another optic on it, like my ACOG, or in the event I can get a PVS-14 and want to mount it.
My other rifle with the ACOG has a Fixed DD front sight, and a flipy Troy. You cannot use the iron sights with the ACOG, so they are there just because I left them on there…And in the event my COG goes down I can have them. Though, if my COG did go down I’d surely not be in the mood to keep shooting unless I had to, (class, or defense).
And, in or around '12, “we” stopped buying and issuing them. Good luck finding a rifle with BUIS on them.
I tried several things and developed my own way this weekend training with Kyle Lamb. Yes, apparently an RDS DOES! have paralax, even at 100 yards. Flipping the front BUIS up fixed group shift at 100 for me, and when in roll-over prone, and other positions from behind cover, the front sight provided a way to accurately gauge cant on the fly, as well as providing a “reference” so that I knew I was looking at things correctly shooting support-side, etc. Sometimes you can get so caught up in things that you do stupid crap like look through a left-hand shouldered rifle with the right eye—or try to—etc. FSB up prevents 99% of that monkeybusiness.
Just what I learned. Do what you want.
I run KAC or Matech rear and a KAC or dd fixed front. My primary use with a red dot is similar to what WS6 just mentioned, parallax help with the front when taking shots that are a little more precise.
My main purpose is to assure zero with my red dot optics. Flip the irons up and assure alignment with cowitness. If it’s off, I know something is wrong with my zero. If not, I know I’m good to go. DocGKR turned me on to that one a good while back.
The contract was filled after we bought more sights than we have rifles and carbines.
Poor until level accountability (probably half of them have been sold on ebay and the gun boards) does not really change the fact that USMC policy is ever rifle and carbine is to have a BUIS
Not that its worth a whole lot, but I have seen so many pictures of Marines with AOCGs and no BUIS that I was starting to wonder…
Fixed D&Ds on my 14.5 with a T1 micro. Primarily for the simplicity and ruggedness of the fixed setup but also because of the added benefit the smaller aperture gives with respect to sharpening my sight picture for lobger shots.
Troy folding battle sights - rear down. I run my optics as an absolute co-witness, so if it fails, flip up the rear, and the sight plane remains the same.
Up until 08 there was no program of record for BUISs in the Marines and it was up to units. From 08 on they were a system push item and we have bought more of them than we have weapons to put them on.
But most Marines did not even know what a BUIS was and it was assumed that since they got iron sight training at Boot or TBS they did not need BUIS specific training; zeroing and usage of a BUIS was added to doctrine just last year.
Didn’t learn this from Kyle but this is exactly why I switched to a fixed front sight a while back. Having that reference point in akward positions being my biggest reason. Good post WS6.
-Jax
Front is fixed standard sight post and rear is a Troy battle sight I keep down. I run a Pro on my 6920.
with a RDS, fixed front and fixed rear if lower 1/3. folding rear if absolute cowitness.
folding f and r with magnified optics…
I currently use:
[ul]
[li]Folding front and rear; lower 1/3 co-witness, sights down unless I’m practicing or optic fails.
[/li][li]Fixed front and folding rear; rear down unless practicing or optic fails.
[/li][li]Two with fixed front and rear; lower 1/3 co-witness.
[/li][/ul]
I’d say my preference is now leaning to fixed sights. It allows for faster transition, in my opinion, IF my optics ever fail. In fact, I just sold the old Aimpoint off of my 10.5" SBR and am now just rocking the fixed sights (until I save up enough pennies for a T-1).
Depends totally on the specific weapon and its role. But I use nothing that flips up on the front sight ever.