Laser bore sights

[norcal77]

The SL500 by laserlyte is the best one and works great but using the bore at 25 is just the same if you can do that with your setup. I disagree they’re worthless, they have their uses. You can also align your external light/laser to the bore so your ccw can be point n shoot.

[IVC]

I have an older Site Lite SL-100 with rubber bands that go on top of three different size bases that screw into the bottom of the device to keep it collimated with the bore.

It's a great tool to get the initial shots on paper. You can get windage sorted out almost perfectly, but the elevation will be off for rifles. You're bore-sighting at close distances, so you have to eyeball the theoretical offset at that distance for that caliber/load. However, it *will* get you on paper when you do the actual live fire, which is all that you really need.

If you understand that the bore-sighter is a tool to get you close-enough so your shots are on paper, and not a tool to sight your gun, you'll be very happy with using one and it will save you a lot of time.

[IVC]

I personally find that aligning the bore to a target and moving the sights/scope to that point is as, or more, accurate than the common (read "inexpensive to moderately expensive") boresighters.

Doesn't work with pistols. And getting red dots to match the laser at 15 yards at home before going to the range saves a lot of time.

[IVC]

A buddy picked one up for a new rifle... He could not see it at 100 yards...

It's not supposed to work that way. You bore-sight with a laser before you go to the range to get it in the ballpark. Laser bore-sighting is supposed to be at a close range, unless I'm doing it all wrong...

[SkyHawk]

I have tested some cheaper universal ones that stick in the muzzle end, and the run-out is pretty bad. You can usually tweak them though, but you have to be very careful handling them after that.

Grab one of the cheapies, chuck it in a good drill on a stable surface and let the drill show you the run-out at 10 or 20 yards - you might be very surprised at how large a circle it draws on a wall. And that means it isn't pointing straight or anywhere near it.

So IMO, get a good one - or get the kind that go in the chamber if it is a smaller caliber and you have a longish barrel, because at least then you know that if the light makes it out of the muzzle clean it is close enough to get you on paper.

[LAKA90034]

The cheap, caliber specific ones from Amazon have been good for getting on paper easily at 25yds.

[Vinnie Boombatz]

I have a cheap $35-$40 green laser boresighter I bought from Brownells a little while back and it's been great. Used it for a few handguns after installing new sights on a few Glocks and to dial in the rear target sight on a Springfield Loaded 1911. Dead-nuts accurate. Also used it to rough in the iron sights and red dot on an AR15 before taking it to the range to zero and it was very close.

Many seem to poo-poo laser boresighters, but maybe they're using them incorrectly or maybe I've just been lucky with the one I have. They aren't the be-all, end-all, but they get you close and cal save you ammo. Also allows you to dial in handguns at home most of the time, and all I've needed to do was confirm with a few shots. The Springfield 1911 I mentioned above had the rear target sight all out of each when I bought it. Used the laser boresight at home to dial it in (the rear sight needed a LOT of adjustment). Took it to the range and ripped a ragged hole.

[theLBC]

i have had one of these for many years and it has worked on several calibers and even a shotgun to get the optic close enough, even inside the house (putting the zero at scope height above the bore/laser), to get on paper.
of course your muzzle has to be perfectly square, but it even worked on a muzzle brake.

[subscriber]

Laser bore sighters are a solution to a non-existent problem:

Place a 2 foot square carboard box at 25 yards. aim for the center of the box with the sights at mechanical zero. Shoot with box against or in front of a decent backstop. Zero the sights at 25 yards.

Move the box to 100 yards and shoot another group. Zero the sights. You are done.

Unless you want a 200 yard zero; in which case you place your target at 200 yards and zero there.

Due to barrel flex, bore sighting with a laser sighter is not any better than removing the bolt and looking through the barrel, and setting the sights to match.

By placing a substantial target at 25 yards to start, you are not going to miss it. You should be able to hit that, shooting a rifle by pointing it like a shotgun... All you need to ensure is that you are on paper when you shoot at 100 yards. You achieve that with the 25 yard zero.

[SharedShots]

I use Site Lite SL500 Boresighter and have had good success with it. I bought it at Black Friday when Cabela's had a sale on it with another 10% off sale, stacked on a 12% cash back on ActiveJunky. I even used discounted gift cards to buy it.

Anyway, the green laser is strong enough to use in daytime up to 50 yd and in the afternoon twilight, up to 150 yd (wonder what the neighbor must be thinking seeing the green laser dot on his wall.) It gets you close enough to zero so it saves you ammo.

The only downside is that you have to take off the muzzle device to zero because the device needs to sit directly on the barrel crown.

Don't be this guy.^

Who do people do such things? You are one phone call away from the police/sheriff paying you a visit with a complaint you were pointing a gun in a threatening manner at someone or someone's home and that would be well deserved. This is one reason we can't have nice things.

That s about as careless as it gets. It might be one thing to look through a scope from inside a room outwards but quite a another to advertise you are pointing guns at other peoples homes. What possesses someone to do such a thing? If you're careless enough to do that anyone would be right to think you're careless enough to accidentally load up and squeeze off a round too.

"417.25 PC states that “(a) Every person who, except in self-defense, aims or points a laser scope, as defined in subdivision (b), or a laser pointer, as defined in subdivision (c), at another person in a threatening manner with the specific intent to cause a reasonable person fear of bodily harm is guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by imprisonment in a county jail for up to 30 days. For purposes of this section, the laser scope need not be attached to a firearm.

(b) As used in this section, “laser scope” means a portable battery-powered device capable of being attached to a firearm and capable of projecting a laser light on objects at a distance.

(c) As used in this section, “laser pointer” means any hand held laser beam device or demonstration laser product that emits a single point of light amplified by the stimulated emission of radiation that is visible to the human eye."

So let me ask, if you are outside and see a laser hitting your house you think what?:

1. Its just kids playing around.
2. Its an idiot with a gun pointed at me or my home.
3. Aliens.

And then what happens if someone calls the cops and they show up at YOUR house asking if you've been pointing a gun and laser at your neighbors house? They will not need a warrant and they will find your gun and laser and then you will go to find yourself with a real big problem.

Now going down the road of this, what do you think someone who knows anything about guns and laser would think if they saw the laser strike and then followed that nice green beam back to your position and saw you pointing a rifle at them?

What would you do if someone pointed a rifle at you? Laugh it off?

[subscriber]

SharedShots,

You have a point, but the OP would wait until he is at a range before he uses the laser bore sighter.

That said, laser sighters are a waste of money; and not nearly as useful as they sound. Not when there are simple free alternatives that are proven to work.

[tabascoz28]

Probably needed now as ammo prices are astronomical. But I have the sightmark with a magnetic base which needs a flat muzzle. Gets you close on your first shot. If your scope is perfect just make a vertical and horizontal correction and verify. Do it at 25, 50 then 100. Works on multiple rifles not just one caliber.

[CSACANNONEER]

Why would anyone WASTE money on a laser boresighter? IT's far to simple to use the one shot zero method to zero any optics at any distance with one shot. In reality, I use this method and take a grand total of 3 shots. The first gets me in the black, the second fine tunes and the final shot confirms it's zeroed. Of course, if you use your eye to bore sight and know how much vertical adjustment you need for your desired distance, it can easily be done with two shots with the second shot confirming zero. This works for any firearm chambered for any cartridge at any distance.

[SharedShots]

SharedShots,

You have a point, but the OP would wait until he is at a range before he uses the laser bore sighter.

That said, laser sighters are a waste of money; and not nearly as useful as they sound. Not when there are simple free alternatives that are proven to work.

Yup, just pointing out that using someone else's house wall as the target for a laser boresighter is about as irresponsible as it gets, as if as gun owners we aren't already surrounded by people just waiting to make a 9-1-1 call - see the man pointing a gun at his neighbors house.


I use lasers to sight but use them differently than perhaps most others. Instead of using it as a boresighter I have one that mounts to a rail or small PIC section. When the rifle is zeroed I then QD mount the laser and align the laser strike to the actual zero. Since my scopes all return to zero after taking them off and remounting them I can easily verify that condition by just mounting the laser and insuring that the stroke and scope both agree. Since they are different mounts both would have to be off to be unreliable.

I've been able to swap one scope between rifles that other than cartridge are the same model - for me that is 22 Mag and 17 HMR. For me its been 100% reliable and perfectly accurate. I can use that one scope, take it off the 17 and mount it to the 22Mag and that first shot is good if I do my part. While it might not work for cartridges that have very different ballistics where you might need so much adjustment the scope can't handle it I've found that it's not usually the case.

The laser isn't the typical boresighter type but rather a tube type that fits scope rings. It only works if you have the known distance to verify everything though but with a distance marker its pretty easy.

I swap scopes around between same model different cartridge rifles enough that re-zeroing even with the one-to shot technique is more of a hassle. I also don't want to buy lots of scopes and prefer to use higher quality items and then have multiple uses for them.

[IVC]

Place a 2 foot square carboard box at 25 yards. aim for the center of the box with the sights at mechanical zero. Shoot with box against or in front of a decent backstop. Zero the sights at 25 yards.

Some ranges have minimum distance for rifle targets, some ranges don't allow arbitrary size of the target so you start with a small paper target at 50 yards.

Move the box to 100 yards and shoot another group. Zero the sights. You are done.

You get to this step either by what you suggested above, or by bore-sighting. Both serve the same purpose - to get you on paper at the distance at which you want to sight-in your rifle. I would also argue that bore-sighting is faster and more convenient than what you're doing since it can be done at home.

Due to barrel flex, bore sighting with a laser sighter is not any better than removing the bolt and looking through the barrel, and setting the sights to match.

Again, not all guns allow this method. And you need a solid support so the setup doesn't move as you switch between bore and the sights. Laser does the same thing, just faster.

It's okay to do it your way if you don't shoot handguns and only have rifles that allow you to look through the bore, you have a solid rest setup that will allow you to switch between scope and bore, you can put any size target at any distance and you don't mind tinkering with different distances as you sight-in the rifle.

It's also okay to use a shortcut that allows you to get on paper with much less tinkering, with any gun regardless of the ability to pull out the bolt (or separate upper from lower), without having to go to a remote area where you make your own rules about distances and targets...

I'd say that it's different strokes for different folks, not a gimmick for non-existent problem.