How Accurate Is Bore Sighting a Red Dot

Bore sighting comes from the practice of lining up the weapon by looking directly down the bore at the target. Which is mainly designed to increase your accuracy and precision without firing a shot. But it is important to note that it’s not a substitute for zeroing your site.

Though it is observed that bore sighting a red dot can be effective but its point of impact may still need to adjust as the distance of your shooting increases or decreases. In between 25 – 30 yards, you can be perfect with your red dot but experts have accuracy till 100 yards.

Additionally, bore sighting does not take into account other variables like gravity, air resistance, ammunition used, temperature, and wind conditions, which can all affect the point of impact. These limitations can be compensated with some adjustments and your experience of shooting.

The fact is without shooting some rounds you can’t bore sight if you are not that lucky or an expert with red dots, but with MOA adjustment you can be more accurate. Bore sighting is not just for rifles you can use it on a variety of firearms both long and side. 

However, sighting a red dot will save you time and bullet cost and if you are a newbie it’s a great way to start researching your target adjustments. There are different methods and tools to help your sight. You can utilize the best bore sighters in the market to get the job done fast and easily. 

Keep reading to know more about bore sighting a red dot with more accuracy.

Method to bore sight with a red dot? 

Boresight red dots can achieve an accuracy close to zero (0-6 inches) from the bullseye but your shooting experience and understanding of how does a bore sighter works can make it to the bullseye. Although, you can use your sighting tools or other traditional methods.

The traditional method of looking through the bore 

This is an old-school technique for bore sighting. Let’s have a look at how you can do this with your red dot.

1. Remove the bolt or lower receiver from your rifle. 
2. Make your rifle mount to a nice steady surface.
3. Look through the bore and align the center to your distant target.
4. After, you need to look at the target through your red dot and make adjustments to align this with your bore target.

Detail guide to the traditional method

It’s a straightforward process to deal with, you will need only a few minutes to set all these thighs up.

1. Prerequisite: Make sure that your firearm is unloaded and all ammunition is removed.
2. Mount red dot: Once the firearm is unloaded, add the red dot to the firearm and make sure the sight is level and secure it with a proper mounting bolt.
3. Target: Set up the target at least 25 or 30 yards. The more the target distance gets the more the bore sighting accuracy will be.
4. Mount rifle to a still surface: Now you need to mount your firearm to a still surface from where you can adjust your target. You can use sand bad or firearm mounting tools for that. 
5. Look through the bore: After placing the firearm, you need to directly look through the bore and make sure not to move it when you are looking at the target through the bore.
6. Red dot adjustment: Using the adjustment knobs adjust the red dot red point to the target which you look through the bore. 
7. Now you can fire a few rounds: Firing a few rounds is important to achieve 100% accuracy because after firing you will know how to fine-tune to get the bullseye.
8. Red dot fine-tuning: After a few rounds if you are not getting the target then fine-tune the red dot using the windage and elevation screws on the red dot until it is in line with the barrel.

Laser tools

There are different types of bore sighters available in the market, some need to be inserted into the muzzle at the end of the barrel and others are placed in the rifle’s chamber like bullets. Laser bore sights are the same as when you are looking at your target through the bore.

In this case, the bore sight is visible to the target and you just need to match the red dot target to this one. As both the laser and red dot’s target points are the same coloured so you can face problems but to avoid this you can use a green dot sight.

Detail guide to boresight red dot using laser tool

This process is very effective when you are using both laser and red dot for bore sighting.

1. Prerequisite: Make sure that your firearm is unloaded and all ammunition is removed.
2. Mount red dot: Once the firearm is unloaded, add the red dot to the firearm and make sure the sight is level and secure it with a proper mounting bolt.
3. Target: Set up the target at least 25 or 30 yards. The more the target distance gets the more the bore sighting accuracy will be.
4. Mount rifle to a still surface: Now you need to mount your firearm to a still surface from where you can adjust your target. You can use sand bad or firearm mounting tools for that. 
5. Quick measurement: Center of the barrel to center of the scope. Suppose it is 2.5 inches. Now take a piece of paper and make a big dot and measure 2.5 inches from the dot and go down and draw a horizontal line.

1. Then draw two vertical lines on the first line based on the diameter of the big dot like the below image.
2. Set laser tool: Now use a laser round to your barrel and set it to a laser pointer as shown in the image.
3. Red dot adjustment: Now adjust the red dot pointer in the big dot by using the windage and elevator knob.

Benefits 

• It takes a short adjustment time.
• You can get close to zeroing without wasting ammo which also saves you money.

Drawbacks

• Hard to adjust after 100 yards.
• Only effective at close range.

No matter what method you are using to bore sight your red dot, the accuracy improvement will depend on how much time you are giving to alight the bore with the target. A better alignment will always give you a sight close to zero.